The Essential Writer Workshop WRW
Workshop Format
The original Writers Retreat Workshop curriculum, developed by the late Gary Provost, provides the basic structure for the workshop, including sessions on ideas, character, plotting, structure, tension, pace, description, dialogue, and more. At the same time, other writers and writing teachers will also be referenced, which offers participants a variety of perspectives on these aspects of the craft.
Gary's 14-Step Process takes you step-by-step through the entire process of starting, writing, and completing a novel or narrative non-fiction book. It provides a framework through which you can discover your own variations on the theme of telling your story. ``````````````
Whether you are a proficient writer or a rookie at your first workshop, you can find the tools to assist you in your work, and an instructor who is present in order to share her knowledge and experience with you. We are all writers on the same path, pilgrims on the journey of our individual stories. This is not a cookie-cutter, one-size-fits-all approach to the craft of writing. You are ultimately the one who determines what will serve your vision, your characters, your book. The choice is yours.
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Close-up of detail on wood carving by Michael Quirke of Sligo, Ireland
Workshop offered weekly by invitation only for now - updates will be made as things change.
Writer at work in Old North State Food Hall meeting room during November 2023
Another detail of Michael’s wood carving
Cost
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Carol (left) with Gail Provost Stockwell (Nushka, right)
Carol L. Dougherty
Carol L. Dougherty has worked in professional theatre, Boys & Girls Clubs of Western Pennsylvania, San Francisco Zen Center, and Writers Retreat Workshop as well as several non-profit organizations. She has a BA in Communication/Theatre from John Carroll University, a JD from Duquesne University School of Law, and an MDiv from Naropa University.
Carol has worked professionally with the Three Rivers Shakespeare Festival, City Theatre Company, and University of Pittsburgh Theatre, and was also Managing Director of the Berkshire Theatre Festival from 1988-1990. She updated and co-edited the 2019 edition of 100 Ways to Improve Your Writing, originally written in 1972 by her writing teacher and mentor, the late Gary Provost. She worked with Gary’s widow, Gail Provost Stockwell on the book, and taught Gary’s curriculum at the Writers Retreat Workshop for a number of years after his death. In 2016, she took over as director of the workshop, which went on hiatus during the pandemic. She is the author of a political thriller, The Santiago Inheritance, and a nonfiction work on theatre, How Full of Briers: The Organizational Structure of the Non-Profit Theatre Corporation. In North Carolina during 2023, Carol explored the arts community in the Selma/Smithfield/Princeton area and participated in Telling Our Stories at the Harrison Center, Open Mike night at Old Fashioned Ice Cream in Selma with Triangle East Writers, plus co-organized the NaNoWriMo sessions with Cindy Brookshire at the Old North State Food Hall. She also worked with the arts group, Cluttered Minds, to organize a holiday arts market at the Old North State Food Hall. Her most recent novel, Smiling at Grief, is a finalist in two categories for the 2025 Goldie Awards (Golden Crown Literary Society). |