Maggie Smith presents Dear Writer

Join Magers & Quinn and the Loft Literary Center for an evening with beloved poet Maggie Smith, celebrating her brand new book on writing!

In conversation with Jeannine Ouellette

Good to know:

• Books can be purchased with ticket or at the event. The best way to ensure your copy is to pre-purchase with your ticket!'
• Check in starts at 5:00pm, Event starts at 5:30pm
• The Open Book Performance Hall is on the 2nd floor of the Open Book building (1011 Washington Ave. S, Minneapolis 55415)

About the book: New York Times bestselling author and poet Maggie Smith distills creativity and the craft of writing with a practical guide perfect for fans of Elizabeth Gilbert’s Big Magic and Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird.
Drawing from her twenty years of teaching experience and her bestselling Substack newsletter, For Dear Life, Maggie Smith breaks down creativity into ten essential elements: attention, wonder, vision, play, surprise, vulnerability, restlessness, tenacity, connection, and hope. Each element is explored through short, inspiring, and craft-focused essays, followed by generative writing prompts. Dear Writer provides tools that artists of all experience levels can apply to their own creative practices and carry with them into all genres and all areas of life.

About the speakers:

Maggie Smith is the award-winning New York Times bestselling author of eight books of poetry and prose, including You Could Make This Place Beautiful, Good Bones, Goldenrod, Keep Moving, and My Thoughts Have Wings. A 2011 recipient of a Creative Writing Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, Smith has also received a Pushcart Prize, and numerous grants and awards from the Academy of American Poets, the Sustainable Arts Foundation, the Ohio Arts Council, the Greater Columbus Arts Council, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. She has been widely published, appearing in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, The Nation, The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Best American Poetry, and more. You can follow her on social media @MaggieSmithPoet.

Jeannine Ouellette is the author of the memoir (Split/Lip Press, 2021), the children’s book Mama Moon, and several educational titles. Jeannine teaches creative writing with the Minnesota Pr*son Writing Workshop, and is the founder and director of Writing in the Dark, an independent creative writing program based in Minneapolis with in-person offerings across the U.S. and internationally, and virtual offerings on Zoom. Jeannine’s newsletter on Substack brings her teaching digitally to a community of thousands. Jeannine earned her MFA in fiction from Vermont College of Fine Arts and is working on a novel.

Host or Publisher Magers & Quinn Booksellers