MFA Residency Public Lecture and Reading Schedule for Friday, January 11th

Friday, January 11th     

Readings and lectures are held in the Region Room of Blue Ridge Center at Blue Ridge Assembly. 84 Blue Ridge Circle; Black Mountain, NC 

Faculty Lectures        

10:45 AM

ALAN SHAPIRO – Mark Twain and the Ambiguities of Expertise

As teachers and writers, we often talk about the creative process in contradictory ways: on the one hand we celebrate the importance of craft, which is to say, of knowing what we’re up to when we write; on the other hand, we say that at our best we write by instinct, intuition, hunch—we try not to know too completely why we do what we do. We advocate for expertise and we distrust it. In this lecture we’ll look at Life on the Mississippito see what Mark Twain’s description of his training to pilot a steamboat can tell us about these inherent and inescapable tensions between will and inspiration, calculation and intuition when it comes to writing poems and stories.

READINGS by GRADUATING STUDENTS

Sarah Audsley

Michael Feigin

Jodie Free

Sonja Srinivasan

Kelsy Yates

The public is welcome to attend the morning lectures and evening readings in fiction and poetry offered during the Master of Fine Arts Program winter residency.  Events last approximately one hour. Admission is free. The schedule is subject to change. PLEASE NOTE: The winter residency is being held at Blue Ridge Assemblyin Black Mountain, NC, not on the Warren Wilson College campus.

For more information, call the MFA Office: (828) 771-371