Council for Wisconsin Writers

Supporting Wisconsin writers from 1964 to 2022

Georff Gilpin

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WBF: How Wisconsin Writers Can Support Each Other

CWW is on the Wisconsin Book Festival agenda. Here are the details:

“HOW CAN WISCONSIN WRITERS SUPPORT ONE ANOTHER?”

A Panel Discussion Featuring Winners of the 2011 Council for Wisconsin Writers Awards

Thu, Nov. 8  |  5:30PM – 7:00PM
Any writer can tell you that it’s not an easy life. The bad economy and the upheaval in the publishing industry make our time especially difficult. As writers, we’re trying to do it all–marketing, publicity, distribution, and accounting in addition to our creative work. We need all the help we can get, and who understands our needs better than other writers?
In this gathering of distinguished Wisconsin writers, (Paula W. Dail, Kathleen Ernst, Adam Fell, Janet Halfmann, Wendy Vardaman) we’ll discuss practical ways that we can help each other. We’ll share stories of support from our peers and talk about the ways we give back to the literary community. Along with the panel discussion, our program includes readings by winners of our annual contest, the Wisconsin Writers Awards.
The Council for Wisconsin Writers is a unique group of writers, poets, and educators dedicated to the recognition of outstanding work by state writers and to promoting public awareness of Wisconsin’s great literary heritage.
You can submit questions for the panel discussion in advance. Please send your questions to geoff@geoffgilpin.com.
Please visit the CWW website at www.wiswriters.org

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News We Hope You Can Use

In addition of the new “News” page on the Council for Wisconsin Writers website at www.wiswriters.org, the Council is supplementing the major events and announcements posted there with this blog, which will provide more detailed information about what’s going on in the Wisconsin writing community.

The number of organizations–large, small, active, not-so active, formal, more casual, genre specific and general–abound in Wisconsin. Events for some of those organizations as well as many of their members’ publishing credits and recognition are truly impressive and contribute to Wisconsin being at the forefront of the literary world.

While this blog is not exclusively for CWW events and members, this initial post focuses on the organization’s annual contest which opened the first of this month and will close on Jan. 31, 2012. Awards will be presented to first place and honorable mention winners at the Council’s annual banquet, May 12, 2012, at the Wisconsin Club in Milwaukee.

Contest categories–there are nine of them–guidelines and entry forms can be found at http://www.wiswriters.org/contests.htm.

First place winners in eight categories each receive a $500 award and a week in a residency writing program with Shake Rag Alley Center for Arts and Crafts and Maplewood Lodge in Mineral Point.

 The ninth category is the Essay Award for Young Writers, which recognizes Wisconsin high school students’ nonfiction writing. First place award in that category is usually $150, but is $250 this year, thanks to a generous contribution from an anonymous patron. Qualifications and guidelines for the youth essay category are at http://www.wiswriters.org/Student_Contest_Guidelines.pdf. The entry form is at http://www.wiswriters.org/Student_Contest_Entry_Form.pdf.

You can help spread the word about the student essay contest by printing and distributing a flyer, which is at http://www.geoffgilpin.com/pdfs/CWW-Essay-Award-flyer.pdf. The flyer can be given to high school students, teachers and counselors and other interested individuals and groups and posted in libraries and other appropriate locations.

The Council for Wisconsin Writers hopes visitors to this blog will find it informative and will send items to be considered for posting to blog manager Jerrianne Hayslett at jfarhsi[at]aol.com.

Visitors who want to receive email notification when new posts are published or updated can do so by clicking on the “Follow” button at the upper right of this blog page.