Word festival writing workshops are open to participants of various skill levels and are taught by celebrated writers in a range of genres. With the exception of youth events, workshops are either two or three hours long and require registration and payment in advance. Most two-hour classes are $25 and three-hour sessions are $35. Payment is non-refundable. Workshop fees are kept low with a grant from the Maine Arts Council.
Through conversation and exercises, Richard Blanco will take workshop participants on a deep dive into the golden rule of writing poetry, “show don’t tell.”
Fanfiction can give you unique tools to tackle characterization, voice, perspective, structure, tone, and more. This workshop is designed for writers and editors of all backgrounds, from those who know nothing about fanfiction to people who read and write fic every day.
Using a range of diverse materials and mediums, bookmaking explores the intersection of paperfolding, narrative, and visual design. Artists as young and as old as they come are welcome to participate
Choose a character from an array of photos provided (a teenager? An old curmudgeon? An unhappy fairy?), and spend 45 minutes getting to know him or her through lightning-fast writing prompts. Maybe you’ll go home with a story to write!
Children ages 5-9 are invited to come to a writing/drawing mini-workshop offering 45 minutes of drawing and idea-catching, with a peek into the process behind book making.
Why do you want to write a memoir? What has made it important, what’s making it urgent, to bring your past into the present? In this workshop we’ll discuss inspiration, process, points of view, dealing with resistance, using all the senses in writing, using research.
Fear, procrastination, not knowing what direction to take, all contribute to our inability to get on with our writing. Sometimes it feels impossible to write that first sentence. Sometimes we’re at the climax and aren’t sure how to proceed. This workshop will touch on methods to get you writing again.
Longtime friends and collaborators, Stookey and Emlen will offer songwriting techniques to aspiring songwriters of all levels and genres, both in a group setting and one-on-one.
