Description
What does it take to truly step inside another life?
At its core, writing is a practice of compassion. Great novels ask us to imagine boldly and listen closely, while entering minds and worlds vastly different from our own.
In this workshop, debut novelist Brian Schaefer and award-winning author and N4 co-founder Colum McCann invite you into their creative process. Drawing from their own work, they’ll explore their approaches to crafting stories told from multiple points of view and creating fully realized characters across a range of experience, culture, and belief.
Through guided conversation and short, hands-on writing exercises, participants will experiment with inhabiting different perspectives and discover new narrative possibilities on the page.
Whether you’re an emerging writer or a seasoned storyteller, this workshop offers tools, insight, and inspiration to deepen your fiction—and expand the way you see the world.
We invite you to come write with compassion and discover new ways of seeing!
Presenter Bio – Brian Schaefer
Brian Schaefer contributes regularly to The New York Times and has written for The New Yorker, New York magazine, and more. He is a recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Arts Journalism and was a finalist for the Livingston Award for International Reporting. He earned his master’s degree in creative writing from Bar-Ilan University in Tel Aviv. He and his husband live in New York City and the Hudson Valley. Town & Country is his first novel.
Check out Brian Schaefer’s author page on the Simon & Schuster website to read an excerpt from Town & Country, explore the reading group guide, and more!
