Advice for Writers: Christian Teresi

Saturday, February 1, 2014

AWP Seattle 2014: A Preview

New this year at the conference of the Associated Writers and Writing Programs (AWP) is a full schedule of events on Saturday. In the past, Saturdays at AWP have mostly been for winding down, packing up, and saying goodbye to friends. No more. This year, Saturday is jammed with events, including readings in the evening by poets Sharon Olds and Jane Hirshfield, as well as by prose writers Sherman Alexie and Timothy Egan. If you haven’t already made your travel plans, try to stay at least till Sunday morning, so you can catch all the Saturday activity.

AWP is rightfully proud of this year’s line-up. According to AWP Director of Conferences Christian Teresi, “I’m really excited about the programming this year. I think this is arguably the best overall slate of events we’ve ever had.”

AWP has also added a number of services to make things easier for conference attendees. There are maps of the venues, bookfair, and downtown Seattle on the main conference webpage: https://www.awpwriter.org/awp_conference/overview

“Attendees are also now able to personalize the online schedule,” Teresi notes. Instructions can be found on the main schedule page: https://www.awpwriter.org/awp_conference/schedule_overview

This year, registration will not be closing between the end of preregistration and onsite registration. There is a new will-call registration system that hopefully will bypass the long lines. “As always, we encourage attendees who have not registered to do so now, as using the will-call system will be faster than registering onsite,” adds Teresi.

Some of my favorite writers will be attending AWP. Each day of the conference I’ll be posting highlights that I find interesting. Look for events with these writers:

Kim Addonizio

Anita Amirrezvani

Richard Blanco

Catherine Brady

Mark Doty

Cornelius Eady

Nick Flynn

Thaisa Frank

Robert Hass

Ernestine Hayes

Tyehimba Jess

Charles Johnson

Phillip Lopate

Nancy Lord

Bobbie Ann Mason
C.M. Mayo

Robert Pinsky
Eva Saulitis

Patricia Smith

Gary Snyder

Carla Trujillo

David Wojahn

Sholeh Wolpe

Matthew Zapruder

“Seattle is a great city with great facilities, and we’re really looking forward to hosting the conference there,” Teresi sums up.

Other posts on the AWP conference:

Don't Avoid the Bookfair

Zack Rogow will be chairing two panels at the AWP conference in Seattle on Thursday, February 27: Is Poetry Ready for Prime Time? with Cornelius Eady, Kim Addonizio, and Toby Barlow, from 10:30 to 11:45 a.m.; and Homesteading on the Digital Frontier: Writers' Blogs, with Mark Doty, C.M. Mayo, and Charles Johnson, from 4:30 to 5:45 p.m.

Other recent posts about writing topics:
How to Get Published: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4
Getting the Most from Your Writing Workshop: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7
How Not to Become a Literary Dropout, Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10
Putting Together a Book Manuscript, Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7
Working with a Writing Mentor: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5
Does the Muse Have a Cell Phone?: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5
How to Deliver Your Message: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6
Why Write Poetry? Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4
Using Poetic Forms, Part 1: Introduction; Part 2: The Sonnet; Part 3, The Sestina;
Part 4, The Ghazal; Part 5, The Tanka

Thursday, February 2, 2012

Tips for the AWP Conference, Part 1

The annual conference of the Associated Writers and Writing Programs (AWP) is an amazing event that brings together many thousands of writers, publishers, and creative writing instructors in one place for four days. It’s the largest gathering of its kind in North America.

The AWP conference has an interesting history. According to Christian Teresi, AWP’s former director of conferences, “The first conference was in 1972 at the Library of Congress, and hosted only six events. It’s safe to say there were at most a couple of hundred people there.” Growth was slow during the early years. “I can tell you that at the 1991 conference in Miami there were only around 16 events and 40 presenters,” Teresi recounted. Since then, the increase in the number of participants and programs has been nothing short of astronomical. “By 2012 we already had over 400 events and 1600 presenters.”

The AWP conference is now as over-stimulating as seven marching bands all doing their routines at once on the same football field. You get to hear great or disappointing readings by writers you admire, have chance encounters in glass elevators with people you never wanted to see again, discover writers you’re delighted to learn about, get headaches, wolf down overpriced food, buy more books than you planned, make embarrassing faux pas, and maybe reach a few people with your work who didn’t know your writing beforehand.

Is it worth it? Absolutely. It’s a unique and amazing opportunity to have that many literary people and institutions in one place at one time. You get to hear some of your literary heroes. You have the chance to meet the editors of your favorite magazines and presses, and to find out about ones you never knew existed.

But I find that it’s much more productive to go to AWP if you have a clear goal in mind.

Think about what your current needs are as a writer. Do you have several pieces you’re ready to send to magazines? Have you got a manuscript for a new book that you’re hoping to find a publisher for? Do you have a new book just published that you want to publicize? Are you looking for a job or internship with a literary organization? Do you want to get re-energized to go home and write? Pick a goal and stick to it.

_________________________________

Zack’s new book of poetry, The Kama Sutra for Senior Citizens and Other Poems on Aging. Order in the USA Order in the UK

Zack’s most recent translation: The Water Drinkers and Other Sketches of Paris in the Romantic Era by Henry Murger