I mentioned some of my writing inspirations from the last year (Brandon Sanderson’s Writing Sci-Fi/Fantasy course at BYU on YouTube, Kathy Hepinstall’s novel-writing seminar test run, Makoto Fujimura’s work, etc.) yet I haven’t mentioned the most helpful of all: the Amherst-style writing sessions brought to our church community by Alli Dahlgren.
The main writing advice I heard over and over was to find a writing group. I talked about starting one, though I wasn’t sure how to put a group together. Should we bring stuff to read or write in person? Was it even possible to align the schedules of writers all over the city?
Then at the beginning of 2020, Alli, who also works as the Director of Worship & Arts at Imago Dei, asked me to write something for Ash Wednesday. She also asked if I’d heard of the Amherst Writers method, and if I was interested in an Imago writing group. I’d never heard of Amherst, and I pictured gathering in Room 101 and going off to separate tables to write. This didn't sound ideal, but I wanted to try so I said, Sure.
The group never met in-person, though, because Covid-19 shut down churches a week or so later. Instead, we began meeting in a location ideally suited to the writing life: Zoom.
Formed by Missourian Pat Schneider through the 1970s and ‘80s, the Amherst Writing method is a grassroots organization with a focus on nurturing everyone’s inner artist, and to keeping the art of writing liberated from the gate-kept recesses of higher education.
Here’s the Amherst Writers and Artists philosophy:
Everyone has a strong, unique voice.
Everyone is born with creative genius.
Writing as an art form belongs to all people, regardless of economic class or educational level.
The teaching of craft can be done without damage to a writer’s original voice or artistic self-esteem.
A writer is someone who writes.
Part of our group’s success is the Zoom format. Like, I’m just at home doing whatever—having dinner or watching the Blazers—and then it’s time for group. So I set up my screen in a quiet space with a pen and paper and login. There’s somewhere between 5-9 folks there, a cast of writers I’ve gotten to know. We chat and check-in, then Alli reads an excerpt or a poem and provides a prompt based on the mood of that reading. Sometimes the prompts are deep and wistful and sometimes they’re simple, like “Write about watermelon.”
At that point we turn off the camera and we’re alone in our space, where we write for anywhere from 5-15 minutes. For instance, here’s what I wrote about watermelons (edited some):
There was one summer in Phoenix where I became watermelon obsessed and in retrospect maybe it was a good year for watermelons, or maybe Sprouts had the perfect supplier, or maybe because nothing was finer in 110 degree heat than cool fructose and hydration.
I liked how the Shun blades sliced right through, a clean bisection, and how a wide spoon punched right into the cold, crunchy flesh and you could carve out an apple-sized chunk and just bite in.
And I ate so many melons: King of Hearts and Crimson Sweets, usually seedless for the convenience. I scanned for a darker green rind paired with a high contrast spot to show they’d grown unrolled and undisturbed. Then I’d strap them into the passenger seat of the Highlander for the drive home, where they’d cool in the fridge before being devoured like Pac-Man on his way to a power pellet.
It was the summer of the watermelon.
When the writing is through, we go around the group and read our piece if we like. This trains us in two different skills crucial for storytellers: active listening and reading aloud. The pieces are often excellent to an inspiring degree considering they’re all live first drafts. I try and write down particular lines which stand out, though other times I’m simply caught up in the stories. So I’ve seen the first Amherst principle in action: Everyone has a strong, unique voice.
After reading, there’s a round of comments—entirely positive—calling out what was strong and what stood out in the writing. This part of the group is encouraging and uplifting.
(There’s also a confidentiality agreement, and the general assumption that every reading is fiction, even when stories are told in the first person and true.)
After a year of attending Amherst groups, I feel far stronger as a writer. I’m more confident in producing words, and I feel closer to inhabiting my truest writing voice. The groups are like a full cross-training, yet thoroughly enjoyable. And soooo approachable! That’s the point of Amherst: everyone is welcome.
Part of our group’s strength is due to Alli Dahlgren. The Dahlgrens moved here from Tennessee, where Alli experienced the poisoned nature of commodified art as a singer-songwriter. She found refuge in the Amherst-style groups set up to cultivate and shield songwriters in Nashville, then brought the method west.
Alli is an empathetic and principled group facilitator, and our group thrived. Now she’s opening her writing groups up to a broader audience through the newly-launched Shelter Writers, which is offering workshops at very affordable prices for what basically amounts to effective group therapy + a seminar on writing tradecraft.
Alli’s also a native Iowan, which is a state that seems absolutely crammed with writers. I mean, sure, there’s the whole illustrious history of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and whatnot, though I happen to know a handful of Iowans—not even through writing—and the majority of them also write. Thanks for keeping the American literary engine alive, Hawkeyes! We’ll close out on some writing from some of your favorite sons.