Prague Summer Writing Program Take-aways
All posts by kristineheim
Prague Photo Gallery: 6/28/14
The Problem With Prague
For the month, I’m changing the emphasis of my blog from “wondering” to “wanderin
g.” That’s because I’m in Prague, Czech Republic, on a writing residency. Residencies vary in their context. Some simply provide a place to sleep and work, with a venue to show or read what you’ve done. This one, associated with Western Michigan University, is more of a “study abroad” program. Twenty writers of various genres from all over the US will live in community for 4 weeks of seminars, master classes, peer reviews, one-on-one conferences and readings.
The residency begins Sunday, June 29, with a kick-off dinner and orientation. We dig into the writing on Monday. However, there will be lot of time to explore this inspiring city and surrounding areas. So I’ll be posting lots of photos.
The problem with Prague is that it’s so photogenic. It’s over a thousand years old, with a varied topology and mix of architecture. People call it “Golden Prague” because of the ornate gold work found everywhere–on its buildings, statues and monuments. It’s also called “The City of a Thousand Spires,” due to its many churches.
Prague crackles with vitality as well. It’s hilly and scenic. A river runs through it. People enjoy the beauty in a multitude of ways. They stroll under sweet-smelling lindens that line the river walk, listen to musicians, eat at outdoor cafes, shop at open-air markets, and boat on the river. Runners, bicyclists, skate-boarders and segway-ists keep up a steady stream of activity along the walkways. The trolleys clang, the train whistles blow and, each hour, a bell-tower somewhere chimes.
There are photo ops everywhere–up, down, in the distance and up close. Prague is always posing. You get a shot, and five steps later there’s another. Or the same shot, with different lighting. I hope the photos I post this month give a glimpse of this most amazing and alive city.
How Writing Made Me Own-up
When I was granted a summer 2014 writing residency in Prague, I knew I would have to start admitting to people I’m one of those, you know, writers. That, while others spend their non-working hours attending birthday parties, growing tomatoes or spelunking, I’m happily hunched over a page, creating characters and searching for exactly the right dialog for those made-up characters in my made-up stories.
Usually, I’m pretty outgoing. But I don’t say too much about my own writing. For one thing, people who aren’t familiar with the long, solitary process often equate writing with publishing.
“What have you written?”
“A couple of novels.”
“I don’t think I’ve heard of them.”
“They’re under my bed.”
This is when I get the raised eyebrow, the look of pity. And I suppose writing can seem like a sorrowful endeavor. At the end of a lengthy road, what we have in our hands often does land under the bed. Or, buried in a stack of spiral notebooks we’ve been filling while squirreled away in garrets. Or even in the reject pile, when we finally try to market what we’ve worked on so diligently.
Yet writing, like any other activity we pursue for love, is an end in itself. As with knitting, gardening or playing soccer, there’s a comforting familiarity in handling the tools. There’s an understanding of how things have to come together. There’s growth over time, and an ability to draw back and look at what we’ve created. Finally, there’s a headiness in getting something exactly right and a triumph when we finish–even if it doesn’t go anywhere but under the bed.
And so, when I received the news that I’d be going to Prague with nineteen writers of all ages, genders, genres and experiences, I mentally prepared myself to reveal to others that I write. That, if you count the weepy poems of my youth, I’ve been writing for half a century. I got ready to discuss the joys and disappointments of working for hours at a keyboard. And I braced myself for the question of how widely I’d published.
As I knew they would, the comments came. Like rapid fire.
“Wow, Prague! Where’s Prague?”
“Wow, Prague! Got your passport?”
“Wow, Prague! Who’ll take care of your dog?”
It appears that the only person surprised by my revelation was, um, me. I have been uncloseted as a writer, apparently for some time.
When one of my students heard the news, he said, “Wow, Prague!” And then he repeated to me what I say to students and colleagues before we part for an extended amount of time. “Come back with stories!”
Travel and the Inner Life
In the 1990’s, I took a travel writing workshop from Catherine Watson, travel journalist for the Minneapolis Star Tribune. Her writing then, as now, was not a narrative of pretty views, delicious meals and how to save money by going to museums on half-price days. Hers were gritty essays about life in tundra-like climates, unpopulated islands and areas in the midst of political unrest. And she documented her pieces with photographs that told their own stories–survival, human interest and cold beauty.
Her workshop was gritty too. She said we were in class to recognize and report on the inevitable inner journey that converges with and diverges from the external journey. She told us that, like a good novel, the main character needs to enter the piece like he or she enters the place. That the main character will be changed by the journey. Travel is, after all, a metaphor for Life. She stated that the reader will be most interested in the main character’s inner changes. And, she announced, the main character was us.
I have never forgotten her lesson. Travel changes us. Travel needs to change us.
There is something greater at work than just going somewhere when we travel. The first footstep on the journey is a leap into inevitability. We enter an engine bigger than we are. We feel ourselves burst open. We are breathless at the going toward, at the possibilities, at the unknowns, the potential for disappointments, at the awe and wonder and fear of the new.
Many people travel at this time of year. I will be traveling, too. As I pack, I want to remember Catherine’s lesson. Travel broadens us, which is good. But it also deepens and changes us. Which is better.
LeArniNg tO fLy 