Posts Tagged: University of Houston Creative Writing Program

Puzzling through stories with Peter Turchi

February 4, 2015, by

Inprint loves to showcase the best in new books by top local authors. One of the most interesting books to come out in the past year is A Muse and A Maze: Writing as Puzzle, Mystery, and Magic by Houston writer Peter Turchi. Turchi is the author of several books, including Map of the Imagination: Writer as Cartographer, named by The New York Times as one of the 100 Best Nonfiction Books of All Time. Turchi,  a faculty member at the University of Houston Creative Writing Program, serves as a frequent interviewer for the Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series.  

A-_Muse_and_A_Maze-cover-236x300Some of my favorite books when I was just a li’l egghead were the Encyclopedia Brown stories by Donald Sobol. I went back to a collection of them recently after reading A Muse & A Maze: Writing as Puzzle, Mystery, & Magic, the new book by University of Houston creative writing professor Peter Turchi.

The Encyclopedia Brown stories present themselves as mysteries. They concern Leroy, a.k.a. “Encyclopedia,” a 10-year-old “Sherlock Holmes in sneakers,” whose father happens to be the chief of police of Idaville, a town “like many other seaside [ones],” with “lovely beaches, three movie theaters, and four banks.” Except no one, writes Sobol, “got away with breaking the law in Idaville.”

The lawbreakers are your typical seaside layabouts; nothing to see here. Encyclopedia’s primary nemesis is a fledgling sociopath named Bugs Meany, instigator of a gang of would-be toughs called the Tigers who try to scam the other townies. Each chapter begins with an aggrieved victim seeking out Encyclopedia and his sidekick, Sally Kimbell. They ride their bikes to the scene of the crime; the story of the accuser and the story of the accused are told, and Encyclopedia pauses dramatically while Sobol interrupts to direct you to page 64 for “the solution.” In the end, some detail that violates the rate at which water evaporates, or the conventions of elevator repair, or the date when the Liberty Bell was cracked, is the lie that tells the truth. The antique lamp or the champion yodeling toad is returned to the rightful owner, and order is restored.  Continue reading →

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A Telling Story: Lacy M. Johnson’s The Other Side, Nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award

January 27, 2015, by

The Other Side Cover Galley Mech.inddLast week Houston’s literary community was buzzing. Houston writer Lacy Johnson was named a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for her book The Other Side: A Memoir. We are thrilled for Lacy who is an alum of the University of Houston Creative Writing Program and a former recipient of an Inprint Fondren Foundation Fellowship. Lacy now serves as University of Houston Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center for the Arts’ Director of Academic Initiatives. We asked Houston writer and University of Houston Creative Writing Program PhD candidate Austin Tremblay to share his thoughts about Lacy and her memoir with us.

“I have something important to tell you” is a familiar lead-in, especially for writers. We might say this to fellow storytellers, friends, family, or the stranger two barstools down, and we might mean that we have good news, a severe warning, or an epiphany. What we will always mean, though, in spite of these variables, is that we have a story to tell. And we think you, storyteller, friend, family, stranger, should listen.

I have something important to tell you: Lacy M. Johnson’s memoir, The Other Side, has been named a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle Award. It is incredibly exciting that this work has received such a nod. It’s a harrowing book, often difficult to read due to the nature of its subject matter. And yet, it’s a heralded book, and difficult to put down. As Johnson’s website describes, The Other Side is “the haunting account of a first passionate and then abusive relationship, the events leading to Johnson’s kidnapping and imprisonment, her dramatic escape, and her hard-fought struggle to recover.” Continue reading →

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Readings on Readings on Readings

November 10, 2014, by

cookieLast week—during the week—there were no fewer than 7 readings in Houston. And readings—and their high frequency and quality—seem to be a perennial source of confusion for writers in this city. Bring up readings to a student in the Creative Writing Program at UH and you’ll likely hear either excitement: “I know! I can’t wait,” or quiet guilt and dread—as though each reading torments like another book one hasn’t read and, you know, really should—“Gah, I haven’t been to a single one yet.” Trying to navigate this writing life that I’m supposed to have—which I’m learning means “that I’m supposed to make for myself”—is not what I expected when I was dreaming about it in my Business Statistics class three years ago: drinking coffee and letting brilliance flow from my fingers for hours a day.

