Arc at the Poet’s Seat is a literary residency program for emerging and established writers based in Greenfield, MA.
From Dzanc Books, the award-winning independent press committed to outstanding fiction and nonfiction, comes a new residency program celebrating poetry, prose and creative nonfiction.
Set in the rich foothills of Western MA, within the Five College region, and steeped in the rich history of literature, poetry, music, and the arts, Arc at The Poets’ Seat brings together emerging and established writers, editors, artists, and publishers—working in fiction, nonfiction, and poetry both locally, nationally and abroad—to read, to write, to walk, to speak with and learn from other writers, to build community, and to read and write some more.
A 501(c)(3) non-profit art and publishing organization located in a historical, renovated house in Greenfield, Massachusetts, Arc at The Poets’ Seat is a residence, a studio, and a home for literary arts and creative development.
We are Arc.
Nestled in the thriving and vibrant local community, Arc at The Poets’ Seat aims to celebrate and serve the community as a place to gather, to learn, and to celebrate vital new stories of the community, its members, and its participants. We’re thrilled to be joining Greenfield’s rich arts, music, and literary traditions and programs, alongside its incredibly robust and wondrous small businesses, bookshops, restaurants, cafés, bakeries, and more. Through our Arc Initiatives program and seasonal workshops, we provide a space for community members, young and old, to join in bookmaking, writing workshops, poetry workshops, cooking classes, and more (including K-12 programming, and college writing classes and workshops).
We are Dzanc.
At its founding in 2007, Dzanc Books was hailed as “the future of publishing” in Publishers Weekly. As winner of the 2023 AWP Small Press Award, we're still at it, going strong, and reaching outwards and onwards.
“Dzanc is an independent, nonprofit press devoted to thorny, difficult, brilliant, rule-breaking literature,” said Michelle Dotter, editor-in-chief. “Thanks to founders Steve Gillis and Dan Wickett, indefatigable champions, Dzanc has remained a press that publishes books because they deserve to be published, not because they’re written to the market. In an increasingly market-driven industry, that’s something worth celebrating.”
Over the last seventeen years, Dzanc has published has published over 224 original works, including 87 works by debut authors. We’ve also restored more than 290 titles that were either out of print or unavailable through the Dzanc rEprint series. Notable and award-winning authors include Charles Johnson (National Book Award), Lindsey Drager (Shirley Jackson Award winner, Lambda Literary Award finalist), Chaya Bhuvaneswar (PEN/Bingham Award finalist), Josip Novakovich (finalist for the 2013 Man Booker International Prize), and Lee Martin (Pulitzer Prize finalist)
In 2011, Dzanc Books also founded the Disquiet International Literary Program, a two-week annual workshop in Lisbon, Portugal. Past guests of honor and instructors include Colson Whitehead, George Saunders, Denis Johnson, Sam Lipsyte, and Tayari Jones. As part of our continued commitment to build a thriving literary community, we're now offering writing residencies in Greenfield, MA, and a low-cost Dzanc Mentorship Program for aspiring writers.
Arc at The Poets’ Seat is thrilled to continue that legacy of service and commitment to the literary community by bringing writers to the region, sharing in the beauty and vitality of Greenfield, and helping creative minds flourish.
Visit dzancbooks.org to learn more.