WFNS logo ltrmark sticky 100px
WFNS logo ltrmark sticky 100px

Sarah Emsley on “Imagining the Austens in Halifax”

Date:
Time:
-
Venue:
Maritime Museum of the Atlantic
Location:
1675 Lower Water Street, Halifax. More info
Link:
https://maritimemuseum.novascotia.ca/event/imagining-austens-halifax
Calendar:
Member event

Maritime Museum of the Atlantic Tuesday Talk series

*Special pre-talk session, 6:15 pm: Special-tea Sampling and Tasting with Phil Holmans!

During the years when Jane Austen was writing the novels that would later make her famous, including Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice, her naval captain brother and his family spent time in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Their experiences were a source of inspiration for Jane when she wrote her naval novels, Mansfield Park and Persuasion.

This illustrated talk will offer a tour of sites Captain Austen and his wife Fanny visited when they were in Halifax, including Government House, where they danced at a ball in 1810, and St. Paul’s Church, where their daughter was baptized in 1809, along with other places that would have been familiar to them, such as St. George’s, the Town Clock, and the Naval Yard.

Sarah Emsley is the author of Jane Austen’s Philosophy of the Virtues and a history of St. Paul’s in the Grand Parade. She received her PhD from Dalhousie University, held a postdoctoral fellowship at the Rothermere American Institute, University of Oxford, taught classes on Austen in the Writing Program at Harvard University, and now lives in Halifax with her family. Her debut novel, The Austens, was published by Pottersfield Press in 2025.

6:15 pm: Special-tea Sampling and Tasting: Meet Philip Holmans, owner of World Tea House, who specializes in hand blended, organic, small, farmed teas from around the world. Philip will be sharing period-based teas and talk about their significance during the time period of Austen’s novels.

Scroll to Top
WFNS logo ltrmark sticky 100px

Experience Levels

The Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia (WFNS) uses the following terms to describe writers’ experience levels:

  • New writers: those with less than two years’ creative writing experience and/or no short-form publications (e.g., short stories, personal essays, or poems in literary magazines, journals, anthologies, or chapbooks).
  • Emerging writers: those with more than two years’ creative writing experience and/or numerous short-form publications.
  • Early-career authors: those with 1 or 2 book-length publications or the equivalent in book-length and short-form publications.
  • Established authors: those with 3 or 4 book-length publications.
  • Professional authors: those with 5 or more book-length publications.

Please keep in mind that each form of creative writing (fiction, nonfiction, poetry, writing for children, writing for young adults, and others) provides you with a unique set of experiences and skills, so you might consider yourself an ‘established author’ in one form but a ‘new writer’ in another.

Occasionally, WFNS uses the phrase “emerging and established writers/authors” to mean ‘writers and authors of all experience levels.’

The “Recommended experience level” section of each workshop description refers to the above definitions. A workshop’s participants should usually have similar levels of creative writing and / or publication experience. This ensures that each participant gets value from the workshop⁠ and is presented with info, strategies, and skills that suit their experience. 

For “intensive” and “masterclass” workshops, which provide more opportunities for peer-to-peer feedback, the recommended experience level should be followed closely.

For all other workshops, the recommended experience level is just that—a recommendation—and we encourage potential participants to follow their own judgment when registering.

If uncertain about your experience level with respect to any particular workshop, please feel free to contact us at communications@writers.ns.ca