Creative Writing Workshops
Craft development, community and support for writers at all levels.

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"But if I write what my soul thinks, it will be visible, and the words will be its body." Helen Keller.

Amherst Writers and Artists (AWA)
Underpinning the Amherst Writers methodology is the belief that everyone is creative, and there is no right or wrong in creative expression.

The AWA method creates space where everyone's innate creative genius can find expression.

With carefully selected prompts and the mysterious magic of writing together we invite fresh stories to venture out. Writers have the opportunity to share their work in every session, to receive positive, thoughtful feedback and to discover which aspects of their stories and voices resonate most with others.

The AWA method helps us to honour both the privacy and process of every writer -- to nurture and support in an unthreatening atmosphere of mutual respect. Although not specifically therapeutic, the AWA process is often helpful to people who are working through isolating difficulties like loss and illness.

“...to part a curtain, that invisible shadow that falls between people, the veil of indifference to each other's presence, each other's wonder, each other's human plight.” Eudora Welty


Melissa Webster 
Melissa@storiesandvoices.org
Melissa Webster is a  writer, story editor, and creative writing workshop leader.

She holds an MA in writing from Johns Hopkins Krieger School of Arts and Sciences and is a trained, certified and affiliated member of the Amherst Writers and Artists workshop method.

Her thesis work was recognised with an Outstanding Graduate Award, Johns Hopkins, (2011)
She received an honourable mention in New Millennium Writings creative non-fiction contest (2012)
Her writing has appeared in Harper Palate (USA); Agape Review (USA); New Contrast (South Africa); Mail and Guardian (South Africa); Harare News (Zimbabwe); Outside In Literary Travel Magazine (USA); The Center Magazine (Zimbabwe); Up, Do: Anthology of Flash Fiction by Women Writers (USA) and Penn-Union (USA).

Melissa served as script adjudicator for the Writers Guild of South Africa Muse awards in 2021 and 2022 and her screenwriting has been produced in the award-winning Zimbabwean short film, Freestate. Her feature script, Land of Grey Ghosts, was optioned by Portable Sky Productions.