Lions in Winter 2024:
Visiting Writers Roar for Creative Freedom
by Meghan Bentley, Alyssa Falco, Ray Fauley, Jay Johnson, Ethan Miller, Braden Reedy, Jenna Tobias, and Jordan Wetter
Lions in Winter 2024, EIU’s annual literary festival, brought students and professional writers together on January 24-25 to share their love of stories. This year’s writers were Cynthia Pelayo, award-winning poet and author of Crime Scene, nonfiction writer Emily Maloney, author of Cost of Living, and Taymour Soomro, acclaimed author of the novel Other Names For Love.
Pelayo, Maloney, and Soomro all read from their work on the 25th, along with short readings by EIU students Athena Ballard, Riley Bauer, Sabrina Bunting, Hannah Hadley, Erica Heldenbrand, Maddy McLaughlin, and Ethan Miller.
On the 26th, each writer spent an hour giving craft talks to attendees. Here, the authors shared their process and feelings about writing. They read from drafts or manuscripts, leaked a few spoilers, and gave listeners a behind-the-scenes look at the life of a professional writer.
Although sponsored by the English Department and the Doudna Fine Arts Center, Lions is a public event. Anyone and everyone can attend regardless of their major. The festival is rooted in storytelling and bringing writers and readers together. As Studio Arts major Pamela Zimmerman noted, “I think it’s important for non-writing students to see what writing students’ work looks like. It’s pretty accessible.”
Hearing authors speak about their writing processes and struggles, along with having the works of student authors at the event, created the inspirational environment that Dr. Colleen Abel, the festival’s organizer, sought to build. Many students who attended felt motivated to create and share their work after the event. As Zimmerman said, "It was a good learning experience for me as someone who wants to read my own work for others someday too.”
When asked what she wants students to take away from this year’s Lions in Winter event, Dr. Abel remarked that she hopes they find “inspiration in life,” a goal reflected by the visiting authors in their craft talks and in the experiences of those who attended.
Pelayo aimed her talk at inspiring students to create, hoping to rouse the audience to open a notebook and write. One of the major reasons Pelayo identified why new writers find themselves anxious to create and share their writing is the Spotlight Effect, a psychological phenomenon where it feels like more people are watching and judging you than there truly are.
The solution Pelayo posed to her audience is not to worry about other people’s opinions while writing. “It's just you and your writing,” she said. “It's just you and your thoughts. It's just you and your page.” This theme of writing for yourself, rather than conforming to others, was a prominent theme throughout Pelayo’s talk. The writing process is validation in itself, Pelayo explained. “If you write, you’re a writer.”
She said that when in graduate school participating in a writing workshop, another student tore her down, continuously saying they didn’t understand her work. She replied, “it’s just a werewolf story. It’s not that deep.” She went on to advise possible writers to share their work in progress with “nurturing” readers. She also empowered listeners to have intimate experiences with the blank pages before them, sharing what they need to share, telling the story they need to tell.
Pelayo said she has learned not to take others’ opinions personally. It isn’t that she doesn’t care, though. She wants to write without worrying about opinions or the boundaries of a genre holding her back from her passion in writing. Her bottom line: “I hope you come away with: Do what you want.”
Emily Maloney has found her creative niche in telling the truth about her life through her writing. With her typical wry humor, she commented, "If you're a writer, things have probably gone terribly wrong at some point." More seriously, she spoke about how writing about her life has come with its fair share of conflict.
Speaking of her newest book, Burn This House Down, she said, “I don’t know if writing this book will end my relationship with my family. But I have to write the book.”
Maloney also said, “Telling the truth is ethical, even when it’s hard to hear.” She has learned through her writing career that it’s okay to write the truth angrily at first, but it’s important to take a step back and be compassionate while editing. Compassion, she says, has allowed her to tackle the difficult stories of her own life with absolute truth, creative freedom, and tact.
The compulsion to write is riddled with pitfalls and fears. Maloney noted, “I’m neurotically self-disclosive and have no shame.” With this attitude, she doesn’t give up on her work. She urged aspiring writers not to give up either and advised, “It’s good to make friends who are writers, who understand how horrible it is to be a writer.”
In his craft talk on the relationship between authors’ identities and how they affect the perception of their stories, Soomro pondered whether identity constrains authors to writing certain stories. For Soomro, creative freedom has been tied up with his identity as a queer, British-Pakistani man.
“I don’t want to feel like I have to write a Pakistani book,” Soomro said.
Still, Soomro showed that there are no easy answers to questions about who can write about what, and how authors’ identities affect the way readers respond to books. Though he doesn’t want to be confined to writing about his identities, he recognized that “Representation is important, and variety is important.”
The visiting writers’ emphasis on finding your creative freedom was echoed by English major Erica Heldenbrand, one of the student writers who read in the showcase. “Anything you put out into the world is yours,” she said. Heldenbrand also appreciated the advice not to stay in a given niche: “Don’t let format confine you” was another of the lessons she took away from the event.
Throughout this year’s Lions in Winter, it became clear that allowing yourself to grow is one of the best ways to exercise your creative freedoms. Learning other writers’ processes and workflows is “especially valuable to a writer,” said English major Raymond Cummins.
Maloney, Pelayo, and Soomro shared their writing, allowing audiences to peek into the worlds they have crafted. They also shared their philosophy and their practice as writers. Each writer shared moments of writing ecstasy, memories of failure, and motes of wisdom to inspire those listening: Tell the truth, tell it loud, and be who you are.
Meghan Bentley, Alyssa Falco, Ray Fauley, Jay Johnson, Ethan Miller, Braden Reedy, Jenna Tobias, and Jordan Wetter are EIU professional writing students.