Literary Conference

“Wilderness”

November 7-9, 2023

Location:
Goodstein Foundation Library, Room 215A and 215B

The workshops and reading are free and open to the public.

The theme for the 37th annual Casper College Literary Conference is Wilderness. Wyoming is home to one of the last intact ecosystems, is over 48% public land, and home to breathtaking national parks that are heavily visited and beloved all over the world. But what about wilderness as an idea that shapes our daily actions? How do wild landscapes inform artists? John Steinbeck, in the Log from the Sea of Cortez, said, “It is advisable to look from the tidepool to the stars, and then back to the tidepool again.” This year’s conference will explore how artists use the natural world as a springboard to explore ideas and create art. Our presenters will each offer two free workshops held at the Goodstein Library on the Casper College Campus. Coffee and refreshments will be served. On Wednesday the 8th, poet Elizabeth Bradfield, and novelist, Rich Chiappone will meet with ten readers at a local coffee shop. Books will be provided by Casper College. Contact the Goodstein Library to secure your free copy.

Wilderness Book Club

Contact Us

David Zoby

conference director

elizabeth bradfield headshot

Elizabeth Bradfield

Writer/naturalist Elizabeth Bradfield is the author of Toward Antarctica, Once Removed, Approaching Ice, Interpretive Work, and Theorem, a collaboration with artist Antonia Contro.  She has co-edited the anthologies Broadsided Press: Fifteen Years of Poetic/Artistic Collaboration, 2005-2020 (with Alexandra Teague and Miller Oberman) and Cascadia Field Guide: Art, Ecology and Poetry (with CMarie Fuhrman and Derek Sheffield). Her poems and essays have appeared in The Sun, the New Yorker, Atlantic Monthly, Poetry, Orion and have been widely anthologized. Winner of the Audre Lorde Prize from the Publishing Triangle, finalist for a Lambda Literary Award and the James Laughlin Award from the Academy of American Poets, her honors also include a Stegner Fellowship and a Bread Loaf Scholarship. Founder and editor-in-chief of Broadsided Press, she lives with her partner on Cape Cod, teaches creative writing at Brandeis University, and balances her work as a writer with work as a naturalist/field assistant, both locally and abroad.

christine peterson headshot

Christine Peterson

Nonfiction writer Christine Peterson has covered wildlife, the environment and outdoor recreation as a journalist in Wyoming and across the West for more than a decade, first at the Casper Star-Tribune then as a full-time freelancer. She has since written about grizzly bears, wolves, elk and insects. She writes for National Geographic, Wyoming Wildlife, and Cool Green Science, to name a few. Her words and photos grace the most widely read outdoor journals and magazines.

rich ciappone headshot

Rich Chiappone

Fiction writer Rich Chiappone, the winner of the 2021 Alaska State Foundation for the Arts and Culture Award and grant, an Edible magazine award, and an Alaska Press club Award, is the author of three short story collections and the recent novel The Hunger of Crows, 2021. (Crooked Lane Press, distributed by Penguin Random). His stories have appeared in Playboy, The Sun, The Catamaran Literary Review, Missouri Review, ZYZZYVA, and many other magazines, and have been featured on BBC radio.

natalie behring headshot

Natalie Behring

Natalie Behring became a photojournalist by lucky accident in China in 1996. She walked in to the Reuters Beijing Bureau asking if they might want to buy a photo, and walked out with a job. The first major story she covered was the Hong Kong Handover. Since then she has made a name for herself in photojournalism, covering the war in Afghanistan and tensions in the Middle East. She has shot disasters, wars, celebrities, presidents, Olympics, food, and, most recently, the interplay between people and wildlife in the Grand Teton area.  Her work frequently appears in The New York Times and the Washington Post. Lately, she has been setting trap cameras in the national forests and publishing zines featuring her words and images.  Her workshop will teach students how to create their own “zines” using photojournalism.

Schedule 


Tuesday November 7th

5-6:30 Bourgeois Pig Coffee Shop

Rich Chiappone Book Club Discussion

Sign up at our library for a free copy of Rich’s thriller The Hunger of Crows. We will meet in a small group to discuss the writing process with the author. Lead by Casper College student Tyler Cooper.

 

Weds. November 8th

All workshop sessions take place in the Goodstein Library classrooms. Snacks provided.

9:30-10:45

Natalie Behring

“Telling a Story with Images”

Natalie Behring has seen the world through a camera lens. Her images have appeared on the front page of some of the biggest newspapers. Today she lives in Driggs with her cattle dog Alonzo. She hikes miles and miles of wilderness to set and retrieve images from her many trail cameras. Come hear how she approaches a story.

9:30-10:45

Rich Chiappone

“Some Books Make You Want to Write, and Some Make You Want to Quit”

For normal readers, it’s often surprising, sometimes disturbing, to find that other people have reactions to books contradictory to theirs. That’s because everybody wants something slightly different from a book. (This is why some people shouldn’t drink alcohol at book club.) But for a writer, the stakes are even higher. Normal people read for pleasure. Writers read for plunder. Some books are veritable treasure chests of goodies a smart writer can borrow (steal) and use in their own writing. Others are impenetrable vaults of genius no average writer can crack. It can be maddening.

12-1

Elizabeth Bradfield

“Exploring Erasure & Found Poems”

What makes a “good” or “real” erasure or found poem? In this workshop, we’ll examine works by Mary Rufle, Layli Longsoldier, Nick Flynn, and Muriel Rukeyser, and more to consider how a poet finds their own voice within the text of another, how those layers of knowing create an awareness and aesthetic of their own.

2-3:30

Natalie Behring

“Creating your Own Zine”

Zines are a great way for writers, artists and photographers to share their work. They are easy and inexpensive to make and I will share what I know about, designing, printing, and distributing them.

2-3:30

Christine Peterson

“Finding Meaning in the Story”

We all have our favorite outdoor stories, the ones we tell our friends and family and the ones that compel us to write them down. Learn what it takes to turn those stories into a published piece, and then put some of your newly-learned skills to pen and paper.

5-6:30

Elizabeth Bradfield Book Discussion Bourgeois Pig Coffee Shop

Sign up for a free copy of Elizabeth’s poetry collection and meet at the coffee shop for a lively discussion.

 

Thursday November 9

All workshop sessions take place in the Goodstein Library classrooms. Snacks provided.

9:30-10:45

Christine Peterson

“How to tell a good story”

Every story has a beginning, middle and end, but how you fill those slots is the difference between rapt reader attention and someone wandering off mid-paragraph. From entertaining your friends to selling your first magazine piece, learn what it takes to weave a compelling tale from start to finish.

11-12:15

Rich Chiappone

“Bring in the Clowns: The Uses of Humor in Writing”

We’d all like to be a little funnier when we write. Let’s see how some of the masters of humor writing have done it. Let’s look at ridiculous stories, essays, poems. Let’s talk about sarcasm, irony, parody, satire, impertinence, vulgarity, and all-encompassing foolishness.

Not sure you want to spend a whole hour talking about humor? Rather learn something more serious about writing? Well, if you were going to take a cooking class, would you rather spend the time cooking and tasting brownie recipes or liver and lima bean dishes?

11-12:15

Elizabeth Bradfield

“Othering” the Nature Poem:

How might class, race, gender, and sexuality infuse our “nature writing?” We will look at “socialized nature poems” that allow identity to hold space with biological and cultural accuracy. We will explore our own ancestries and linkages to the more-than-human world, and we will laugh, wince, rejoice, and write. The more-than-human world also holds the human world…. how can we examine our own roles and biases poetically?