Brenna Womer speaks at Writing a Life event

Writing: A Life

“Writing: A Life” Events

Each semester the College welcomes a visiting author to host a reading on campus as well as other events that may include writing workshops or classroom visits.

“Writing: A Life” broadens our students’—all students, not only those in Creative Writing and English—exposure to exciting, vibrant artists and allows them to make connections that will serve them as professionals and as practitioners of their craft, as well as understand the way the arts intersect across all disciplines.

LVC will welcome two visiting writers to campus this fall. Their public readings will take place either via Zoom or in person and will be available free to the campus community and the public. Copies of the writers’ books will be available for purchase and signing at the readings.

Sarah Cypher headshot

Sarah Cypher

September 25 | 7 p.m. | Bishop Library Atrium and Zoom

Join us for a reading and Q&A session. Readings are free and open to all. Registration required for Zoom session.

About Sarah Cypher

Sarah Cypher is a freelance book editor and author of The Skin and Its Girl (Ballantine, April 2023). She holds an MFA from the Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College, where she was a Rona Jaffe Graduate Creative Writing Fellow in Fiction, and a BA from Carnegie Mellon University. Her writing has appeared in the Washington Post, Lit Hub, Electric Literature, New Ohio Review, North American Review, Crab Orchard Review, and others, and she has been a resident at the Headlands Center for the Arts and Vermont Studio Center. She grew up in a Lebanese Christian family near Pittsburgh and lives in Washington, D.C., with her wife.

Joseph Thomas headshot

Joseph Earl Thomas

October 17 | 7 p.m. | Bishop Library Atrium or Zoom

Join us for a reading and Q&A session. Readings are free and open to all. Registration required for Zoom session.

About Joseph Earl Thomas

Joseph Earl Thomas is a writer from Frankford whose work has appeared or is forthcoming in VQR, N+1, Gulf Coast, The Offing, and The Kenyon Review. He has an MFA in prose from The University of Notre Dame and is a doctoral candidate in English at the University of Pennsylvania. An excerpt of his memoir, Sink, won the 2020 Chautauqua Janus Prize and he has received fellowships from Fulbright, VONA, Tin House, Kimbilio, & Breadloaf, though he is now the Anisfield-Wolf Fellow at the CSU Poetry Center. He’s writing the novel God Bless You, Otis Spunkmeyer, and a collection of stories: Leviathan Beach, among other oddities. He is also an associate faculty member at The Brooklyn Institute for Social Research, as well as Director of Programs at Blue Stoop, a literary hub for Philly writers.

Outcomes and Reviews

Green Blotter editorial staff members Rachael Speck ’20 and Paige Bryson ‘20, in collaboration with genre editors Sydney Fuhrman ’18 and Jackie Chicalese ’18, published a guide to undergraduate literary magazines for Assay: A Journal of Nonfiction Studies under guidance from visiting writer and reviewer Renee d’Aoust.

As a result of Renèe d’Aoust’s in-class discussion of the value/professional development merit of publishing book reviews, Sydney Fuhrman ’18 published a book review in Alternating Current Press’s literary magazine The Coil. Fuhrman wrote the review for ENG 254 Fiction Workshop.

Cheyenne Heckermann ’17 is now a book reviewer for Anomaly, focusing particularly on works by writers of color and LGBTQ2IA writers. Her reviews are online here.

Read what some of our students have to say about the “Writing: A Life” series.

“The opportunity to meet one-on-one with Adam Tavel and discuss my work was incredibly beneficial, as I was able to receive unique advice and encouragement from a knowledgeable and award-winning poet. As a mentor, Adam was insightful and sincere, and offered his personal experiences and support to assist in preparing me for a transition from undergraduate writing to graduate.” ~ English major

“Another section that I thought was really relatable to me was the ‘real writer’ conversation. Being a musician, when Tom McAllister talked about the set of habits, it made me understand why writers have to practice with workshops and lectures just like musicians have to sit down and play…. he inspired me as a musician to treat music different and to experiment.” ~ music education major