@Shambaugh House

An historic partnership between the International Writing Program and the Moscow Art Theatre, Book Wings is a collaborative performance that will take place simultaneously in Moscow and Iowa City on March 9th, 2012.

Working in conjunction with the University of Iowa's Department of Theatre Arts, the Virtual Writing University, Information Technology Services, and UITV, this ambitious literary and theatrical endeavor is made possible with grant funds provided by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State and will bring together two stages and theatre companies to produce (in real time and with 5,000 miles between them) a collaborative, bilingual performance of new work commissioned for the project. That we know of, this production is a first in the world of theatre and represents a breakthrough in the leveraging of technology for the purposes of artistic cooperation, exchange, and engagement.

A three-year initiative, this first year of Book Wings features commissioned work by distinguished, young American and Russian poets: Matthew Zapruder, Dora Malech, Terrance Hayes, Quan Barry, Inga Kuznetsova, Anna Russ, Linor Goralik, and Maxim Amelin. The commissioned poems have been translated and serve as the basis for the staged performances on March 9th.

In 2013, Book Wings will feature Russian and American playwrights, and in 2014, the commissions will come from American and Russian fiction writers. 

Viewers around the globe will be able to watch the performance live on March 9th here and can submit questions about the project immediately following the performance by Tweeting the IWP at @UIIWP. 

The Live Event:

What: Book Wings Performance

When: Friday, March 9th, 2012

Time: 10 a.m. – 12 p.m. (U.S. central time),  8 p.m. Moscow time

Where: Theatre B, University of Iowa Theatre Arts Building & The Moscow Art Theatre, Moscow, Russia

Streaming the Show Live!: http://www.writinguniversity.org/page/live-streaming

Partnerships:

In addition to the project’s purely artistic goals, Book Wings represents a great opportunity for instructors to address issues of translation, performance, collaboration, and the utilization of new media technologies in the arts. To that end, we’re thrilled to invite you to host a viewing of the live event on March 9th via a live video stream.   

Plans for off-site viewings are currently in the works with Columbia College in Chicago, IL and Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland, among others. Interested schools, universities, arts organizations, and theatres can contact the IWP's Nate Brown for further information about hosting a viewing on March 9th. It's as simple as visiting the Virtual Writing University's streaming site and pressing play!

If you have any questions about the project or to set up a viewing at your institution, please contact:

Nate Brown

Publicity Coordinator

International Writing Program

Shambaugh House

430 North Clinton Street

Iowa City, Iowa 52242-2020

Office:   319-335-2817

nathanael-brown[at]uiowa.edu

http://iwp.uiowa.edu/

The deadline for this summer's Between the Lines summer writing program is fast approaching. American high school students have until this Thursday, Feb. 24th to apply. 

Since 2008, the International Writing Program has hosted Between the Lines (BTL), a program that brings young writers, aged 16-19, to the University of Iowa for creative writing study and cultural interaction.

We are excited to announce that for 2012, there will be two BTL sessions:

• BTL Russia (June 30-July 13): Students from across Russia will be invited to join American students.
• BTL Arabic (July 14-28): Students from selected Arabic-speaking countries will be invited to join American students.

Students will live in a dorm on the University of Iowa campus along with university-trained counselors, who help foster a strong sense of creative community. Sessions will include literature seminars and language-specific creative writing workshops taught by faculty who are renowned writers in their own right.

• BTL Russia: Alan Cherchesov and Camille T. Dungy
• BTL Arabic: Iman Humaydan and Marcus Jackson

International students are nominated by the American embassy in their respective countries.

American students are invited to apply for either session. The application deadline has been extended to Friday, February 24. Please see this page for application details.

BTL is sponsored through grant funds provided by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs of the US State Department.

For more information on BTL, contact:

Kecia Lynn, BTL Coordinator

International Writing Program

Shambaugh House

430 N. Clinton Street

Iowa City, IA 52245

(319) 384-3296

kecia-lynn[at]uiowa.edu

Last fall, the International Writing Program, in partnership with the University of Iowa Museum of Art(UIMA) and through the support the Shelley and Donald Rubin Foundation, welcomed Tibetan poet and visual artist Tenzing Rigdol to Iowa City for a special six-week residency. Since the 2008 flood and its damage to the university’s arts campus, the UIMA has been encouraging artists to respond to its centerpiece holding, Jackson Pollock's “Mural, 1943,” a seminal work of abstract expressionism donated to the University of Iowa by Peggy Guggenheim in 1951.  The black-and-white “Kirti – From the Ashes of Agony”—Rigdol considers it “visual poetry”—addresses the recent wave of self-immolations by Tibetans protesting Chinese rule. 

