Participants may use the week to write about their unfolding experiences in southern France or they may use the workshop, and the invigoration of a new setting, as an opportunity to plunge into new material or to hone writing already underway. Those writing travel pieces, memoir, personal essay, or literary journalism are all welcome.
Each morning, participants will come together for a writing workshop during which they will discuss one another's work, and engage in writing exercises. The main focus will be on looking at how participants' pieces are developing on the page and how they may fulfill their promise. Discussions will be directed to touch on the many elements of craft that make for lively literary nonfiction writing, including: concrete detail and use of the senses; figurative language; characterization and dialogue; voice; structure and plot; balance of scene, summary, and musing; sense of time and place; use of observation and interviews; and incorporation of historical, political, and factual information.
At the close of each day's class, the instructor will suggest an optional writing exercise, designed to awaken the writer to the surrounding French world, that may be undertaken during the afternoon. In addition to group discussions and exercises, participants will have the opportunity to meet one-to-one with the instructor.
Throughout the week, the instructor will cultivate a safe, yet adventurous atmosphere, one that offers a jump start for beginners and stimulation and fellowship for more seasoned writers.
In this lovely, tonic setting away from home, participants will sharpen and refine the skills to make their writing come "miraculously alive." Beholding the glorious vistas and feasting on the famous pruneaux and foie gras of Gascony, they will discover, as well, their senses quickened and perspectives refreshed.
There is one partial work-study scholarship available for this workshop. Click here for more information and application guidelines.
 Sara Taber is the author of Bread of Three Rivers: The Story of a French Loaf, a book about the work and lives of the baker, the wheat farmer, the miller, and the other artisans whose work goes into a French village loaf. She has also published Dusk on the Campo: A Journey in Patagonia, and Of Many Lands: Journal of a Traveling Childhood. Her travel pieces, essays and memoirs have been published in literary journals and newspapers such as Southwest Review and The Washington Post, and produced for public radio. She was a William B. Sloane Nonfiction Fellow of the Breadloaf Writer's Conference, and has been awarded residencies at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. A long-time instructor at the Bethesda, Maryland, Writer's Center, she also teaches at Washington D.C.-area universities and offers seminars both in the U.S. and Europe.
"[T]he printed page alone will evoke the crackling noises and the toasty aroma of cooling loaves in Jean-Claude Choquet's boulangerie." -The Boston Globe
"Bread of Three Rivers . . . is a work dripping with charm and more importantly is a homage to artisan French baking and the culture that sustains it." - Slow Food
Above photo of boat by Karen Bell
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