Nope. When the time comes every day for me to write it’s like, I don’t reeealy have to write today, right? Which may not seem like a compelling argument right now, but that argument comes—from the Devil, I think—via my sleeping self at 6:00 or so in the mornings. And I’ve proven pretty much unable to beat it so far. That adds up to a lot of days of not-writing. And when I do sit down to write—when I steal a few minutes at work or in the afternoons or evenings (something gave me the guts this past Sunday afternoon)—writing turns out to be hard work. More simply put: writing is work. Like real, actual work. Amazing. Continue reading →

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In Which I Break My Foot and Am Saved By Students (Twice)

July 25, 2014, by

Inprint is proud of the work we do to support emerging writers, including giving more than $2.8 million since 1983 in fellowships, prizes, and other support awarded to graduate students at the highly ranked University of Houston Creative Writing Program (UH CWP). This support attracts the best emerging writers to Houston who go on to publish books, win nationally competitive literary awards, enhance our city, and serve as educators throughout the community.

Being a creative writing graduate student, however, isn’t always an easy thing. No high-paying summer internships or corporate recruiters come these students way! And in addition to pursuing their craft, many generously give back to the community, like the great pool of writers at the UH CWP who teach our Writers Workshops, Teachers-As-Writers Workshops, and Senior Memoir Workshops. Without them, Inprint workshops would not be ranked among the best in the city.

Jameelah Lang, a PhD candidate in fiction at the UH CWP, taught a fiction workshop for Inprint this summer. We asked Jameelah to share her experience as an instructor with us. We were blown away by what she said.

BrokenFootI had a bad go of it last year. I took comprehensive exams, moved into another apartment, and rescued a puppy; my puppy cried without end, the windows in my new apartment wouldn’t open, and Virginia Woolf stalked me in dreams. My students were all too young or too old or too tired to care who Marguerite Duras or the New Kids on the Block were; they wrote about murderers even when I explicitly told them to write about anything but murderers.
Continue reading →

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Not Yo’ Mama’s Poetry!

May 16, 2014, by

If you still have nightmares about interpreting The Rime of the Ancient Mariner for your seventh grade English teacher, come conquer your fear of poetry and hear what hip young poets are writing these days.

There is a ton of fresh, smart, and diverse poetry coming from Houston poets and it’s exciting to see. Inprint is proud that the four University of Houston Creative Writing Program PhD candidates who will be reading their poetry Monday night—Beth Lyons, David Tomas Martinez, Karyna McGlynn, and Justine Post—are good friends of the organization and the Houston reading and writing community. The free reading takes place Monday, May 19, 7 pm at Brazos Bookstore, Houston’s fine independent bookseller, 2421 Bissonnet.

All four poets have participated in Inprint’s Poetry Buskers program, which sends poets out to write poetry on demand (on a typewriter!) at Houston festivals and other public events. Justine and Karyna have each won the Inprint Paul Verlaine Prize in Poetry; David Tomas was one of the three pre-dinner readers at this year’s Inprint Poets & Writers Ball and will be teaching an Inprint Writers Workshop this summer; and Beth is currently working part-time at Inprint! We are also happy to report that all four are wonderful poets whose work yields many riches.

Here’s a short poem we promise you’ll understand from David Tomas Martinez’s just released book of poetry, Hustle, along with bios of each of the poets who will read Monday night

HustleScientifically Speaking

There have
been exciting

discoveries
in the field

of me.
Many

of which,
I have

made
myself. Continue reading →

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Boldface: A Writers’ Conference in the Bayou City

May 7, 2014, by

Boldface logoFor emerging writers, there’s always the moment when the workshop ends and you’re left wondering what the next step will be. Writers’ conferences—which combine intensive workshops, master classes, and readings—are a great way to sustain the momentum of writing and revision in a community of peers.

While many conferences involve cross-country travel and fees that can range from hundreds to thousands of dollars, the Boldface Conference—housed here in Houston—offers a dynamic experience at a fraction of the cost of many programs. The Boldface conference fee for the week is $125 for students and $200 for non-students; registration is open until May 9.  Click here to learn more.

Boldface was started in 2009 by the editors of Glass Mountain, the undergraduate literary journal at the University of Houston, to create a conference devoted exclusively to developing writers. Any person who has not studied creative writing at the graduate level is welcome to attend.  The goal of the conference is to give emerging writers an experience that is usually available only to professional writers: several days of intense focus on the craft of writing through workshops, readings, and craft talks. Continue reading →

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Writers, Opera, and Chitra Divakaruni’s River of Light

March 21, 2014, by

RIVER-art-newWhen we think of writers and the different mediums through which they share stories, we think of novels, memoirs, poems, perhaps even oral traditions. But do you ever think of opera?

Houston has a thriving literary community and one of the many ways writers are enhancing the cultural life of this city is through serving as librettists for the Houston Grand Opera.

