Bearlodge Writers

Featured Book

 

 

 

 

 

Voices From The Underground

by James Bowers

PROLOGUE

I am sitting in my chair in the cabin built by my own hands, looking out at the stream flowing through my property, with my feet elevated, piles of newspapers and my dog at my side. It is not that I am lazy. I’m retired, and retirement means not doing whatever I do not care to do, not talking with people I do not find interesting, not being anything other than what I want to be. It is the ultimate in freedom, just to be myself: no more games to play, no role to tell me how I ought to act, only silence and intuition. But that also involves getting to know who I really am. Memories from the past float to the surface, long-forgotten, painful, surprising. I am changing in unexpected ways: death and rebirth in my late sixties, as if one can start over again at that age. I am becoming more reclusive, more observant, delighted by the vast panorama of inward experience.

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We Quote

"Pass the chocolate."

Bearlodge Writers

The Bearlodge Writers have been meeting since 1979. Membership has expanded over the years to include writers from the Black Hills of South Dakota and Wyoming (and beyond). Our purpose is to enjoy each other’s fellowship, to encourage one another in our writing endeavors, to help each other improve our work, and to share information and tips.

We meet twice monthly on first Tuesdays at noon and on third Tuesdays at 5:00 p.m., at the Crook County Library in Sundance, Wyoming. We welcome beginners (we all began sometime) and many of us are now professionals—we all love to write.

At any meeting we might hear chapters from novels, historical works, or other books in progress; poems, essays, newspaper columns, short articles, short stories, journal entries, letters and queries, book proposals, even limericks. We give feedback as requested by the author—from simply listening, to evaluating characters, plot, style, etc., to a full line-by-line critique on pieces headed out for submission.

Our work has been published by over a dozen national houses, such as Doubleday, Forge, and Houghton Mifflin, and has appeared in many periodicals, including Newsweek, Smithsonian, Parabola, The Christian Science Monitor, and Guideposts. It is included in anthologies and collections, including the Chicken Soup books, Writing Down the River, poetry chapbooks, and the "Windbooks" series: Leaning Into the Wind, Woven on the Wind, and Crazy Woman Creek.

Our members have given hundreds of workshops, readings, and presentations throughout the west, including at the National Cowboy Poetry Gathering in Elko, Nevada. We have also given radio and TV presentations, been keynote speakers, panelists, and faculty at various professional conferences, conducted writing retreats, worked in the schools, and received a variety of awards and fellowships.

As a group, BLW juries entries annually for the National Park Service’s Devils Tower National Monument residency competition, and gives writing workshops for writers and teachers (with accreditation for college requirements).

 

Code of Conduct

Bearlodge Writers etiquette and ethics include such pithy instructions as "Shut up and read the crap!" (don’t waste time making excuses) and the vitally important "Pass the chocolate." We’re also known as the Bearlodge Eaters and even the Bearlodge Matchmakers (two members met at a meeting and later married).

Bearlodge Writers is a group of writers, both published and unpublished, who get together to share their love of writing. Our purpose is to:

        ♦ encourage and support each other in our writing endeavors provide feedback, as requested, on our work

        ♦ promote interest in good writing through cooperation with the schools, by providing public workshops, and by supporting other arts/writing groups such as Wyoming Writers and Wyoming Arts Council

        ♦ disseminate information of interest to writers

        ♦ promote networking among writers

        ♦ enjoy the company and fellowship of other writers

Bearlodge Writers etiquette:

♦ share, rather than instruct

♦ with new writers, offer critique sparingly, encouragement plentifully

♦ be conscious of time available and number of people to read—if necessary, take formal steps to avoid monopolization of reading time by one person

♦ observe professional ethics*;

         *Professional ethics: 
        -When contacting a market, editor, or agent, never use another writer’s name without permission.  
        - Pass the chocolate.

♦ maintain confidentiality—writing can be an intensely personal activity. We sometimes share with the group stories or feelings that we hesitate to share even at home or with loved ones. It’s understood that what is shared with the group goes no further and is not repeated outside of the group;

♦ “Shut up and read the crap!” Don’t waste time with excuses.