by Kathleen Driskell, Chair
I feel extraordinarily lucky that soon many of us will gather and be nurtured by our warm community of Spalding writers during residency. Over the years, I’ve come to see that each residency has its own particular feel, and while I love them equally, I look forward to November’s residencies which always seem cozy and full of intimate conversations among writing family as we snuggle down in the lobby of the Brown Hotel. Maybe the chillier weather coaxes us to stick around the hotel rather than venturing out into the city. Of course, this is Louisville and those in the know know that during fall residency, we might wake up to snow-covered streets—or, just as likely, we might need to shed coats as the weather returns to summer temperatures. And, yes, sometimes we’ll find ourselves experiencing both kinds of weather during our week together. But what we can rely on is that our Naslund-Mann fall residency, November 9-16 in Louisville, students, faculty, and alumni will be enriched with the many opportunities directors, faculty, and staff have planned for discussions and the practice of new writing techniques during our seven days of workshops, lectures, readings, panels, graduation celebrations, and more.
Open to all: Virtual Pre-Residency Faculty Reading,
Wednesday, November 6, 6:30 p.m. Eastern
But before you leave home for Spalding’s campus, we’ll kick off Fall 2024 with our pre-residency virtual faculty reading at 6:30 p.m. Eastern, on Wednesday, November 6. Walk away from your residency packing for an hour to join us for what’s become a new and lively tradition for students, faculty, and alumni. Come hear faculty readings from those you know well and those who may be new to you: Silas House (F), Jason Kyle Howard (CNF), Jeremy Paden (translation) and Sam Zalutsky (W4TVSS). A Zoom link that will provide access to this reading will be in the Thursday Memo.
Creative Nonfiction is Our Cross-Genre Area
Solito by Javier Zamora Wins the 2024 Spalding Prize
As creative nonfiction is our cross-genre area for fall, residency students have already attended the virtual lecture by faculty member Dianne Aprile: “Beauty is Truth, Truth Beauty: An Exploration of Form and Content in Creative Nonfiction,” which prepared students to read our book in common, Javier Zamora’s best-selling memoir Solito, which is also winner of our 2024 Spalding Prize for the Promotion of Peace and Justice in Literature. I announced Zamora’s award for Solito in a previous blog post. You can click here to learn more about him and his work.
Soon after all arrive, we’ll dive right into our studies on Saturday, November 9, with the residency book-in-common discussion. Come to our kick-off session at the Brown Hotel ready to participate with your comments on Solito.
After that discussion, we invite all of our School of Writing members to gather at a cash-bar cocktail party to reconnect with each other before we sit down to a community dinner at the Brown.
Javier Zamora will be here Tuesday, November 12, to give a community presentation in the auditorium of the Main Branch of the Louisville Free Public Library. For this literary event, we’re partnering with both LFPL and The Library Foundation. Carmichael’s Bookstore, our official bookseller for the Naslund-Mann residency, will have Zamora’s books for sale and signing. The next morning, Wednesday, November 13, Zamora joins us for a Q & A open only to the Naslund-Mann writing community.
Other cross-genre sessions include my plenary lecture “Truth, Goodness, & Beauty: The Literariness of Creative Nonfiction,” a talk that asks students to join me in a close reading of three essays that beautifully use the techniques of fiction and poetry to tell their true stories: Jo Ann Beard’s “The Fourth State of Matter,” Brent Staples’s “Just Walk on By: Black Men and Public Space,” and Lydia Davis’s “Joan Mitchell and Les Bluets.” Students should read all three texts, which are posted in the Residency Card on Canvas, before coming to residency.
At the end of my cross-genre lecture in creative nonfiction, I’ll give our cross-genre exercise assignment. After our graduation lecture symposium on Sunday, we’ll all head downtown for a field trip to the 21c Museum Hotel on Main Street in Louisville to hear Katie Wilson, associate curator of the museum, give a brief talk about the current collections. After Wilson’s talk, students are free to wander the galleries and choose an art item that will be the focus of your cross-genre assignment, to be submitted and shared with one another at the end of residency.
After the visit to 21c, students can join other students, faculty, and PGRAs for dine-arounds at various downtown Louisville restaurants. Sign-up sheets are available for dine-arounds on Saturday afternoon and evening and during Sunday’s plenary events.
My craft lecture presented this fall is one of my absolute favorites to share: “Sentence Craft: The Art & Science of Syntax.” After a quick refresh on the grammar of sentences, we’ll settle into what I hope will be an illuminating discussion on the rhetorical power of the sentence. I always feel as if I’m handing over the keys to the kingdom when I give this talk and am able to share what I’ve learned from other teachers of writing.
