Poet and essayist Rob Whitbeck will conduct a series of three-hour

writing workshops at the La Grande and Baker City public libraries this

Friday and Saturday.

The intensive workshops are geared toward writers of all levels and

will focus on “writing home” – exploring and creating work rooted in

the northern West, and in Oregon in particular.

Whitbeck will encourage participants to place themselves in the larger history, and literary history, of the region.

The “Writing Home” workshop will be offered at Cook Memorial Library, 2006 Fourth Ave. in La Grande, from 6-9 p.m. Friday, Sept. 12, and at the Baker County Public Library, 2400 Resort Ave. in Baker City, from 1-4 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 13.

Writers of all skills levels and in all genres are welcome. Libraries of Eastern Oregon (LEO) is sponsoring the workshop as part of the regional “A Sense of Place” series of programs, which include literary arts.

Participants may register in advance at the libraries or at the door.

Raised in Springfield, Whitbeck now farms in Wheeler County. A member of the Writers Guild of Eastern Oregon, he is the author of two volumes of poetry, “Oregon Sojourn” and “The Taproot Confessions” and has been published in numerous national magazines and anthologies. In 2005 he won an Oregon Literary Arts fellowship.

The workshops at La Grande and Baker City are sponsored by funding provided to LEO from The Shelk Fund and the Walt and Perry Morey Fund of The Oregon Community Foundation (OCF).

For further information, please contact La Grande public library director Jo Cowling at 541-962-1339, Baker County Library District director Perry Stokes at 541-523-6419, or LEO director Lyn Craig at 541-763-2355.