MONADNOCK PASTORAL POETS & WRITERS RETREAT XIX
THE RETREAT – April 25 – 27, 2025
For over a quarter of a century, this group of writers has gathered annually to celebrate new work and publications as the New Pastoral Poets and Writers. These award-winning writers have been anthologized in China for over a decade, including a book On the Monadnock: The New American Pastoral Poets (Chinese Drama Press: Beijing, 2006). They have spent decades staying true to language written beneath the shadow of the mountain Emerson, Thoreau, and Kinnell made famous—Mount Monadnock.
Please join us for the annual gathering of the Monadnock New Pastoral Poets & Writers as they host their weekend poetry retreat at the Barbara C. Harris Conference Center in Greenfield, NH.
The weekend will be low-key, collegial, but full with small group (6 maximum) workshops (a primary workshop that meets twice and an optional single-session secondary workshop that meets once), an individual conference with mentors, readings by participants, writing time, social time, optional activities such as Saturday night acoustic folk music by The Grumbling Rustics. The conference concludes with the 30th annual reading of mentors, followed by a closing banquet.
There will also be an opportunity to enjoy the almost 350 acres of hiking trails at the Harris Center on Otter Lake. See: www.bchcenter.org or e-mail [email protected] for additional details.
Registration is limited to maintain a small workshop size.
TENTATIVE SCHEDULE
Friday Evening (April 25):
Wine and cheese reception 6 p.m.
American renga ceremony 7:30 p.m.
Saturday (April 26):
Breakfast (buffet style) : 8 a.m.
Primary Workshop 9:30–11 a.m.
Lunch (buffet style): noon
Participants reading 1–2 p.m.
Optional workshop//Indiv. conf./
Leisure activities: 2–4 p.m.
Dinner (buffet style): 6 p.m.
Participants reading 7– 8:30 p.m.
Acoustic music: 8:45 – 10 p.m.
Sunday (April 27):
Breakfast: (buffet style) 8 a.m.
Primary Workshop 9:15—11:15 a.m.
Lunch: (buffet style) noon
Indiv. conf./writing
Optional presentation workshop 1–2 p.m.
31st. Pastoral Poets Reading 2:15—3:45 p.m.
Closing Banquet: 4 p.m.
REGISTRATION
Registration deadline: 3-22-25
Per-preson includes meals and private or semi-private cabin lodging, two workshops, individual conference with mentor, readings, and closing banquet, Adult Friendly Cabin (4 guests) $500, Lodge Double: $550, Lodge single: $650. Day Rate: $390 (meals but no lodging). Late fee (space available) add $50 (after 3-22-24) (Online payment option, add $15 processing fee)
Primary Workshop (Meets twice)
Fiction/Drama (T. Farish, D. Mulligan)
Prose/Personal Narrative: (Becky Rule, Maura MacNeil )
Poetry: (J. Hodgen/J. Beschta; S. Roney-O’Brien, H. Walters, Henry Walters [R. Martin, Sat. p.m. Indiv.])
Please include with the application 3 poems or 3-5 pages of fiction or prose you’d like to workshop.
The Mentors:
Award-winning poet Jim Beschta, author of Cutting the Cemetery Lawn and North From Yaounde, (Adastra Press: 2009) and teaches on the poetry faculty of the Worcester Art Museum.
Novelist Terry Farish’s seventh book, The Good Braider, won the 2013 Lupine Award. Her children’s book The Cat Who Liked Potato Soup won the NH Reading Association’s Book of the Year and has been released in Japan. She has written three adult novels and three novels for adolescents.
John Hodgen’s latest poetry collection, What We May Be, will be published by Lynx House Press in the fall of 2023. John has received AWP’s Donald Hall Prize and the Grolier Poetry Prize among his many awards. The Univ. of Pitt. Press released his 4th book of poetry, Heaven and Earth Holding Company, in 2010.
Maura MacNeil is the author of the poetry collections Lost Houses, A History of Water, and This Last Place. She is the founder and editor of Off the Margins and is a Professor of Creative Writing at New England College.
Rodger Martin, co-editor of The Granite State Poetry Series, has an Appalachia award for poetry. He has four poetry books: The Battlefield Guide, The Blue Moon Series, For All the Tea Zhnggou and The Nemo Poems. Hid fith book, a series of translations with Chinese poet/calligrpher Zi Chuan, is due out in Taiwan late 2024.
Diane V. Mulligan has written two novels for adults: What She Inherits (2017), which was named an Honorable Mention for Mainstream Fiction in Writers’ Digest’s 25th Annual Self-Published Book Awards, and The Latecomers Fan Club (2013), which was named a 2014 IndieReader Discovery Award winner. Her first novel, Watch Me Disappear (2012), for young adults, was a Kindle Book Review Best Indie Book Award finalist in 2013.
Susan Roney-O’Brien, winner of Nightshade Press’s William and Kingman Page Poetry Book Award and NEATE’s Poet of the Year, she has published two books of poetry, Farmwife and Earth. Her poems have appeared in Prairie Schooner, Beloit Poetry Journal, and Diner.
Rebecca Rule is a full-time writer, humorist, storyteller, host of the NH Authors Series on NHPTV for ten years, and current host of Our Hometown on NHPTV. The author of a dozen books for children and adults, her latest is That Reminds Me of a Funny Story: a memoir, how-to, and compendium of Yankee humor. She writes a monthly humor column for New Hampshire Magazine called “Ayuh.” Her daughter, Adi Rule, is also a writer.
Henry Walters’ Field Guide A Tempo (Hobble- bush: 2015) became the ninth title of The Granite State Poetry Series. His poetry won The Better Magazine poetry award in 2013. His seo0cnd book of poetry, The Nature Thief, (Waywiser Press) came out in 2022.
USE THE BUTTONS BELOW TO REGISTER AND PAY ONLINE WITH PAYPAL
| Adult Friendly Cabin (4 guests) | |
| Double | |
| Single | |
| Day Rate (meals, but no lodging) |
To register/pay by mail, make checks payable to:
Monadnock Pastoral Poetry Retreat
30 North Rd., Hancock, NH 03449