The comingling of writers with the Opera has been going on for several years and Inprint is proud to be a part of it. In 2006, the Houston Grand Opera approached Inprint to identify a Houston writer who could develop and write a unique libretto for a main stage piece celebrating Houston’s diversity. The overall project was called “Song of Houston,” and the piece—for soloists, chorus, and orchestra—was called The Refuge. The writer was to spend months interviewing dozens of people in six different Houston immigrant communities, and then distill these stories into a libretto portraying the struggles to get to this country and adjust to life here in the United States. Inprint recommended Leah Lax, a UH Creative Writing Program (UH CWP) alumna, on the basis of her work teaching senior citizens for Inprint, and the piece was a great success, resulting in a major write-up in The New York Times.

Since then, Inprint has connected HGO with several Houston writers who have written libretti for original works commissioned by HGO, including Farnoosh Moshiri (The Bricklayer), Irene Keliher (A Way Home, a bilingual opera), Janine Joseph (From my Mother’s Mother), and Bao Long Chu (Bound)—all UH CWP alumni. Inprint also worked with the HGO staff to select Houston writers to teach writing workshops to senior citizens in the Third and Fifth Wards, which resulted in poems set to music by composers at UH and Rice—these teachers were also UH CWP graduate students. As a result of this partnership, Inprint Executive Director Rich Levy now serves on the HGO Community Outreach (HGOco) Committee, where he is helping the HGO staff to envision future collaborations with Houston area writers.

Now HGO is building on its success and continues to work with the city’s top writers.

As part of its Song of Houston: East + West series, HGOco is presenting River of Light with the libretto written by Houston writer Chitra Divakaruni. Amongst the literary community here, Chitra is a household name. Chitra, an American Book Award winner and faculty member at the UH Creative Writing Program, is the author of novels, short stories, and poems, including her latest novel Oleander Girl. Continue reading →

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A Road Trip with Failure: A Conversation with Sasha West

February 6, 2014, by

sasha_westOn Friday, February 7, Sasha West and Jason Schneiderman will read their poetry at the Menil Collection as part of the Public Poetry series. West will be reading from her collection Failure and I Bury the Body and Schneiderman from his collection Striking Surface.

Sasha has a close relationship with Inprint. She was a winner of the Inprint Paul Verlaine Prize and was a long time Inprint Writers Workshop instructor. She is an alumnus of the University of Houston Creative Writing Program, where she also served as the editor for Gulf Coast: A Journal of Literature and Fine Arts, and later went on to become Gulf Coast’s Board President. In 2012, West’s poetry collection, Failure and I Bury the Body, was selected by D. Nurske as a winner of the National Poetry Series and published by Harper Perennial.

Her poems have appeared in Southern Review, Ninth Letter, Third Coast, and others. Sasha was kind enough to answer some questions about her poetry and creative process—a big thanks to Sasha for taking the time to talk to us.

BETH: In an interview, you likened linked short stories to “recognizing someone dear to you in the airport of a faraway city.” Could you explain a little about how you linked the narrator, Failure, and the Corpse together in Failure and I Bury the Body? Continue reading →

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On turning 30

May 10, 2013, by

Just 30 no nameMay 9, 2013, was Inprint’s official 30th birthday! Executive Director Rich Levy shares his thoughts about what Inprint is most proud of, what excites Inprint as it turns 30, and where the organization wants to go.

Thirty years: we are in a state of astonishment. To be honest, when I took this job 18 years ago, it was difficult to believe that the making and consumption of literature were compelling facts on the Houston cultural landscape—even with a great Creative Writing Program at the University of Houston (UH CWP). And we have done what we can to keep that program strong and to help attract some of the nation’s best emerging writers to Houston: since 1983, our fellowships and prizes to UH CWP grad students have exceeded $2.5 million and supported more than 500 of the nation’s top emerging writers.

That is a meaningful legacy for the city. These writers lead our workshops, and teach in schools and colleges and community centers throughout the region, sharing their work and skills everywhere, on stage and in bookstores and bars and coffee shops. There’s no part of the city or surrounding areas that hasn’t been touched by these writers and their work in the community. Continue reading →

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Enjoying the Sweet Land of Bigamy

July 18, 2012, by

Before dawn this morning, I grabbed the book that I had reluctantly laid on my bedside table late last night, when I could no longer keep my eyes open. It was Miah Arnold’s debut novel Sweet Land of Bigamy. I eagerly devoured the remaining 30 pages of this wonderfully quirky tale of a cast of realistically drawn characters caught in a love triangle. Miah is reading at Brazos Bookstore this Thursday at 7 pm, and I’m so glad that I had a chance to read it ahead of her book launch. I’ve known Miah since she was a graduate student at the UH Creative Writing Program, and have had the pleasure of hiring her to teach many writing workshops for Inprint. Everyone associated with Inprint should take special pride in Miah’s achievement, as she was the recipient of one of our first $10,000 prizes―the Inprint Diana P. Hobby Prize in Fiction, as well as the recipient of an Inprint Cambor Fellowship and Barthelme Prize. Continue reading →

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