F205. The Fifty-First Minute: Beyond the Therapist's Office and onto the Page

Marquis Salon 7 & 8, Marriott Marquis, Meeting Level Two
Friday, February 10, 2017
1:30 pm to 2:45 pm

 

Some say that to write good creative nonfiction the transformative therapy must come well before the writing. But, what if we write about a subject dealt with in an ongoing therapy setting? Writers whose work has addressed mental illness argue the validity of the therapy first/writing second belief, discuss challenges encountered while writing about this often stigmatized topic, and explore the difference between therapy, catharsis, and the inevitable insights brought on by the writing process.


Participants

Moderator:

Ainsley McWha writes nonfiction and freelances for local publications. Her MFA in creative nonfiction is from The New School.

Camille Chidsey is a 2016 Writing Away the Stigma fellow at Creative Nonfiction.

Heather Kresge is a literary and visual artist based in Pittsburgh, PA. In 2016, she was a Writing Away the Stigma writing fellow with Creative Nonfiction. In April 2015, Kresge won first place in the inaugural Alexandra L. Rowan Writing Award in Nonfiction at the University of Pittsburgh.

Christopher Collins is the author of the poetry chapbook, Gathering Leaves for War. He has published work in the anthologies No, Achilles and Proud to Be. A former “Writing Away the Stigma” fellow for Creative Nonfiction, he is a PhD student in literary nonfiction at the University of Cincinnati.

Elissa Washuta is a member of the Cowlitz Indian Tribe and the author of two books, My Body Is a Book of Rules and Starvation Mode. She serves as a nonfiction faculty member in the MFA program at the Institute of American Indian Arts.

#AWP24

February 7–10, 2024
Kansas City, Missouri

Kansas City Convention Center