Aspen Words is a literary hub, and branch of the Aspen Institute that brings decorated writers to Aspen through many programs such as Winter Words and Summer Words.
When Caroline Cares started as the librarian at Aspen High School three years ago, she began a partnership with Aspen Words where certain authors from the Winter Words programs come to the high school to give talks and participate in Q&A’s during SET. In past years, authors such as Geraldine Brooks and Shasha di Julian have visited AHS and spoken about their respective written works.
On March 14, Elizabeth Egan will be in the library during SET. The opportunity to hear from experienced and successful authors is a unique opportunity everyone should take advantage of, especially high school students. Madeline Lipton, an employee at Aspen Words who helps Cares organize this program at AHS, sees this as an extremely valuable resource for students.
“And it’s more in these cases about inspiration and instruction, I would say, but I think there’s like a certain almost like magic that happens between authors and students when they’re in those smaller settings rather than an auditorium of 400 people,” Lipton said.
Students who have attended in the past have found inspiration from the talks, regarding both the literary aspects of this partnership and the life experiences of the authors. On Feb. 6th, 2024 Sasha DiGiulian came to AHS and inspired many students.
“With Sasha de Julianne, she’s a three-time world champion [in] rock climbing,” Cares said. “I had three or four students just say that they were so amazed because they were either rock climbers themselves and they were inspired by her story, or they were just women in male-dominated sports that felt really inspired by her story.”
Lots of work goes into preparing for these authors. If you are interested in coming to one of these talks during SET, expect an introduction from the author and then 30 to 40 minutes of an interview with questions catered towards high schoolers. Finally, there will be about 10 minutes at the end to ask the author questions.
“I look at at least 10 interviews by that author, and I read blog posts or I read interviews that they’ve done and I’m just trying to find questions that I think can be focused and directed toward a high schooler,” Cares said
For many students, SET is valuable time, and students are hesitant to give it up, but if you are able I highly recommend coming to the next author talk on March 14, 2024.
“I would hope that students would maybe have some self-awareness about the, the unique position that they’re in to take advantage of something like this,” Cares said
