the where of it

writing at ghost ranch

• Posted by Summer Wood on March 2nd, 2009 filed in craft of writing, places
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As much as I love my home place, getting away from it once in a while can give me the jolt I need to break through in my writing.  Being in a new landscape, learning firsthand about the history of an unusual place, can inspire a renewed connection to the landscapes of my fiction.

When I land in a new place on a trip whose chief purpose is to take time specifically to focus on my writing – well, that’s twice as powerful.

The summer before last, I had the chance to attend a writing retreat at Ghost Ranch.  The arid landscape, a 21,000 acre property maintained as a spiritual and educational retreat center, was immortalized in many of Georgia O’Keefe’s paintings.  It was kind of strange to look out on vistas new to my experience but vivid in my visual memory.  (An aside:  I remember seeing the Notre Dame for the first time and thinking:  Look!  Just like the photographs!  Weird.)  But it was extraordinary to pass five days immersed in that landscape and watch the light play over the odd and sometimes eerie rock formations.  It renewed in me a habit of seeing; an active, engaged participation in place, and I took that home with me to my novel, set in an equally gorgeous, odd, sometimes eerie stretch of wild California.

Being in so spectacular a landscape was an added bonus to the rich rewards of the retreat, offered by A Room of Her Own Foundation.  I went as a “free agent”, but those writers who participated in the intensive workshops raved about the quality of the teachers and of their fellow participants.  Ellen McLaughlin, Meredith Hall and others were devoted to providing their students with an unforgettable experience.  I spent an intimate afternoon with a few dozen other writers listening to Leslie Marmon Silko talk about the writer’s life.  Even the food wasn’t bad, and the rustic accommodations put us all in touch with the profound, starry silence of the New Mexico night.

This summer AROHO is doing it again.  Former U.S. Poet Laureate Rita Dove will make a special appearance, and workshops led by Meredith, Ellen, Dana Levin, Pamela Painter and Laura Fraser will run the gamut from poetry to fiction to memoir and more.  I’ll be there to work one-on-one with participants who’d like to consult on their writing plans and progress.  Even if you don’t attend a workshop, retreat participants are invited to attend panel discussions and the like with agents, editors, publishers and performers.  There are a limited number of scholarships available to offset the cost of attending (which is fairly reasonable, considering the skyrocketing cost of other summer writers’ conferences) – but you’ve got to get your application in by March 15.  Check out the website for more info, or email retreats@aroomofherownfoundation.org.  That will put you in touch with Kim Ponders, the retreat director and an astonishing novelist in her own right.

The one hitch?  This retreat is for women only.  Later this week I’ll talk about a terrific writers’ conference in Taos, New Mexico, that includes men as well.  I’m teaching at that one, and am wildly excited to work there with writers who’d like to delve more deeply into place in their work.