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A weekend of learning for writers of poetry, fiction, and non-fiction in Grades 8 through 12 from the greater Worcester area. The Bancroft Young Writers Conference offers a valuable opportunity for teenage writers to develop their craft with mentors who are published authors and working writers. Supported and encouraged by these mentors, attendees have the opportunity to work closely with - and learn from - dynamic, published writers, gain exposure to various genres of writing, learn about the writing process from idea to publication, and garner feedback on their writing.

Young Writers Conference 2023

April 29 & 30, 2023

What is the YWC?

The Young Writers Conference offers a valuable opportunity for teenage writers to develop their craft with mentors who are published authors and working writers. We strive to open a space for people who are curious, who wonder about how to get better at writing, how to develop their voices, and gain confidence to share their work with an audience.

Supported and encouraged by these mentors, you will have the opportunity to:

encourage your self-expressive, creative, and artistic writing in a non-judgmental environment
cultivate a joy of writing, and participate in a community of writers
share your passion with your peers
work closely with and learn from dynamic, published writers
gain exposure to various genres of writing
learn about the writing process from idea to publication from experienced writers
learn how to give quality feedback and how to receive feedback
develop ideas for future writing projects
use your writing to collaborate with other writers and artists

2023 MENTORS

Carolyn Oliver

Bio

Carolyn Oliver is the author of The Alcestis Machine (Acre Books, forthcoming 2024) and Inside the Storm I Want to Touch the Tremble (University of Utah Press, 2022), selected by Matthew Olzmann for the Agha Shahid Ali Prize in Poetry, as well as three chapbooks. Her poems appear in The Massachusetts Review, Copper Nickel, Poetry Daily, Shenandoah, Beloit Poetry Journal, 32 Poems, Southern Indiana Review, At Length, Plume, and elsewhere. Her honors include nominations for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net in both poetry and fiction the Goldstein Prize from Michigan Quarterly Review, the E. E. Cummings Prize from the NEPC, and the Frank O’Hara Prize from The Worcester Review, where she currently serves as editor. Carolyn lives with her family in Massachusetts. Her website is carolynoliver.net.

Eve Rifkah

Bio

Eve Rifkah was co-founder of Poetry Oasis, Inc. (1998-2012), a non-profit poetry association dedicated to education and promoting local poets. Founder, and editor DINER, a literary magazine. She is the 2021 recipient of the Stanley Kunitz award. She has five published books (not self-published). A play, Outcasts the Lepers of Penikese Island, based on her first book, Outcasts the Penikese Island Leper Hospital, 1905-1921, was performed at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, NY. She lives in Worcester, MA. www.eve-rifkah.com

Mandy Gonzalez

Bio

Mandy Gutmann-Gonzalez is a Chilean poet, novelist, translator, and text-based artist. They are the author of the novel La Pava, published by the Chilean press Ediciones Inubicalistas. Their poetry manuscript, Edge Beast, was a finalist for the Omnidawn Book Prize. They hold an MFA in Poetry from Cornell University and their writing has appeared in the 2021 Best New Poets Anthology, Colorado Review, West Branch, AGNI, Quarterly West, DIAGRAM, diode, Interim, and other literary journals. Winner of the 2018 Boulevard Emerging Poets Prize, they have been awarded fellowships from the Bucknell Seminar for Younger Poets, Lambda Writing Retreat for Emerging LGBT Voices, TAKT Residency in Berlin, Center for Book Arts, Frost Place Conference on Poetry, the Studios at MASS MoCA, and MacDowell. Mandy Gutmann-Gonzalez is Associate Professor of Practice in Creative Writing at Clark University, where they founded and run the Clark Poets and Writers Reading Series.

Fred Lafortune

Bio

Fred Lafortune is a Ph.D. student in French Language and Literature at Boston University. His research interests are postcolonial studies and literary criticism and theory. Fred is the director of a poetry collection called L’immortel, put together by JEBCA Editions in Boston. He has written several books, including En nulle autre (2009), An n al Lazil (2014), and Silex (2016). He co-edited an anthology of Haitian literature and art with James Noël called Le Cahier Haïti (2009). Fred’s poems have also been published in several literary anthologies, including Une soirée haïtienne (2020) and the Anthologie de Poésie Haïtienne Contemporaine (2015), published in Paris by Édition du Seuil – Collection Points.

Benjamin Garcia

Bio

A 2023 NEA Fellow in poetry, Benjamin Garcia’s first collection, THROWN IN THE THROAT, won the National Poetry Series and the Eugene Paul Nassar Poetry Prize, in addition to being a finalist for the Kate Tufts Discovery Award. He works as a sexual health and harm reduction educator in New York’s Finger Lakes region, where he received the Jill Gonzalez Health Educator Award recognizing contributions to HIV treatment and prevention. A CantoMundo and Lambda Literary fellow, he serves as core faculty at Alma College’s low-residency MFA program. His poems and essays have recently appeared or are forthcoming in: AGNI, American Poetry Review, Indiana Review, Kenyon Review, and New England Review.

Linda McCarthy

Bio

Alan W. Holt

Bio

Alan W. Holt is excited to be a mentor at the Young Writer's Conference at Bancroft. He is a graduate of the New School's MFA in Creative Writing and was selected for and participated in both the Disquiet and Juniper writing conferences. Since committing himself to writing and teaching, Alan has taught both at Bronxloaf and with the New York City Writing Project, where he developed writing programs for teachers. He anticipates finishing his first novel this year.

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