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Colaisde na Gàidhlig / The Gaelic College

Address: 51779 Cabot Trail

City: St. Ann's

State: Nova Scotia

Country: Canada

Postal Code: B0E 1B0

Website: https://gaeliccollege.edu/

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Cabot Trail Writers Festival

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Our weekend festival unfolds over three days in St. Ann’s and surrounding communities, a rural region of Unama’ki (Cape Breton), Nova Scotia. Over its 18 years, the Cabot Trail Writers Festival has hosted such literary luminaries as Jane Urquhart, Jesse Thistle, Shelagh Rogers, Omar El Akkad, David Chariandy, Souvankham Thammavongsa, Eleanor Wachtel, Desmond Cole, Kate […]
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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