“In 2011 [at the same time he was in residence in Iowa], there were 12 self-immolation cases by Tibetans and they could all be traced back to the Kirti monastery in Tibet,” writes Rigdol on his gallery’s website. “These episodes of unfortunate and desperate events deeply disturbed me and made me rethink about Tibet. And the result is this painting.”

Here's Rigdol's painting, alongside the Pollock for comparison. More information about Rigdol and his work is available at his gallerist's website: Rossi & Rossi.

[iae|109|] Jackson Pollock's 'Mural, 1943'

Since 2008, the International Writing Program has hosted Between the Lines (BTL), a program that brings young writers, aged 16-19, to the University of Iowa for creative writing study and cultural interaction. Sponsored by the University of Iowa, the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs of the U.S. Department of State, and the International Writing Program, Between the lines is a unique summer writing program that gives students the opportunity to interact with student writers from other cultures, to experience the literary life in Iowa City (the only UNESCO-designated City of Literature in the United States), and to receive writing instruction from distinguished professionals in the field.  

We are excited to announce that for 2012, there will be two BTL sessions:

• BTL Russia (June 30-July 13): Ten students from across Russia will be invited to join 10 American students.
• BTL Arabic (July 14-28): Twelve students from selected Arabic-speaking countries will be invited to join 12 American students.

Both sessions will include a literature seminar and a language-specific creative writing workshop taught by faculty who are renowned writers in their own right. Students will live in a dorm on the University of Iowa campus along with university-trained counselors, who help foster a strong sense of creative community.

International students are nominated by the American embassy in their respective countries, and American students are invited to apply for either session. Please see this page for application details and a link to the online application. Completed applications are due Februrary, 15, 2012.

UPDATE: Our upcoming distance-learning course "International Issues in Creative Nonfiction" is now filled!

Thanks for all of you who expressed interest, and keep your eyes here on the the Shambaugh House Blog, the IWP's Facebook page, and on the IWP's new website for more information about distance-learning offerings from the IWP, including an upcoming fiction workshop!

The International Writing Program is offering another credit-optional distance education course this spring. The topic: International Issues in Creative Nonfiction. The instructor: Stephanie Elizondo Griest, author of Mexican Enough and Around the Bloc. You can take it from anywhere, and you can take it for free.

For more information about the class and to register, contact the IWP's Distance Learning Coordinator, Jimmy O’Brien at james-obrien@uiowa.edu.

International Issues in Creative Nonfiction

Where does the subjective terminate, the objective commence? What are the boundaries between domestic and global, personal and political, fiction and nonfiction?

International Issues in Creative Nonfiction will address such questions through academic and creative means. We’ll investigate ongoing global concerns through the lens of creative nonfiction by reading some of the most challenging and innovative nonfiction from throughout the world and composing our own in response. Students will read a variety of texts ranging from literary journalism to fragmentary personal narratives, potentially including authors such as Terry Tempest Williams, Arundhati Roy, Dave Eggers, and Li-Young Lee, among many others drawn from recent literary publications. This class will be delivered online through the International Writing Program and will link a cohort of domestic students with another group based in Tijuana, Mexico.

International Issues in Creative Nonfiction is credit optional, and can be taken for free if audited. It’s for students who aren’t afraid of technology—who are interested in Skyping, working on message boards, and exchanging multimedia responses with students from throughout the world, and working with international peers to examine the most pressing social, environmental, and creative issues we face.

The International Writing Program is proud to announce the launch of its newly redesigned website. Here you can find information about the IWP’s many programs and initiatives in one (if we may say so) attractive location: iwp.uiowa.edu

Through strategic partnerships with many international organizations, and frequently with the support of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State, the IWP fosters   relationships and understanding between international and American writers; provides joint distance learning opportunities for American and international students; and publishes materials that bring established and new international voices to a broad audience.

