A Blog of Seattle Arts & Lectures
Many of us are searching for something we can hold onto right now. A sense of normality, the absence of fear, a story to escape in—a feeling that will extend us past our limitations, and past this seemingly never-ending month of physical distancing. As readers, we know we can find such a haven in the […]
Every year, Seattle Arts & Lectures’ Writers in the Schools (WITS) program holds the Elaine Wetterauer Writing Contest to celebrate the wisdom, creativity, and heart captured in student and teacher writing. The inspiration from this year’s contest was drawn from Pachinko by Min Jin Lee, an epic historical novel that follows a Korean family over the […]
Do you have a middle or high-schooler at home looking for learning opportunities? Or, maybe you’d like some inspiration for yourself? Today’s #SALMoment comes from WITS Writer-in-Residence Laura Da’, who shares a writing prompt for when times feel overwhelming. This lesson teaches us to center and focus, to become quiet and still, even though the […]
By Peter Mountford, WITS Writer-in-Residence This year’s two-week fiction-writing residency—my ninth, I believe, with the eighth grade class at Blue Heron Middle School—was my favorite to date. There’s an inexplicable magic to these groups, something of a class culture, and some years, the students are more guarded, wary, and their writing reflects that. This year […]
Every year, Seattle Arts & Lectures’ Writers in the Schools (WITS) program holds the Elaine Wetterauer Writing Contest to celebrate the wisdom, creativity, and heart captured in student and teacher writing. The inspiration from this year’s contest was drawn from Pachinko, by Min Jin Lee, an epic historical novel that follows a Korean family over […]
With our daily lives disrupted, we are all working to finding new forms of togetherness. From balconies, Italians break into song and Spain applauds its healthcare workers. Bookshops hand-deliver to Seattle porches. Local relief funds have opened up for artists and hospitality workers. And we at Seattle Arts & Lectures want to do what we […]
By Lisa Wells, WITS Writer-in-Residence I think of writing as a practice of awareness, a habit of heightened attention to detail—to light, gesture, sensation, intonation—and I try to approach the teaching of writing with the same quality of attention, awake to the shifting dynamics of the classroom. Good writing demands that we be awake in […]
At our recent Local Voices reading on February 10 at Hugo House, WITS Writer-in-Residence David Lasky gave some much-needed advice for creatives everywhere—especially for those of us who consider ourselves “late bloomers” in the arts. We just had to share it with you, below! David Lasky teaches comics writing through WITS at Renaissance School of […]
By Karen Finneyfrock, WITS Writer-in-Residence There is a funny idea about inspiration that lurks in our culture. The idea holds that poets are just people who walk around, waiting to be struck by a fit of unexpected inspiration. We collectively imagine poets like hikers in the woods, and poetic inspiration a mountain lion watching silently, […]
By Arlene Naganawa, WITS Writer-in-Residence I love how poets use language in surprising, transformative ways, creating metaphors and images that we don’t often encounter in academic or journalistic writing. When I work with students, I encourage them to take leaps in their poems, to elevate their language. I don’t mean for students to use words […]