T-Bones

Each month, students and faculty in the Center for Writers gather at T-Bones, a local cafe and music shop, for our reading series. It’s a chance for students to share their work in the wider Hattiesburg community and to gain experience giving public readings. The atmosphere is always supportive and celebratory. In many ways these readings embody the spirit of the Center for Writers. They highlight the strong poetry and fiction coming out of our program while giving us a chance to catch up, have a drink, and relax with one another.

 Submit-a-Thon

Once per semester, we hold Submit-a-Thon. During this event, the school funds each student to submit to journals, contests, and conferences. It also gives the graduate students a chance to mentor some of the undergraduate creative writers who are new to sending out their work. We’ve had a great deal of success with this event. A lot of our students have been published because of the support they’ve received through Submit-a-Thon. This past semester each student was allotted almost $90!

Salons

Our Salon Reading Series is an open-mic opportunity for students to read their work in an intimate setting. They are essentially literary parties: we listen to poems and stories in the first half and party during the second half. We also bring in outside featured readers. These events allow students to read new works in progress, hear what others are up to, and experiment in other genres.