While the URL remains the same, you’ll notice that the redesigned site makes it easier than ever for an extended network of readers, writers, teachers, and students to explore the cache of literary work, presentations, interviews, films, news items, and collaborations accumulated over the IWP’s 45-year history.

Here’s a preview of what you’ll find on the new online home of the IWP:

• Residency:

Since 1967, the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa has been dedicated to welcoming professional writers from across the globe to Iowa City in order to encourage creative engagement, collaboration, and fellowship. Under the Residency tab, you will find listings for 45 years of IWP participants, organized as a searchable database.  You will also find information about our fall residency programming, important forms for residents, and a list of frequently-asked questions for potential nominees and nominators.

• IWP Courses:

The International Writing Program offers classes at the University of Iowa as well as distance learning courses that put American writers and students in direct contact with writers and students worldwide, from Spain, New Zealand and the United Arab Emirates to Lebanon and Scotland.  On-campus courses as well as distance learning opportunities will be announced here.

• Publications:

Under the Publications tab, you’ll find 91st Meridian, the program’s online literary journal, as well as information about the 91st Meridian book series published by Autumn Hill Books. The newest offering in the series is a free e-book, How to Write an Earthquake, in which sixteen Haitian writers respond to the 2010 disaster in English, French, and Creole.  Several new volumes are forthcoming.

• Programs:

Each year, the IWP administers a number of special programs, including a international reading tours and creative exchange programs. Additionally, since 2008, the IWP has been bringing together high school students from the U.S. and abroad in a program called Between the Lines. A unique creative writing summer initiative at the University of Iowa, BTL will mark its fifth summer in 2012, hosting a group of young writers from the Middle East and, for the first time, a group from Russia. This is just one of the many initiatives that you’ll find under the Programs tab.

• Archives:

In 45 years of continuous programming, the IWP has amassed a rich archive of original essays, panel papers, short stories, novel excerpts, poems, photographs, interviews, and recordings of older audio and video presentations, all available under the Archives page.

We hope you’ll agree that our new website is an important tool for wide-ranging reading and research, a gateway to new ways of thinking about creative writing’s global potential, and an inspiration for ways of engaging across literary borders.

And now, onward.

Christopher Merrill

Director

The International Writing Program

In 45 years, the IWP has hosted over 1,400 writers, and today it's easier than it's ever been to stay in touch with our former fall residents and to share their work with the public. To that end, here's a brief roundup of recent pieces written by IWP alumni and/or about the IWP that have recently been published online. We will periodically publish these roundups here on the Shambaugh House blog, so check back for more. And if you're an IWP alumnus, feel free to send your updates our way!

Chandrahas Choudhury (IWP '10) recently a piece for The Telegraph explaining how he came to love the novel. 

Bina Shah (IWP '11) has a very interesting piece in Dawn calling for for a greater role for women in Pakistan's business community (and, more generally, for economic independence for all women).

Rajeevan Thachom Poyil (IWP '04) interviewed by GSP Rao at Muse India.

Last but not least, here's a wonderful article in The Spectator by examining the origins and the growth of the International Writing Program by Winston Barclay, a writer and editor with the University News Services. 

Today marks the beginning of the Invisible Man Project here in Iowa City. This five-day exploration of the work of Ralph Ellison will culminate in a staged reading of the new (and first) stage production of Ellison's Invisible Man, which will open at Chicago's Court Theatre in early 2012. 

The week's events include lectures, panels, and roundtable conversations. All events are free and open to the public. A full schedule of events is available here.

Last week, while many Americans were eating their turkey dinners, novelist and IWP Fall 2011 resident Moshe Sakal's novel Yolanda was shortlisted for the Sapir Prize for Literature, one of Israel's highest literary awards. 

According to Maya Sela writing in Haaretz, "The winner of the Sapir Prize will receive NIS 150,000 and his book will be translated into Arabic and one other language of his choice. The other finalists will receive NIS 25,000 each."

Congratulations Moshe! 

