Between 21-25 July I was invited to be a guest speaker and participant in a 5-day writing retreat organized by The Women’s Narratives, a story-sharing and Writing Retreat, held on the shores of the scenic Cayuga Lake in the Finger Lakes Region of upstate New York. The Retreat is run by a group of Ithaca women who believe in the power of storytelling. It was co-hosted by Emma Lou Shaikh writer and a successful businesswoman; Su George writer and professor of Chinese language at Cornell University; and Parveen Talpur writer, historian, and archaeologist whose ongoing journey of deciphering the ancient Indus inscriptions and symbols began at Cornell (1991-97).
The emphasis of this five-day retreat was on narrative, which means not only telling a story but how to tell it well. The goal was not merely to write a good narrative but also to experience writing itself as a therapeutic exercise. The participants included women from diverse backgrounds and various levels of writing experience (no experience is required to participate).
As a guest speaker, I was asked to give a talk on the goddess Aphrodite focusing on ancient literary evidence and her legacy as a source of inspiration for writers and artists throughout the ages and up to the present day. The Retreat proved to be a wonderful experience! Interacting with this small group of very inspiring women of all ages and engaging in narrative writing and sharing of our stories, allowed me an opportunity to reflect on my own writing style, which is predominantly academic. The workshop inspired me to explore different possibilities and the potential of including a narrative format in what often tends to be a dry and disengaging style of writing aimed at a restricted academic audience.
During the time spent together, our group had the opportunity to visit Cornell University, Ithaca College, and the broader Ithaca region, which is associated with a galaxy of internationally known literary personalities such as Carl Sagan (Dragons of Eden and Cosmos-the book and the TV series), Ann Druyan (Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey), Rod Serling (Twilight Zone TV series), Vladimir Nabokov (Lolita and Pale Fire), Alex Haley (The Autobiography of Malcolm X), Alison Lurie (Foreign Affairs, The War Between the Tates, The Last Resort), to name a few. Others, like Pearl Buck (The Good Earth), and Toni Morrison (Song of Solomon, Beloved), studied at Cornell and became Nobel Laureates.
While at Cornell, we also had the opportunity to visit the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, a teaching and research facility with 40,000 works in its collection, which includes an impressive collection of art from Asia, and a smaller Greek and Roman collection, as well as European art before 1800, including an El Greco painting of St. James.
A trip to the nearby historic city of Seneca Falls, the birthplace of women’s rights, where the first women’s rights convention in the USA was held in 1848, was most inspirational! Here we visited the small museum on the site of the Wesleyan chapel where the convention launched the women’s suffrage movement, which more than seven decades later ensured women the right to vote. The five women who organized the Seneca Falls Convention-Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucretia Mott, Mary M’Clintock, Martha Coffin Wright, and Jane Hunt- were also active in the abolitionist movement, which called for an end to slavery and racial discrimination.
The National Women’s Hall of Fame is also located at Seneca Falls inside a restored knitting mill dating to 1844.
The museum is dedicated to honoring and celebrating the achievements of distinguished American women, some of them famous and some more obscure but equally influential, including Maya Angelou, Amelia Earhart, Aretha Franklin, Hillary Clinton, Billie Holiday, and Helen Keller, amongst many others. There are more than 300 inductees at present, with the number growing every year.
Ithaca is also the home of the Namgyal Tibetan monastery, established by His Holiness Dalai Lama in 2004, and we visited the site where a new library and learning center are currently under construction. Namgyal Ithaca is the North American Seat of the Personal Monastery of HH Dalai Lama.
Overall, the experience gained during this 5-day writing retreat was invaluable. Being in the company of women with great stories to tell and inspired by the beautiful scenery and historic landmarks of the Finger Lakes region while indulging in the culinary delights of locally grown organic produce, making it a most productive and rewarding retreat.
