Many Americans such as Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, James Baldwin, and F. Scott Fitzgerald found writing in a foreign setting to be more inspiring and they produced their best work that way. Being in a new setting, in a foreign country, away from familiar surroundings, will help us gain new and more astute perceptions of what we are creating and insights into the characters and settings we are writing about. The workshop will emphasize how to go about creating complex, real people within the context of plot, dialogue, viewpoint, voice. Morning class sessions will be devoted mainly to participants' work—short stories or chapters of novels, novellas, or personal memoirs—which will be read and commented upon. Constructive criticism will identify strengths as well as weaknesses and suggestions will be made for improvement. The class will also touch on the publishing aspect of writing: how to go about getting an agent, writing a cover letter, what to expect from the publishing world today. Individual conferences with the instructor may be arranged by request. This is Ms. Rachlin's debut international writing workshop.

ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR
Nahid Rachlin's long-awaited memoir, Persian Girls (Penguin), has drawn rave reviews from numerous publications including Publishers Weekly, the Boston Globe and the Washington Post. She is the author of four novels, Jumping Over Fire (City Lights), Foreigner (W.W. Norton), Married to a Stranger (E.P.Dutton), The Hearts Desire (City Lights), and a short story collection, Veils (City Lights). Her individual stories have appeared in magazines, including Shenandoah, Redbook, Confrontation, Literary Review, Columbia Magazine and have been reprinted in anthologies. She has written book reviews for the The New York Times Book Review and Newsday. Nahid is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts grant, a Wallace Stegner Fellowship from Stanford University, and a PEN Syndicated Fiction Project award. She teaches fiction at the New Poetry Center of 92nd Street Y and the New School University.

Work-study Scholarship
There is one partial work-study scholarship available for this workshop. Click here for more information and application guidelines.

PRAISE FOr nahid rachlin
About Foreigner :... I have read (this book) four times by now, and each time I have discovered new layers in it. The voice is cool and pure. Bleak is the right word, if you will understand that bleakness can have a startling beauty." -Anne Tyler, New York Times Book Review

About Jumping Over Fire:"...If... we are our desire, then who are we if the object of our desire is forbidden? What becomes of us if we are born in one world yet long for another? These are just two of the complex and difficult questions Nahid Rachlin explores and ultimately illuminates in this brave, engrossing, and timely novel..."     -Andre Dubus III, author of House of Sand and Fog

Persian Girls was Selected by Christopher Merrill, the Director of the Univeristy of Iowa's International Writing Program as one of the best four books of 2006: "Her portrait of the artist in an Islamic country on the verge of dramatic change is filled with light."

Bridge photo above by Karen Bell