[author photo: Greg Bal]

Here's a wonderful article at the Department of State's IIP site, featuring 2011 fall resident Ogochukwu Promise. A writer of fiction, poetry, nonfiction, and children's books, Promise has been deeply invested in literary and humanitarian endeavors in her home country, Nigeria. http://bit.ly/ryJTfA

During the week of October 24th the IWP visited Sierra Leone to conduct a series of creative writing seminars with local groups including PEN Sierra Leone, the Instituit Francais Film School, the Sentinel English Language Institute, and the Falui Poets Society. The writers also visited the American International School and Forouh Bay College. All seminars were hosted at the US Embassy in Freetown and were facilitated by IWP writers Jenny Browne (poetry) and James O’Brien (fiction). During their weeklong visit, Browne and O’Brien led a diverse number of sessions on constructing character, plot, narrative, and setting in fiction and, in poetry, establishing images, creating rhythm, and performing pieces to an audience. Other topics included close reading, the rhetorical implications of stylistic choices, and revision. The IWP writers additionally discussed with facilitators, teachers, and the potentials and possibilities of integrating creative writing in the classroom and curriculum, and with emerging writers the nature of the publishing world, funding opportunities, and professionalization of the writing career. The trip terminated with an event hosted by the US ambassador, Michael S. Owen, at his residence that included music, stand-up comedy, and readings from the students and the IWP writers.

The outcomes of the visit were illuminating and encouraging; Browne and O’Brien connected with the facilitators and students, and were grateful for the ongoing and sincere support of the US Embassy. Resultantly, the IWP Distance Learning Program, which offers creative writing classes and events to nations and regions that might not otherwise have access to it, decided to pioneer a new, virtual endeavor to maintain relationships with the groups encountered on reading tours and through programs by developing and hosting secure, individualized websites that offer additional creative writing exercises and opportunities for interaction through message boards in order to foster ongoing dialogue between the IWP and writers in Sierra Leone.

We're thrilled to announce that two IWP writers have made it onto this year's DSC Prize Shortlist! Congratulations to current resident Usha K.R. and alumna Kavery Nambisan (2007) for the well-deserved recognition!

Tonight, Saturday, Oct. 29th at 7 p.m., the IWP will hold a special Cinemathèque screening of the contemporary Argentine film Historias Extraoridnarias (dir. Mariano Llinás, 2008) in Adler E105. Though this screening is part of a course, it is free and open to the public. And because the film is 245 minutes long, we'll hold a brief intermission so that you can stretch your legs and grab a drink of water!

A huge congratulations to IWP alumnus Lyonel Trouillot ('94, Haiti), who is a finalist for the Prix Goncourt! http://bit.ly/tW47Cx

You can read recent work of his in "How to Write an Earthquake," published by 91st Meridian Books, an Imprint of Autumn Hill Books. It's a free and downloadable here: http://bit.ly/sj8lqN

Arabic Forum

Thurs., Nov. 3, 5:00 pm

Shambaugh House

The International Writing Program will host what promises to be a deeply engaging discussion with two very different writers from the Arab world. Lebanese novelist Iman Humaydan and Iraqi poet Naseer Hassan will be led in a discussion of contemporary Arabic literature and culture by Dénes Gazsi, Assistant Professor of Arabic language and culture at the University of Iowa.

Iman Humaydan (novelist, fiction writer) is the founder of ARRAWI, a non-profit center for marginalized youth in Lebanon. Her short stories, essays, and journalism have appeared in German, Swiss, French, and Arab newspapers and magazines. Her novels B Mithl Beit, Mithl Beirut (B as in Beirut) and Toot Barri (Wild Mulberries), have been published in Arabic, French, German, and English, followed, in 2010, by the third, Hayawat Okhra [Other Lives]. Humaydan co-wrote the screenplay for Chatti ya Deni [Here Comes The Rain], which won the first prize at the 2010 Dubai Film Festival, and edited the creative writing textbook Kitabat alkitabah (2010). Her participation is provided courtesy of the William B. Quarton Foundation.

Naseer Hassan (poet, translator) is the manager of a cultural NGO poetry forum, a producer at Free Iraq Radio, and an award-winning journalist. He has published four poetry collections, [The Circle of Sundial] (1998), [Suggested Signs] (2007), [Being Here] (2008) and Dayplaces (2010). In addition to his [Emily Dickinson: Selected Poems and Critical Articles] (2009), and (Days of the Shore: Selections From the New American Poetry For the Period 1980-2010) (2011), and (Luis George Borges: 60 poems) (2011), he has several book-length translations forthcoming, including House of the Star: Robert Frost, Wallace Stevens, Langston Hughes, and the German philosopher Arthurs Schopenhauer’s philosophical work (The World as Will and Representation). His collected poems were published in 2010 by the Arabic House for Publishing in Beirut. He participates courtesy of the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad.

