Jump to navigation Skip to content
“My desire to be a writer was entirely to do with the love of the power of the imagination, imagining worlds, creating worlds for readers to inhabit.” In this 60 Minutes video, Salman Rushdie speaks about the dangers of censorship, how he would like to be remembered, and what inspires him to keep writing.
In a 1789 letter, Benjamin Franklin wrote the phrase, “in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” Franklin was reflecting on the establishment of the U.S. Constitution, which he said promised to be durable, as well as his own ailing health and mortality. This week write a personal essay that riffs off this proverb, reflecting on your own worldview about what can be certain. You might start off with the prompt: “In this world, nothing can be said to be certain, except death, taxes, and ______.” Tell the story of how you arrived at your own ideas about what you can always count on, whether good or bad. What past experiences, encounters, or memories seem to reinforce your belief?
The Summer 2024 Sonoma County Writers Camp was held from July 24 to July 28 at the Ratna Ling Retreat Center in Cazadero, California. The retreat featured generative workshops in fiction and creative nonfiction, panels by authors and agents, master classes, meditative dream writing, and student readings. The faculty included fiction writer Ellen Sussman and fiction and nonfiction writer Elizabeth Stark. The cost of the retreat, which included all meals, lodging in a single-occupancy room, and activities, was $2,495. Registration was first come, first served.
Sonoma County Writers Camp, 1993 Burnside Road, Sebastopol, CA 95472. Ellen Sussman, Cofounder and Codirector.
The Ragdale Foundation offers residencies of 18 days year-round to poets, fiction writers, and creative nonfiction writers on 38 acres of prairie in Lake Forest, Illinois, 30 miles north of Chicago. Residents are provided with a private room and bathroom, a shared kitchen, and meals. The cost of the residency ranges from $630 to $4,500 on an income-based sliding scale. A limited number of fully funded fellowships with stipends of $1,000 or more were available.
Ragdale, 1260 North Green Bay Road, Lake Forest, IL 60045. (847) 234-1063, ext. 23. Deanna Miera, Residency Manager.
The Fiction Meets Science Residency offers up to two residencies of three to ten months annually to fiction and nonfiction writers at the Hanse-Wissenschaftskolleg Institute for Advanced Study in Delmenhorst, Germany. Residents are provided with a private apartment and office space at the institute, where they will connect with an international community of guest scientists. Residents are expected to give one lecture or reading and to attend the weekly lectures given by the scientist fellows at the institute.
Fiction Meets Science Residency, Hanse-Wissenschaftskolleg, Lehmkuhlenbusch 4, 27753 Delmenhorst, Germany. Susan M. Gaines, Project Director.
