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All Aboard the Amtrak Writer’s Residency

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All Aboard the Amtrak Writer's Residency!

All Aboard the Amtrak Writer’s Residency!

The internet (and particularly the Twitterverse) is all abuzz about the new, developing-as-we-speak Amtrak writer’s residency program, a program started in large part by a simple tweet.  You can read the story on THE WIRE here, but in a nutshell New York writer Jessica Gross, after reading an interview with Alexander Chee, in which he said “I still like a train best for [writing]. I wish Amtrak had residencies for writers,” tweeted out to @amtrak, who set her up with one — a New York to Chicago round-trip.  Now, Amtrak is moving forward with offering train residencies to writers, for free (or at least cheap).  How cool is that?

And how obvious, once you think about it.  I love train rides, and I love writing on the train.  There’s something about it that stimulates creativity, harkening back to a simple, more romantic time, to a time when writing was a calling, when locomotion was king.  And it triggers thoughts of fun fiction: MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS, the train ride to Hogwarts, 3:10 TO YUMA, heck even THOMAS THE TANK ENGINE.  Trains, unlike planes, don’t conceal the fact you are traveling long distances.  The world rushes by in a train, and you are part of it.  In a plane, the world is distant, conceptual, and you hover above it.  Trains are an adrenaline rush, planes are somnolent.

I’m sure somewhere there are naysayers already pointing out that free rides cost money, and that Amtrak is not known as a successful business model.  They would be missing the point, however.  Amtrak’s quick response to Gross’s tweet, while showing business and social media savvy, also illustrates, I’d like to believe, Amtrak’s innate understanding of the place of the train in American society, an almost mythical role stretching from the legend of John Henry’s heroic construction of railway tunnels to THE POLAR EXPRESS to (shout-out to my genre fans) Stephen King’s monorail in THE DARK TOWER series.  Amtrak’s offer isn’t about profit, it’s about passion and art and yes, Romance with a big “R.”  Bean counters need not apply.

So speaking of applications: I’m a writer, I like trains.  I like to write on trains.

Where do I sign up?


Filed under: Authors, Writing Tagged: 3:10 to Yuma, Alexander Chee, Amtrak, Amtrak Writer's Residency, Hogwarts train, Jessica Gross, locomotion, locomotives, Murder on the Orient Express, Stephen King, The Dark Tower, The Polar Express, The Wire, Thomas the Tank Engine, trains, writing

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