October 25, 2011 - 7:00pm

Prairie Lights

15 S. Dubuque Street / Iowa City, IA

NELL REGAN & GUY DROLLINGER

Please join us for a special night of Irish music and poetry with Nell Regan and Guy Drollinger. Nell Regan is currently in residence with The University of Iowa's International Writing Program. Her collections of poetry include Preparing for Spring which was shortlisted for the Glen Dimplex New Writing, Strong, and Patrick Kavanagh Awards, and Bound for Home which has just been released in Ireland. Bound for Home is a sequence of poems based on an old coastal fort in County Cork which was commissioned by Cork County Council who also commissioned visual artist Monica Boyle. Irish poet Thomas McCarthy says of the work ”Through these poems the incidences of Camden life become art, the stones stand up and speak to us”.

Guy Drollinger is one of Iowa's premier folk artists and a leading exponent of the distinctive fiddle playing style of Eastern Iowa. Combining traditional Anglo-Scots-Irish dance tunes with influences from bluegrass, Nashville, the folk song revivals from the 50's on as well as Blues, he was named twice as a Master Fiddler for the Iowa Arts Council’s Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program and with his daughter Hannah has represented the State of Iowa at the Smithsonian’s Festival of American Folklife in Washington D.C. Guy plays with many groups including the Drollinger Family Band, as well touring nationally, and internationally with Eulenspiegel Puppet Theatre.

The IWP is delighted to announce a special visitor to our program, and to our town. On Sunday, November 6th, Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka will take part in two public events.

1) At 3:00 pm in Shambaugh Auditorium (Main Library), Soyinka will be presented with the Rex Honey African Studies Program Lectureship Award at a ceremony in which he will lecture and sign books.

2) At 7:30 pm, he will give a reading at the Englert Theatre in downtown Iowa City.

Both events are free and open to the public.

Wole Soyinka (Playwright, Poet, Novelist, and Essayist ): Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1986, Wole Soyinka has published more than thirty works, and continues to be active on various international artistic and Human Rights organizations. A Yoruba born in Western Nigeria and educated in Ibadan, Wole Soyinka continued his studies at the University of Leeds, England, earning an Honours degree in English, then joined the Royal Court Theatre, London, as a play-reader. In 1960, he was awarded a Rockefeller grant and returned to Nigeria, where he researched theatre, and founded two theatre companies. 

Soyinka’s plays include The Swamp Dwellers; The Lion and the Jewel; The Trials of Brother Jero; Jero’s Metamorphosis; A Dance of the Forests; Kongi’s Harvest; Madmen and Specialists; The Strong Breed; The Road; Death and the King's Horseman; A Play of Giants; Requiem for a Futurologist. 

Soyinka has written two novels, The Interpreters and Season of Anomy. Autobiographical works include The Man Died: Prison Notes; AKE, The Years of Childhood; IBADAN, The Penkelemes Years and You Must Set Forth at Dawn. Literary essays are collected in, among others, Myth, Literature and the African World and Art, Dialogue and Outrage while his political and other thematic writings appear in The Open Sore of a Continent; The Burden of Memory, Muse of Forgiveness and his BBC Reith Lectures published as The Climate of Fear. His poems are collected in Idanre and Other Poems; Poems from Prison; A Shuttle in the Crypt; Ogun Abibiman; Mandela’s Earth and Other Poems; SAMARKAND and Other Markets I have Known. 

Wole Soyinka has won numerous civic and professional awards, held several university positions, and still lectures extensively. He is currently Professor Emeritus in Comparative Literature, Obafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria, and President’s Professor at Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles.

Tonight at 7 p.m. in EPB 107 (251 West Iowa Avenue) the International Writing Program and the University of Iowa Museum of Art will host Shadow Tibet: A Conversation with Jamyang Norbu & Tenzing Rigdol. This unique opportunity to hear from and engage with Tibetan writer Jamyang Norbu and Tibetan visual artist Tenzing Rigdol will include a reading by Norbu, commentary by Rigdol about his recent projects. Both artists will address questions specific to their artistic practice and, more broadly, about the role of Tibetan artists in exile.

