A literary baby grows up, with plenty of nurturing

If you’d asked me, five years ago, whether Inkberry would still be flourishing after half a decade I would have blithely said yes. Emily and Sandy and I had no idea what we were getting into when we founded Inkberry. We wanted a literary arts organization in town, so we built one; we assumed that if we built it, people would come. Surely our little nonprofit would thrive forever!

As Inkberry marks its fifth anniversary this summer, I see things differently. I know now what goes into starting, and running, an arts nonprofit. There have been countless late nights of list-making, and early morning board meetings; brainstorming sessions, and author phone calls; workshop sessions and book discussions, classes packed with students and classes canceled for low enrollment. We’ve nurtured new writers, and learned from experienced ones. Inkberry’s first five years have been an incredible adventure, and I look back on them with gratitude and more than a little awe at what we’ve managed to do.

Inkberry is an independent nonprofit organization dedicated to fostering the literary arts in and around Berkshire County. Through workshops geared toward every level of writer, and a reading series that both brings established writers into our community and promotes local talent, we aim to strengthen connections between writing and life, and create a place where everyone can discover their voice.

That’s Inkberry’s mission statement, drafted in my living room back in 2000 as we prepared to launch Inkberry in the spring of 2001. We offered our first workshops in April of that year, and began our reading series with noted poet Donald Hall in June.

Since then we’ve offered nearly 100 writing workshops and book discussion groups, both in-person and online, in subjects ranging from poetry of place and screenwriting, to food writing and humor writing, to novel-writing, midrash, and the art of the personal essay.

We’ve also presented more than 90 writers and artists in our reading series, with events in North Adams, Williamstown, Adams, and — in May of this year — Great Barrington. Among those writers and artists are regional and emerging novelists, poets, essayists, and playwrights — plus winners and finalists for just about every literary award there is, from the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize to the Caldecott Medal and World Fantasy Award.

I’ll never forget the day we nipped next door to Berkshire World Travel to buy our first (and, to date, only) plane ticket for a visiting writer; we flew poet Bob Hicok here, and presented him in a reading with young poet Aaron Jorgenson as the opening act. We brought nonfiction writer Ted Conover here to read from his book Newjack, about being a rookie prison guard in the New York State prison system, and discovered he was every bit as pleasant in person as he seemed in print. Hanne Blank taught a master class at Inkberry on writing erotica…our second-most popular class ever. (The most popular was “The Bible As,” a scripture book group led by rabbi Jeff Goldwasser and minister Rick Spalding.

We’ve worked with the Breast Health Initiative of North Adams Regional Hospital to help breast cancer patients and survivors tell their stories, taught area middle-school kids the fine art of self-published ‘zine creation and looked at the Bible through a literary lens.

We’ve been funded by the Cultural Council of Northern Berkshire, the Massachusetts Cultural Council, the National Endowment for the Arts, and hundreds of people and families who’ve sent five or ten or a hundred bucks our way. We’ve introduced, and reintroduced, countless people to the joys of self-expression and the pleasures of the written word.

Birthdays and anniversaries are valuable because they give us the opportunity to look back. Reflecting on what we’ve done, who we’ve met, and what we’ve learned leaves me marveling…and excited to see what happens next.

In the earliest days of planning and brainstorming, the three of us called Inkberry “our baby.” As Inkberry turns five, it’s abundantly clear that our nonprofit isn’t a baby anymore. Supported by the community, and constantly growing and changing to fit the needs of the people who keep it going, Inkberry at five is all grown up.

Join us for Inkberry’s fifth birthday party (which we’re calling Inkstravaganza!) on June 10th at the Cup and Saucer in North Adams…and join us for Inkberry’s second half-decade. As proud as I am of what we’ve done, I think the best is yet to come — and I extend my deepest thanks to everyone who’s been a part of this amazing ride.