Jenine Holmes, Distinguished MFA Alumni Lecturer
in Creative Nonfiction
Also, we’re delighted to welcome back alum Jenine Holmes (CNF ’13), who has been selected to give the Distinguished MFA Alumni Lecture in Creative Nonfiction for this residency. Jenine’s lecture is called “Intimate Geography: An Exploration of Settings in the Essays of James Baldwin.” A full description can be found in Canvas in the Residency Card with other lecture descriptions for Fall 2024.
Also, on Thursday, November 14, Carmichael’s returns to residency to create a pop-up Naslund-Mann Book Fair during our long lunch hour. If you plan to buy faculty and alumni books, we hope you’ll support Carmichael’s, our official bookseller for residencies, by purchasing them while you’re on campus.
Workshops Scheduled for Spring Residency
Our faculty workshop leaders for this residency are Rachel M. Harper (Fiction), Nancy McCabe (Fiction), Lynnell Edwards (Poetry), Kathleen Driskell (Poetry), Lee Martin (CNF), Ellen Hagan (W4CYA) and Charlie Schulman (WTVSS).
In addition, faculty members Dianne Aprile, Erin Keane, Kira Obolensky, and Sam Zalutsky visit to present lectures during residency.
Naslund-Mann friends visiting as guest lecturers for the Fall 2024 residency include David Arnold, Kristen Gentry, and Susan Elizabeth Kelly.
Best-selling author of Mosquitoland David Arnold returns to lead a mini-workshop in dialogue for Writing for Children and Young Adults students at the end of fall residency. You can read an interview between David and Poets and Writers’ Amanda Ramirez here.
Kristen Gentry visits residency to discuss her debut fiction Mama Said and share her thoughts about linking short stories into a unified collection.
Screenwriter Susan Elizabeth Kelly returns to discuss structure and Aaron Sorkin’s The Social Network. Students should read that script, which can be found on Canvas in the Residency Card, before coming to residency.
Graduation Celebrations Abound this Fall
We look forward to a vibrant group of lectures and readings presented by our graduating MFA students. Congratulations to Fall 2024 MFA and MA in Writing graduates: England Blye (P); Judy Galliher (CNF); Mitzi Hannah (CNF); Katie Massa Kennedy (P); Joan McBride (P); Dymon Moore (F); Abbie Rudibaugh (P); Alyssa Strzalka (P); Shannon Thompson (F); Tess Wardell (W4CYA); David Weller (F); and Laura Wilson (F). Our graduation lecture symposium takes place Sunday afternoon, November 10; graduation readings at the Brown take place throughout residency; and the commencement ceremony is Friday, November 15, at 6:00 p.m. at the Brown. Our celebratory reception immediately follows.
Don’t Forget to Mark Your Calendar for October 20
Required Virtual Events Before Fall Residency
On Sunday, October 20, students are required to attend two virtual sessions in preparation for residency: at 2:00 – 3:00 p.m. Eastern, you’ll meet with your workshop leader and student-colleagues for an introductory workshop session; at 3:00 – 4:00 p.m. Eastern, you’ll join the faculty book-in-common session for a discussion of a text in your residency workshop area. Students find their faculty book- or script-in-common assignments in the Residency Card in Canvas.
Do keep checking the Preparing for the Fall Residency page in the Residency Card in Canvas for added information about lectures and events we’ll feature this November, as well as lecture descriptions, pre-reading required or suggested, and other announcements. Your Residency Curriculum and Events Schedule will be released on Monday, November 4.
Happy preparation for Fall residency at Spalding! Our Naslund-Mann faculty and staff look forward to welcoming you back to campus soon.
Kathleen Driskell, Chair of Spalding University’s Naslund-Mann Graduate School of Writing and Professor of Creative Writing, is an award-winning poet and essayist. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, River Teeth, Appalachian Review, Rattle, Southern Review, Shenandoah, and other magazines. She is the author of five poetry collections, most recently The Vine Temple (Carnegie Mellon University Press) and Next Door to the Dead, (University Press of Kentucky), winner of the Judy Gaines Young Book Award. Her collection Seed Across Snow (Red Hen Press) was named a Poetry Foundation Bestseller. Her collection of poetry Goat-Footed Gods is forthcoming in March 2025 from Carnegie-Mellon University Press. She served as Chair of the Board of Directors of AWP, the Association of Writers and Writing Programs from 2019 to 2022.