The studio for creative writers, which opened Nov. 19, held its inaugural event Wednesday evening with an informal discussion, “How to Get Started on a Story,” led by journalism professor Evan Thomas, the former editor-at-large for Newsweek.
It was designed to provide “a space where professors and others outside the university can come and give workshops,” said Mirabella Mitchell ’13, who has been involved with planning for the new space since it began last year.
“It was almost painful to see how many people were writing independently ... but did not have a space to go to or a community pub to help focus their energies,” she added.
Open Thursdays and Fridays from 8 p.m., the student-run writing studio does not close at a set time. It offers free journals and other writing supplies, along with open writing hours.
“It’s a studio but also a forum,” said Maria Cury ’12, who was also involved in the studio’s planning. Cury is also a senior writer for The Daily Princetonian.
During Wednesday evening’s event, Thomas and the roughly 10 students in attendance discussed the role of the Internet in writing, ways to avoid procrastination and the importance of having an impartial reader for literary work.
Students also discussed what they considered to be the most painful part of writing, with many citing just getting started as the most difficult part. “Writing is painful,” Thomas said, explaining that he also feels vulnerable when others read his work.
He added that writers should know their subject matter well. “To be a really good writer, you should be able to write it without notes,” he said.
The writing studio hopes to host more speaker events and peer workshops in the future.
Kathleen Crown, the Mathey College director of studies, emphasized that the project was student-run.
“From the beginning it was a student-initiated project, coming out of a need to create community, find other writers ... share work and then, kind of secondarily, have resources available,” Crown said.
Mitchell and Cury collaborated with Amelia Worsley GS and Kelly Swartz GS in furnishing the writing studio.
They spent the last year figuring out “how to furnish the room to make it really useful both for group events and also just for free writing hours,” Crown said. “The students put a lot of work into that ... I was very impressed.”
Faculty from the English department, the creative writing program and the writing program were also very supportive of the project, Cury said.
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