Summer Workshop News and Yosef Wosk Supports the Fellowship!
We had a wonderful 2022 season with the Six-Month Intensive cohort and now turn towards summer plans. As always, we welcome your SOLO and VMI Pro applications throughout the year and your Intensive and Fellowship applications for the 2023 cohort by November 9, 2022. With that, we want to share good news:
- Vancouver Manuscript Intensive and Dr. Yosef Wosk are working together to fund the Yosef Wosk VMI Fellowship to mentor emerging writers of promise. We celebrate this partnership by renaming the program that was formerly known as the “VMI Fellowship” in honour of Dr. Wosk’s philanthropic support.
- Director Rachel Rose is running a one-of-a-kind workshop this August, “Write Outside”. Info is below and also on our site here. Please read through to learn more!
The Yosef Wosk VMI Fellowship is for a writer of exceptional promise with a manuscript in progress, who has faced significant barriers to fulfilling that promise. This competitive Fellowship includes a full scholarship to the Six-Month Intensive 2023 program to work with one of our award-winning authors. While Canadian, U.S. and international applicants can apply, communication and work will be in English. The successful Fellow will be featured at the program’s graduation reading in June 2023 and may be interviewed for publication on VMI’s website and in literary journals.
- Application deadline: November 9, 2022
- Notifications: November 30, 2022
- Tuition: WAIVED
- Course date: January 2023—June 2023. An orientation for the group on Zoom will take place in the first week of January. The mentor and Fellow will decide together on a date to begin their work.
- The Fellow may be mentored by any one of our active mentors and may apply with work in any genre. Mentor pairing is determined by several factors, including mentor availability, enthusiasm for the proposed project, and VMI’s careful assessment of the best match.
Further details and application guidelines and forms can be found here.
Vancouver Manuscript Intensive is grateful to Dr. Wosk for his support and is excited to be working with him in this capacity in the literary community.
Yosef Wosk is an Adjunct Professor in Humanities, a Simons Fellow, a Shadbolt Fellow, and former Director of Interdisciplinary Programs in Continuing Studies at Simon Fraser University where he developed seminal programs such as The Philosophers’ Café and The Canadian Academy of Independent Scholars. In addition to being an ordained rabbi and receiving two honorary doctorates, he holds Ph.D.s in Religion & Literature as well as in Psychology, and Masters degrees in Education and Theology. As a businessman, he is president of Binyan and Kolbo Holdings. Widely travelled—including expeditions to both the North and South Poles—Dr. Yosef Wosk is a Fellow of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society. An active media commentator, public speaker and published author, he has founded hundreds of libraries on all seven continents and supported museums in many countries, has endowed Vancouver’s Poet Laureate, and has taught thousands of students over the past fifty years. Identified as one of the top ten thinkers and most thoughtful citizens in the province, Dr. Wosk is included in Canadian Who’s Who and has been presented with numerous awards including The Order of Canada, The Order of British Columbia, The Queen’s Golden and Diamond Jubilee Medals, and a Culture Beyond Borders Medal from the United Nations. In May 2022 he received the Freedom of the City Award, Vancouver’s highest civic honour.
For more information or to support the Yosef Wosk VMI Fellowship with a donation, or to access VMI mentorship programs, please visit the site.
Write Outside VMI Summer Intensive With Rachel Rose
Write. Walk. Swim. Find your inspiration.
Four Saturday afternoons in August: 6th, 13, 20, 27 from 3-5:30-ish.
Jericho Beach. 6 participants maximum.
This workshop will provide participants with feedback and support on sections of a manuscript-in-progress, including individually tailored writing prompts to deepen their work and to break new ground. Each writer will read selections of their work aloud each time we meet, and the group will offer feedback, troubleshoot issues of concern to the writer, and reflect on what they have heard. Reading aloud, deep sharing and creative conversation while walking will all be integral to this process, as we brainstorm and strategize to bring forth the best possible work from each participant in an atmosphere of mutual respect and curiosity. This summer intensive will also be an opportunity to jump-start the in-person creative writing community that we have missed so much during the pandemic, and to develop ongoing ties of mutual support.
Applicants will be selected by Rachel Rose based on her enthusiasm for what she would have to offer the applicant’s project-in-progress, as well as what they will offer to other applicants. Participants should enjoy being outside and walking over sand and in the woods. Ending with sea swims will be optional but wonderful. Cost $440 plus GST total $462.00.
To apply, please send a paragraph or two describing who you are, what you are working on, what you are looking for in a workshop, and the skills and strengths you would have to offer a group. Send to info@vancouvermanuscriptintensive.com. Deadline to apply August 1, 2022. Payment will be via etransfer upon acceptance. Precise location details will be shared in advance. We will meet regardless of the weather.
Rachel Rose’s debut short story collection, The Octopus Has Three Hearts, was longlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize. She’s the author of four collections of poetry, including Marry & Burn, which was a finalist for the Governor General’s Award. Her memoir, The Dog Lover Unit: Lessons in Courage from the World’s K9 Cops, was shortlisted for the 2018 Arthur Ellis award. She is the Poet Laureate Emerita of Vancouver. She has received two Pushcart Prizes as well as the Audre Lorde Award, the Pat Lowther Award, and the Bronwen Wallace Award for fiction. She co-directs Vancouver Manuscript Intensive with Elee Kraljii Gardiner.
We wish you a wonderful writing summer!