College of Charleston in Spoleto...
This afternoon we met Bret Lott and Emily Rosko, the two College of Charleston English professors who are here for a month sharing wonderful Italian writing inspiration with their students. According to the College's Creative Writing Blog, "the program will take 15 students to Charleston, SC's sister city of Spoleto, Italy where they will write and study literature and meet with local artists and writers who reside there. The students and faculty will be housed at a villa just outside of Spoleto, where they will share meals, hold readings, and spend quiet time writing and reading. Once a week, the students and faculty will share a special group dinner which will feature intensive and lively discussions of the craft of writing. The program will include cooking classes, a tour of area wineries, day hikes in the Umbrian hills, and museum tours in town; in addition, students will be urged to use their railway passes to travel on the weekends. We will also spend three days in Florence, Italy where students will take guided tours of such important artistic and historical sites as the Uffizi Gallery, the Duomo, and the Galleria dell'Academmia, and spend one evening in salon with an area painter, writer and historian." Where was this program when I was in college?
I've been a pen pal of Bret Lott's for a few months now and meeting him was very interesting. He is a Professor of English and Writer-in Residence at The College of Charleston. The author of twelve books, including two New York Times bestsellers, Lott's work has been translated into six languages.
I knew I would like Bret when I spotted Bill Bryson's book, Neither Here nor There: Travels in Europe on his bookshelf. Steve and I both read it recently and loved it so much we sent it to Kegan to read before coming to Italy. It's one of the books Bret uses for his Summer program. To me, it is the perfect text for teaching his creative nonfiction workshop where students will seek, "through writing about our travel experiences in Italy–good and bad, wise and foolish, enlightening and murky–to come to a deeper understanding of what it means to be a human being far from home." I wish I was a student of the College of Charleston. This Spoleto Sojourn would be one I would have loved to take!
I've been a pen pal of Bret Lott's for a few months now and meeting him was very interesting. He is a Professor of English and Writer-in Residence at The College of Charleston. The author of twelve books, including two New York Times bestsellers, Lott's work has been translated into six languages.
I knew I would like Bret when I spotted Bill Bryson's book, Neither Here nor There: Travels in Europe on his bookshelf. Steve and I both read it recently and loved it so much we sent it to Kegan to read before coming to Italy. It's one of the books Bret uses for his Summer program. To me, it is the perfect text for teaching his creative nonfiction workshop where students will seek, "through writing about our travel experiences in Italy–good and bad, wise and foolish, enlightening and murky–to come to a deeper understanding of what it means to be a human being far from home." I wish I was a student of the College of Charleston. This Spoleto Sojourn would be one I would have loved to take!
1 comments:
What a great program! It sounds like a perfectly legitimate excuse to spend time in Italy...what every college student needs. I want to see this villa! :)
Do you make sure to 'spell check' when writing him emails? It would make me a little nervous.
I think I should read the book as well...I need some more European inspiration.
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