Jamyang Norbu is an accomplished novelist, playwright, nonfiction writer, and activist. He blogs for Shadow Tibet, Rangzen.net and Huffington Post. He is also the author of three essay collections on Tibetan politics and culture, Illusion and Reality, Shadow Tibet, and Buying the Dragon's Teeth. While directing the Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts in Dharamshala, Norbu wrote plays as well as a traditional Tibetan opera libretto; he is the editor of, and contributor to, the volume Performing Traditions of Tibet. A founding director of the Tibetan Centre for Advanced Studies (the Amnye Machen Institute), Norbu has edited the Institute's journal of history and culture, Lungta, and its newspaper Mangtso.

Tenzing Rigdol's artistic practices include painting, sculpture, drawing, collage, digital media, video installations, and site-specific performance pieces. He has exhibited extensively throughout the United States, as well as in London, Shanghai, Beijing, Hong Kong, Israel, Tokyo, Madrid and Mumbai; his artwork is held in museums and collections worldwide. He is also the author of the poetry volumes “R”—the Frozen Ink, Anatomy of Nights, and Butterfly’s Wings.

The residencies of both artists are sponsored by The Shelley & Donald Rubin Foundation, and the event is free and open to the public. As ever, Individuals with disabilities are encouraged to attend all University of Iowa sponsored events. If you are a person with a disability who requires a reasonable accommodation in order to participate in this program, please contact the International Writing Program in advance at (319) 335-2817.

The IWP is taking creative writing abroad, virtually. For the past few years we’ve been developing a distance learning program in order to better and more continually reach the international community. The program utilizes the latest hardware and software in information technology to host events and classes that are delivered free of charge to international locations ranging from Haiti and Scotland to New Zealand and Iraq. All are based in Iowa City, and local writers lead each class in conjunction with an international instructor, usually a former IWP resident. Full courses are available to University of Iowa students either as credit or non-credit. This semester the IWP has offered creative writing seminars to students in the Gaza Strip via direct video conference and full classes on Young Adult Fiction and Graphic Novels to students in Egypt and Spain. Those who might be interested in Young Adult Fiction should note that the class is still enrolling for free, and that all are invited to take part. Direct questions to Jimmy O’Brien at james-obrien@uiowa.edu.  In the upcoming months the IWP will offer additional courses and events centered on the relationship between creative writing international trans-cultural issues with the intent of fostering a deeper dialogue between nations.

With web-enabled video chat systems like Elluminate Live! at our disposal, the IWP is able to recreate the community found in traditional workshop settings. Students and instructors can see each other face to face in real-time, and engage in the same rapid-fire conversation that creates constructive seminars and a sense of community. Most full courses are additionally supported by ICON, The University of Iowa’s learning management system. Often used in traditional classroom settings as a repository for course documents and assignment drop-off, ICON’s potential as a full-scale classroom becomes realized when employed in distance learning—students interact regularly via message boards, instructors post videos that students respond to, and other multimedia, movie trailers to PowerPoint’s, are continually accessible. The result is a learning environment that mirrors the traditional in-person format in terms of its sense of community, but allows for additional points of reference and resources to engage students who may live thousands of miles apart.

In much the same manner, the IWP’s more condensed programs provide short-term learning opportunities to those interested in the creative arts. These take the form of Direct Video Conferences (DVCs) that are hosted by University of Iowa’s IT services in a specially designed multimedia room. Using the highest speed internet connection available, IT is able to transfer high definition video and sound from Iowa City to any technologically capable location in the world. The IWP has delivered one-time literary readings to several locations and, in the near future, will connect acclaimed American writers and universities in The United Arab Emirates, Afghanistan, and Iraq for individual virtual readings.

 Each semester, we offer five week intro to creative writing seminars, often to young adults, in partnership with regional NGOs and nonprofits such as AmidEast. These are designed to give young people who have expressed an interest in creative writing the opportunity to experience workshop and exchange ideas with peer writers and experienced instructors on a weekly basis. Recently, the IWP has partnered with institutions in Jordan and the Gaza Strip to run such courses.

As the IWP’s distance learning program continues to broaden its reach and expand its offerings we hope to involve as many residents, writers, and community members as possible. To stay informed of our events and plans make sure to watch this blog and our website, or contact the DL coordinator, Jimmy O’Brien, at james-obrien@uiowa.edu for more information about classes and events both this and coming semesters.