Sunday, May 03, 2009

Manuscript Critique Auction and Post-Grad Writers Conference

Two exciting goings on from Vermont College of Fine Arts! The first from Miciah Gault, the editor of our literary magazine, Hunger Mountain:

Please join us for the Hunger Mountain Spring Fundraising Auction, featuring manuscript critiques with notable authors and agents, and limited edition letterpress broadsides. All items will be available at: http://stores.shop.ebay.com/thehungermountainstore beginning at noon EST on May 2nd. Bidding ends at noon EST on Saturday, May 9th. One-on-one critiques in poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, writing for children, and writing for the stage will be conducted by phone, email or mail. This is a great way to study with a writer you admire and support non-profit literary publishing!

Not only are we offering an opportunity to work with authors such as Michael Martone, David Jauss, David Wojahn, Donna Jo Napoli and Tim Wynne-Jones, we also have a full-length children’s/YA fiction critique donated by literary agent Mark McVeigh, founding member of the McVeigh Agency, as well as a middle grade/YA critique offered by Tracy Marchini, agent assistant at Curtis Brown, Ltd. Picture book authors and illustrators Laura McGee Kvasnosky and Marion Dane Bauer will also be offering their expertise. Been toiling away on a script or stage production? Bid on a full-length play critique with playwright Gary Moore. Sue William Silverman is offering a full-length creative nonfiction manuscript critique, complete with a complimentary signed copy of her latest book Fearless Confessions: A Writer’s Guide to Memoir.

Other authors offering critiques in the auction include Philip Graham, Jess Row, Thomas Christopher Greene, Natasha Saje, Xu Xi, along with children’s and young adult authors Sarah Ellis, Martine Leavitt, and more. Also available are signed broadsides from the Stinehour Broadside Award Series including work by authors Alice Hoffman, Neil Shepard, and David Rivard and Lucia Perillo. These letterpress broadsides are all signed and numbered, limited edition, and frame worthy, making them the perfect gift for anyone who appreciates the artistry of literature! All purchases are charitable in support of Hunger Mountain's non-profit mission to cultivate engagement with and conversation about the arts by publishing high-quality, innovative literary and visual art by both established and emerging artists, and by offering opportunities for interactivity and discourse.

The link is: http://stores.shop.ebay.com/thehungermountainstore

The second announcement is from author and faculty member Ellen Lesser about the Post-Graduate Writers Conference coming up this August. And of particularly interest to me, for the first time there is a track for young adult authors led by award-winning authors An Na and Kathi Appelt.


Postgraduate Writers' Conference
Fourteenth Annual EventAugust 11-17, 2009

Vermont College of Fine Arts, home of the nationally acclaimed MFA in Writing and Writing for Children and Young Adult Programs, has since 1996 offered a summer conference dedicated to advanced writers seeking to recharge, reconnect, and nourish their creative development.

The Postgraduate Conference is open to all experienced writers, with graduate degrees or equivalent backgrounds. We emphasize process and craft through our unique structure based on intimate workshops limited to 5-7 participants, and including individual consultations with faculty, readings by faculty and participants, issues forums and master classes—all in a lively, supportive community of writers who share meals, ideas, and social activities in scenic Vermont.

The historic campus of Vermont College of Fine Arts is host to the annual gathering. Along with the rich menu of Conference events, participants enjoy the amenities of downtown Montpelier—the nation’s smallest and arguably most charming state capitol—just a few minutes’ walk from the College, as well as the beauty and recreational opportunities of the surrounding countryside and Green Mountains.

The Conference features prose workshops in novel, short story and creative nonfiction. In poetry, we offer regular workshops as well as ones focusing on book manuscripts. New for 2009, we have added two workshops in writing for young adults, and look forward to an exciting cross-fertilization with the other genres.

Our award-winning faculty for summer, 2009 are: Carol Anshaw and Clint McCown in Novel; Ellen Lesser and Michael Martone in Short Story; Lee Martin and Sue William Silverman in Creative Nonfiction; Nancy Eimers, Cleopatra Mathis and William Olsen in Poetry; Robin Behn, Major Jackson and Charles Harper Webb in Poetry Manuscript; and Kathi Appelt and An Na in Young Adult. Click “Faculty” below for biographical notes on these outstanding author-teachers.

Contact Ellen Lesser, Conference Director, with any questions, and to chat about how our program can serve you, at (802) 828-8835 or mailto:pgconference@vermontcollege.edu

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