Ethan Huffman, president of the Brock University Creative Writers’ Club, invites writers of all types of media to join the close-knit club to share, enjoy and publish Brock’s creativity.
For four years, the Brock Creative Writers’ Club has been a safe space for writers across campus. As Huffman describes it, “I feel like when you’re talking about Charlemagneyou can’t really talk to people about this romance or this writing you care a lot about.”
The Creative Writers’ Club provides a space for anyone interested in the written arts to nerd out, discuss and learn about the written word.
The Creative Writers’ Club general meetings provide students the opportunity to sit at one of two groups who provide different kinds of assistance, which members can switch between. The club meets weekly on Thursdays from 12 p.m. to 2 p.m. at the BUSU clubhouse (TH 252A). The club is very casual in nature and attendance at every meeting is never an expectation.
The Creative Writers’ Club is involved in all types of writing. Students can get help with schoolwork or manuscripts at one group, whereas the other allows you to “talk about whatever you want.”
At the Creative Writers’ Club, you can “chill [and] make friends.” As Hoffman put it, “I met a large majority of my friends at the Creative Writing Club.”
The club holds extra events beyond the general meetings. Huffman has discussed the potential to run a DND (dungeons and dragons) one shot which he believes is “a cool way to build narrative and character building and get students to immerse themselves in the practice and learn more about it.”’
The club also runs events outside of Brock, like going to the woods and exchanging spooky stories around a campfire. Additionally, Huffman hopes to run a collaboration with the Tea and Recreation Club before exam season.
When Huffman first joined the Creative Writers’ Club, “there were a lot of poets in the club […] but there’s been a lot of new upcoming fantasy writers.” The club is open to writers of all varieties, such as songwriters, dystopian writers and script writers.
For Huffman, “it’s always inspiring to see all different forms of writing show up.”
Uniquely, the Brock Creative Writers’ Club operates a publication for its members. For Huffman, “it’s a way for students to get kind of a general feeling for what publishing is like.”
Publishing occurs through the Brock English department, usually with the assistance of Dr. Adam Dickinson or Dr. Gregory Betts.
The Creative Writers’ Club produces an annual anthology, which is a printed book containing the collective writings of participating club members. The anthology encompasses many different types of writing.
Last year, the club was unable to complete their anthology due to an inadequate number of submissions. Still, Huffman hopes to get it published this school year.
For Huffman, the anthology is his “favourite aspect of the club because it’s a part of the community where you get a bunch of writers together, collect their voices and you archive in a printed book.”
“It’s awesome because you […] get poets, you get short fiction writers and they all add their voice to the book, it’s all unique, it’s an anthology,” said Huffman. “We want to be inclusive of everyone’s voice.”
According to Huffman, this year’s anthology “would probably be a larger project, it would probably be [published] via Amazon.”
The club — while numbering over 300 students for membership — sees an average of around 40 to 50 people per meeting. Those interested in joining the Creative Writers’ Club should sign up through the BUSU club page. To check out community spotlights, extra events and general announcements, check out the club’s Instagram page.
As Huffman says, the Creative Writers’ Club is open to all and is just the place for those that feel “they’re not good enough […] they say they don’t want to be a writer because they feel like they’re not a good writer. And to that I have to say that doesn’t exist to me.”
“The Creative Writers’ Club has a very unofficial slogan, and that slogan is “the true writer is the one who writes, and it’s nothing more, nothing less,” said Huffman.
The Brock Creative Writers’ Club welcomes all who wish to write.