Sycamore Hill Writer's Workshop is an annual

workshop Beginning with the Industrial Revolution era, a workshop may be a room, rooms or building which provides both the area and tools (or machinery) that may be required for the manufacture or repair of manufactured goods. Workshops were the only ...

for

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...

writers. Since its origin in 1985, it has been held in Raleigh,

North Carolina North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and So ...

; Bryn Mawr,

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

; and most recently in Little Switzerland, North Carolina. Currently organized by Richard Butner, Sycamore Hill was started by

John Kessel John Joseph Vincent Kessel (born September 24, 1950) is an American author of science fiction and fantasy. He is a prolific short story writer, and the author of four solo novels, '' Good News From Outer Space'' (1989), ''Corrupting Dr. Nice'' ( ...

and

Mark L. Van Name Mark L. Van Name (born 14 March 1955) is an American science fiction writer and technology consultant. As of 2009, Van Name lives in North Carolina. About With John Kessel, Van Name co-founded the Sycamore Hill Writer's Workshop in 1985, and ...

. It is an invitation-only workshop for established SF, fantasy, and slipstream writers. Attendees have included

Kelly Link Kelly Link (born July 19, 1969) is an American editor and author of short stories. While some of her fiction falls more clearly within genre categories, many of her stories might be described as slipstream or magic realism: a combination of sci ...

Carol Emshwiller Carol Emshwiller (April 12, 1921 – February 2, 2019) was an American writer of avant garde short stories and science fiction who has won prizes ranging from the Nebula Award to the Philip K. Dick Award. Ursula K. Le Guin has called her "a ma ...

Harlan Ellison Harlan Jay Ellison (May 27, 1934 – June 28, 2018) was an American writer, known for his prolific and influential work in New Wave speculative fiction and for his outspoken, combative personality. Robert Bloch, the author of '' Psycho'' ...

Bruce Sterling Michael Bruce Sterling (born April 14, 1954) is an American science fiction author known for his novels and short fiction and editorship of the ''Mirrorshades'' anthology. In particular, he is linked to the cyberpunk subgenre. Sterling's first ...

Connie Willis Constance Elaine Trimmer Willis (born December 31, 1945), commonly known as Connie Willis, is an American science fiction and fantasy writer. She has won eleven Hugo Awards and seven Nebula Awards for particular works—more major SF awards than ...

Karen Joy Fowler Karen Joy Fowler is an American author of science fiction, fantasy, and literary fiction. Her work often centers on the nineteenth century, the lives of women, and alienation. She is best known as the author of the best-selling novel ''The Jan ...

Jonathan Lethem Jonathan Allen Lethem (; born February 19, 1964) is an American novelist, essayist, and short story writer. His first novel, ''Gun, with Occasional Music'', a genre work that mixed elements of science fiction and detective fiction, was publishe ...

James Patrick Kelly James Patrick Kelly (born April 11, 1951 in Mineola, New York) is an American science fiction author who has won both the Hugo Award and the Nebula Award. Biography Kelly made his first fiction sale in 1975. He graduated magna cum laude from ...

, Robert Frazier,

Ted Chiang Ted Chiang (born 1967) is an American science fiction writer. His work has won four Nebula awards, four Hugo awards, the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer, and six Locus awards. His short story "Story of Your Life" was the basis of the ...

Benjamin Rosenbaum Benjamin Rosenbaum (born August 23, 1969) is an American science fiction, fantasy, and literary fiction writer and computer programmer, whose stories have been finalists for the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, the Theodore Sturgeon Award, the BSFA ...

, and Don Webb, among many others. Butner has described the methodology used at Sycamore Hill: "We all sit in a circle. Critique starts to the author’s left and goes clockwise in order. You can talk for up to ten minutes about the story (no ad hominem stuff). There’s no cross talk during critique. At the very end, the author gets to respond at whatever length they desire." A collection of original stories from the 1994 workshop was published as the anthology ''Intersections: The Sycamore Hill Anthology'', edited by John Kessel, Mark L. Van Name and Richard Butner (

Tor Books Tor Books is the primary imprint of Tor Publishing Group (previously Tom Doherty Associates), a publishing company based in New York City. It primarily publishes science fiction and fantasy titles, and is the largest publisher of Chinese scien ...

, 1996). It includes works by Richard Butner, Carol Emshwiller, Karen Joy Fowler, Robert Frazier,

Gregory Frost Gregory Frost (born May 13, 1951) is an American author of science fiction and fantasy, and directs a fiction writing workshop at Swarthmore College in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania. He received his Bachelor's degree from the University of Iowa. A gr ...

Alexander Jablokov Alexander Jablokov (born April 29, 1956) is an American writer and novelist. Career He worked for years as a communications engineer in Boston before becoming a full-time writer in 1988; however, he later took a day job as a marketing executiv ...

, James Patrick Kelly, John Kessel,

Nancy Kress Nancy Anne Kress (born January 20, 1948) is an American science fiction writer. She began writing in 1976 but has achieved her greatest notice since the publication of her Hugo- and Nebula-winning 1991 novella ''Beggars in Spain'', which became a ...

, Jonathan Lethem,

Maureen F. McHugh Maureen F. McHugh (born February 13, 1959) is an American science fiction and fantasy writer. Career McHugh's first published story was published as a ''Twilight Zone'' under a male pseudonym in 1988. It was followed by a pair of publication ...

Michaela Roessner Michaela-Marie Roessner-Hermann (born January 27, 1950) is an American science-fiction writer publishing under the name Michaela Roessner. Biography Born in San Francisco, she was raised in California, New York, Pennsylvania, Thailand, and Or ...

, Bruce Sterling, and Mark L. Van Name.

Orson Scott Card Orson Scott Card (born August 24, 1951) is an American writer known best for his science fiction works. He is the first and (as of 2022) only person to win both a Hugo Award and a Nebula Award in consecutive years, winning both awards for both ...

wrote about his experience at the Sycamore Hill Writer's Workshop in the essay "On Sycamore Hill." Scholars such as Michael Collins identify Card's Sycamore Hill experience as marking a critical "turning point" in his career. Sycamore Hill is known to have shaped several award-winning stories, and is featured in the acknowledgment pages of books like Ted Chiang's ''Arrival'' (a.k.a. ''

Stories of Your Life and Others ''Stories of Your Life and Others'' is a collection of short stories by American writer Ted Chiang originally published in 2002 by Tor Books. It collects Chiang's first eight stories. All of the stories except "Liking What You See: A Documentary" ...

'').

References

External links

workshop web page
Speculative fiction writing circles Writing circles Creative writing programs {{art-org-stub