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Playwright Elyzabeth Wilder Playwright Elyzabeth Wilder Carthage College welcomed playwright Elyzabeth Wilder for a residency Feb. 17-20. Ms. Wilder is the Tennessee Williams playwright in residence at Sewanee: The University of the South.

During the residency, Ms. Wilder hosted traditional classroom visits with playwriting students and led an advanced seminar in playwriting for a small, selective group of students.

Katie Layendecker, a first-year student studying theatre performance and English was one of the students selected to participate in the playwriting seminar.

In a blog post, Katie shares her experiences at the seminar and how Ms. Wilder’s lessons impacted her as a playwright.

The experience I had working with Elyzabeth Wilder is one I’ll never forget. My time with her started when she visited my playwriting class with Professor Carroll. Ms. Wilder ran the class through some writing exercises and asked us all to write a scene with no dialogue. It was a very interesting experience.

That night the writing seminar started. It was a small group of current students and alumni. We all came into the seminar with a finished script that we spent the weekend revising. That first night we learned more about revisions and became familiar with the rules of revision.

On night two of the seminar, Ms. Wilder helped us come up with a revision plan. We went through our whole script scene by scene to figure out what our objective was.

She wanted us to figure out where the rough parts were of our scripts and to “trim the fat.” By the end of the night, I had learned some very useful information about not only how to fix my current script but also ideas that will help me with future projects. Our homework that night was to completely revise a scene by the next day.

At first, I was nervous. But then I realized Ms. Wilder had given me the tools I needed to make a better scene. I got to work on the assignment and showed up for our last day feeling ready to read the first draft and revision of my scene. Ms. Wilder gave me really helpful feedback and I enjoyed not only hearing my work read out loud but hearing the work of my peers in the seminar.

The weekend ended with a fabulous dinner at President Swallow’s house where Ms. Wilder shared more stories and advice about playwriting. Having this opportunity taught me so many things and I know it’s made me a better playwright.

Ms. Wilder was amazing to work with. I asked her what it was like for her to work with us. She told me, “Everyone at Carthage was so kind and welcoming. All of the students came in with a solid foundation, so we were able to tackle more advanced skills. I was impressed by the writing, but also the group’s ability to talk about their work.”

I’m grateful for the opportunity I had to spend three days learning from Ms. Wilder. It was a wonderful experience that will live with me forever not just as a writer but as a person in the theatre world.