Unfortunately, the photograph with which I would have preferred to begin this post doesn’t exist. Instead I’ll have to help you reach the right place to recreate the picture for yourself mentally. I’m John Bradley, interim associate director of the Writing Center; thanks for following my lead. I’ll get to the point along the way, I promise.

Start with the photograph to the left here. This is the Campus Lakeshore Area and downtown Madison. Find the fairly squat concrete building with the long rows of black windows near the water line. It’s the one adjacent to the three piers closest to us. That’s Helen C. White Hall. Pick out the window in the middle of the uppermost story of Helen C. Then glance to the window just below that, one floor down. That’s the window of room 6191. It’s got quite a view. To get the right mental image, then, we’ll move from the serene vantage point of this aerial photograph and put ourselves at that window looking out. It’s a crisp spring morning outside with a bright blue sky and a gentle breeze moving across the water.

Back up with me across the room to stand at the door. Keep that view in focus, but add six figures spaced out along two tables just in front of that window, black silhouettes against the bright sky and sun struck water. That, folks, is the photograph I don’t have. It’s the one I’ve been romanticizing more and more (can’t you tell?) since I passed the doorway to room 6191 one recent Saturday morning to check on the group that had chosen the room with the lake view to do their writing during the Writing Center’s second Writers’ Retreat this spring.

Those six didn’t need any checking on at the moment, any more than the retreat writers in our three other rooms that morning did. With their headphones in, their cups of coffee steaming by their sides, and the soft clack-clack-clack of their laptop keyboards filling the air, they seemed completely absorbed in their writing and completely oblivious to me and, well, everything else. I couldn’t have stumbled upon a more striking visual encapsulation of what has made our Writer’s Retreats a wonderful new addition to the Writing Center’s workshop roster this spring and a resounding success with a very promising future. We provided space and time and quiet, and, committed to making the most of those, they were busy writing–on projects big and small and in disciplines ranging from Microbiology and Theater to Journalism and Geology–in the motivating company of others.

Building on the success of our dissertation boot camps last summer, we planned our Writers’ Retreats around a very simple premise. Here’s the blurb we used to publicize them:

“It’s time to make substantial progress with your major writing project. And time is exactly what our writer’s retreats offer. Ditch the distractions and join a group of others all motivated to do one thing: putting hands on the keyboard and words on the page. Build your writing momentum with our February retreat. End the semester strong with our April retreat.

Retreat participants will engage in brief goal-setting exercises followed by time to write in various spaces provided by the Writing Center, with Writing Center staff on hand for consultation.”

In the vast majority of our workshops as a writing center, we have something to teach. We bring writers around a common or a tricky genre and help them see their way through it, offering guiding principles, dissecting models, and otherwise building up a base of knowledge and comfort that helps participants start a draft or take the next step with one. The Writers’ Retreat is different. In many ways, the more we stay out of the way and the less we say, the better. At most, we prompt participants to articulate some goals for themselves in the opening minutes of the retreat and then encourage accountability by having them share those goals in small groups. Writers can choose to have a quick 15-20 minute conversation with one of the Writing Center staff on hand to talk through a block, think through an idea, or get a fresh pair of eyes on something they’ve just written. Otherwise, though, our remaining interaction is to gather everyone together at the end of four hours for a chance to report and reflect on what they achieved.

But while every single participant in the retreat could have done the same thing in a quiet corner of the library (minus the consultations) without the opening and closing group circle-up, they chose to attend our retreat instead. And to sign up for the next one. And to ask for more of these to be held on a regular basis. And to form their own spin-off writing groups (I’m aware of at least three) that meet elsewhere on a regular basis in the meantime.

In Writing Groups: History, Theory, and Implications (1987), Anne Ruggles Gere articulates the powerful draw of opportunities to write in a group like this. On the one hand, Gere writes, “forces, ranging from aspects of intellectual history to social institutions such as copyright law, have contributed to the dominance of a solo-performer view of writing.” And as all of us know who have ever kept writing while the rest of the world slept or have drudged away on a draft in a dark corner library of the stacks only to emerge desperate for social interaction, the reality of the writer as “solo-performer” extends far beyond our by-lines. On the other hand, as Gere explains so effectively, writing groups “contribute to our understanding of what it means to write. Specifically, writing groups highlight the social dimension of writing. They provide tangible evidence that writing involves human interaction as well as solitary inscription” (my emphasis, p. 3).

Gere’s true focus is on groups that write together and then offer each other feedback on drafts. Our Writers’ Retreats don’t go even that far, but they don’t seem to need to. Simply bringing that act of “solitary inscription” into the company of others seems to help alleviate some of difficulties that come from the “solitary” part. If the retreats “teach” anything, it’s that they help normalize that social dimension to the most isolated and isolating part of the writing process, which can only be a benefit in a campus environment with such potentially high pressure on writing. I won’t lie; there’s a bit of accountability and shame involved: “If my neighbor isn’t on facebook right now, maybe I shouldn’t be either.” But, in general, the group lends more a sense of purpose and determination than anything else: “If others are sticking to writing for one more hour, so can I.”

And with so many commitments competing for undergrads’ and graduate students’ attentions alike, it’s also hard for some not to gravitate to an event that requires that they make a firm commitment of time and energy and which allows them to mark their calendars as “busy” in a way many of us find hard to do with our solitary writing time. I’m convinced these elements all play a role in the near unanimous requests we have received after both retreats so far for more retreat opportunities more frequently. In some way shape or form, we hope to make that happen. As you begin to formulate a comment for this post, I welcome your thoughts on the retreat format and experience as well as sustainable models for meeting the apparently high demand for these events in the future.