Welcome New Inkwell Member,
I’m Dr. Ryan Thorpe, and I’m the founder and executive director of the Inkwell Literary Group. During my daily life, I’m an associate professor of writing at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, and I started Inkwell to try and develop a network of creative writers and literature lovers throughout China. We accept writers of all levels of expertise and experience, and we are open to all nationalities.
We started in 2015, and we’ve grown exponentially over the last few years. As a result, new members sometimes don’t know where to go to learn more about what is happening in Inkwell or how to join.
Inkwell generally offers free writing workshops and literature events, and these events can happen both online and offline. To know more about these events, I’d suggest following our official WeChat and reading the responses to most asked questions. Each city has its own WeChat group and Shanghai has several different WeChat rooms for specific genres of literature. To join these, add Ry on WeChat with his ID: Texaswriter. Some of workshops require access to the members section of Inkwell’s website, and you can learn more about the specifics of your city’s Inkwell in its chat. If you need to join the website to get to the members area, you can do that here.
To learn about specific times and places, talk to Ry and join the appropriate WeChat group. The website calendar is often close, but Inkwell is very free, and sometimes we forget things.
Inkwell is also a large group. We are entirely non-profit, and we work together as a community to improve our writing and understanding of literature. We publish a small literary zine called Visions, and if you’re interested in that, then I’d visit its page. For high school writers, we have The PVLSE, which is a zine written and edited by high school students. For more information about that, visit their page.
We go on retreat from time to time around Shanghai. There, we write, share work, and attend lectures from some of the more senior members. Information about the retreats are available on the official WeChat. We also offer lectures and events at different cities in China and online, and information about these can also be found on the official WeChat (QR code is on the side of the page).
If you’d like to help Inkwell out or are interested in running an event with Inkwell, we are always in need of more volunteers and event leaders. Volunteers have groups for publications, administration, and events. To join these teams, add Ry on WeChat with his ID: Texaswriter.
We are happy you are interested in joining Inkwell, and we hope to see you at a meeting.
Yours,
Dr. Ryan Thorpe
Executive Director of Inkwell