Alumni Conference Begins

From Peter Klank (fiction, ’85):

The Annual Goddard/Warren Wilson Post-MFA Writing Conference got underway on Sunday with a reception, dinner, and evening readings that began with a 1978 Goddard graduate and proceeded on into the 21st century. We’re moving on to classes, panels, and caucuses (and readings every evening, of course), as well as poetry and fiction workshops, two Manuscript Reviews (groups of three each who for well over a month have been reading and considering one another’s book-length poetry collections, and who will be meeting each morning for two hours for the next week to discuss responses to and considerations of same), and a Fiction Roundtable (ditto, for book-length fiction). As well as classes on craft and teaching, we’re having one each on e-publishing, self-publishing, and the state of the print publishing world. The food, believe it or not, is good, we’ll have another reception when the short-stayers arrive Wednesday and, of course, a dance on Saturday night in Mt. Holyoke College’s Student Center, where we’ll have access to a top-flight sound system. (And we have several accomplished musicians amongst us who aren’t going to get out of here without providing at least a performance or two.) There’s a great indie bookstore and a gourmet deli just across the street and, rumor has it, three restaurant/taverns as well. It was hot as hell and then rained like hell, and everyone is delighted and excited and relieved to be here.