Write Like the Desert

Write Like the Desert is a field writing workshop that will lead participants through a word journey exploration of Joshua Tree NP and the extended Mojave Desert.

This is an ADA accessible and leisurely activity — less than 2 miles with little or no elevation gain, shade and seating available.

Ruth Nolan lives in the Mojave Desert and is an author and professor of creative writing at College of the Desert. She has curated writing workshops for Desert Institute since 2008. Her desert-centric writing has been published in Boom: California; McSweeney’s; KCET Tending Nature; Art Bound L.A.; Joshua Tree: Where Two Deserts Meet; Campfire Books Volume II Stories Vol. 2: Voices from America’s National Parks and Trails; and Writing the Golden State: The New Literary Terrain of California. A former wildland firefighter for the B.L.M. CA Desert District, she is editor of No Place for a Puritan: The Literature of California's Deserts (Heyday Books) and curator of the humanities project Fire on the Mojave: Stories from the Deserts and Mountains of Southern California.

This immersive field writing workshop, which will include a gentle word walk of up to one mile, will take its cues and inspirations from the magical mystique of the JTNP-Mojave Desert region itself, as well as from samples of writing culled from the vibrant literary canon of our desert. Participants will be guided through prompts and sensory exploration to generate their eco-writing across an exploration of genres — prose and poetry — in ways that interpret, explore, and imbibe in the wonders and ways of the iconic Mojave. Participants should expect to generate a short collection of writing during this workshop.

Participants need to bring all the required items for your course: writing materials (notebook, pen, paper), hiking boots, and the 10 hiking essentials. Don't forget sunscreen, and bring water and snacks for the workshop and short hike.

Photo credit: Tatjana Kudla, Desert Institute Volunteer