USA 2011 NEW YORK CITY 28 SEPT–05 OCTOBER
WRITING RETREAT
With BARRY DIVOLA
“Chapter One. He adored New York City. He idolised it all out of proportion.”
If you recognised the above lines from Woody Allen’s 1979 film Manhattan, and totally identified with them, then have we got a retreat for you. Journalist and author Barry Divola lives in Sydney, but he has travelled to New York 15 times in the last 20 years and wants to share his experiences with you in a writing retreat.
Don’t expect the same old, same old — we’re not just going to do the Empire State Building/Statue Of Liberty/Times Square shuffle like all those other tourists. We want to see the city through fresh eyes. Barry will take you to unexpected places such as the quietest spots and hidden nooks in the city that never sleeps.
Manhattan is one of the biggest collections of neighbourhoods in the world, and we’re going to visit many of them, from the community gardens of the East Village to the classic tenement houses of the Lower East Side and the leafy streets of the West Village. We’ll venture everywhere from Central Park to Washington Square, and stroll across the Brooklyn Bridge to investigate what’s over the river.
We’ll visit bookworm hangouts, including Strand Books (you will not walk out empty-handed, so leave plenty of room in your suitcase), Barnes & Noble in Union Square (where we will catch an author’s talk), Paragraph (a co-operative where writers rent out cubicle space and share their work with each other), and more. If you’re a fan of popular culture, this is also the retreat for you, as along the way we’ll stop in everywhere from the diner from Seinfeld, to the street from the classic cover of The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, to the exact spot where Meg Ryan faked that orgasm in When Harry Met Sally.
Barry will talk you through a number of writing exercises inspired by our excursions around the city, and teach you about looking for story angles (both fiction and non-fiction). You will structure your ideas, write better travel stories and short fiction, battle writer’s block and hone your interview techniques (New Yorkers love to talk, and we’ll be talking to them).
The beauty of New York is that you can walk down any street and find an unusual store, fascinating character, or a classic view to inspire you. It’s a place where getting lost is a good thing. Come and get lost together in New York City.
Although this is primarily a writing retreat that will take in all that New York has to offer, if you are artistically inclined, please feel free to bring along your sketchpad, as you may want to capture visual ideas along with your writing journey.
We will be staying at the Library Hotel. Located between Grand Central Station and the NY Public Library, each floor is dedicated to a different category of the Dewey Decimal System, and each room has a collection of books relevant to a distinct topic. The hotel also has three different common areas where we can meet – The Writer’s Den, the Poetry Garden and the Bookmarks Lounge. The Library Hotel New York is regarded as one of the top rated luxury boutique hotels in New York City.
A member of HK Hotels
USA 2011
NEW YORK CITY 28 SEPT–05 OCTOBER
WRITING RETREAT
With BARRY DIVOLA
“Chapter One. He adored New York City. He idolised it all out of proportion.”
If you recognised the above lines from Woody Allen’s 1979 film Manhattan, and totally identified with them, then have we got a retreat for you. Journalist and author Barry Divola lives in Sydney, but he has travelled to New York 15 times in the last 20 years and wants to share his experiences with you in a writing retreat.
Don’t expect the same old, same old — we’re not just going to do the Empire State Building/Statue Of Liberty/Times Square shuffle like all those other tourists. We want to see the city through fresh eyes. Barry will take you to unexpected places such as the quietest spots and hidden nooks in the city that never sleeps.
Manhattan is one of the biggest collections of neighbourhoods in the world, and we’re going to visit many of them, from the community gardens of the East Village to the classic tenement houses of the Lower East Side and the leafy streets of the West Village. We’ll venture everywhere from Central Park to Washington Square, and stroll across the Brooklyn Bridge to investigate what’s over the river.
We’ll visit bookworm hangouts, including Strand Books (you will not walk out empty-handed, so leave plenty of room in your suitcase), Barnes & Noble in Union Square (where we will catch an author’s talk), Paragraph (a co-operative where writers rent out cubicle space and share their work with each other), and more. If you’re a fan of popular culture, this is also the retreat for you, as along the way we’ll stop in everywhere from the diner from Seinfeld, to the street from the classic cover of The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, to the exact spot where Meg Ryan faked that orgasm in When Harry Met Sally.
Barry will talk you through a number of writing exercises inspired by our excursions around the city, and teach you about looking for story angles (both fiction and non-fiction). You will structure your ideas, write better travel stories and short fiction, battle writer’s block and hone your interview techniques (New Yorkers love to talk, and we’ll be talking to them).
The beauty of New York is that you can walk down any street and find an unusual store, fascinating character, or a classic view to inspire you. It’s a place where getting lost is a good thing. Come and get lost together in New York City.
Although this is primarily a writing retreat that will take in all that New York has to offer, if you are artistically inclined, please feel free to bring along your sketchpad, as you may want to capture visual ideas along with your writing journey.
We will be staying at the Library Hotel. Located between Grand Central Station and the NY Public Library, each floor is dedicated to a different category of the Dewey Decimal System, and each room has a collection of books relevant to a distinct topic. The hotel also has three different common areas where we can meet – The Writer’s Den, the Poetry Garden and the Bookmarks Lounge. The Library Hotel New York is regarded as one of the top rated luxury boutique hotels in New York City.
A member of HK Hotels
CLICK HERE FOR MORE ABOUT BARRY DIVOLA