Katie McDougall (left) and Susannah Felts
Nashville is known for its authors and songwriters, and the creative current that feeds both of those things is a robust writing community. The Porch, a nonprofit with a mission to engage local writers with workshops, retreats and other services, has been nurturing and growing that community for 10 years, and we are better for it.
Looking back on a decade of The Porch, the Scene spoke to co-founders and co-directors Susannah Felts and Katie McDougall about how they started, what they hoped The Porch would become and plans for the future.
“Mostly I hoped it had legs,” McDougall says. “I hoped that we would be a connector of writers. What I didn’t realize was the degree to which the formation of community and communion therein would be as essential as writing itself.”
Since 2014, The Porch has been teaching Nashville how to write, and thanks to a pivot to virtual classes in 2020, the organization reaches further than ever. Regardless of your skill level, if you want to write, The Porch can help.
The Porch’s fiction and nonfiction classes are the most popular, but the organization also offers classes on poetry, spoken word, eco-fiction, mindfulness, naturalist writing and more. There’s also a focus on the business of writing, with classes on how to submit and how to build a writing practice, as well as panels on publishing and how to get the right headshot.
The Porch is a literary collective that offers writing classes, which means that, yes, you will likely leave with a piece of finished work. But more importantly, you will leave with classmates who will become friends, and friends who will become community.
“One of the best things about this whole long ride of The Porch has been the people it has introduced me to,” says Felts. “I wouldn’t know 95 percent of the people that I know and call friends. That’s been the real joy for me.”
In the past year-and-a-half, The Porch has launched writer affinity groups spearheaded by Yurina Yoshikawa, director of education for The Porch. Groups like Nashville AAPI Writers, Nashville Black Storytellers, Parent Writers, Latine Creative Collective, LGBTQ+ Writers and more gather once a month to write and share their work with one another.
“I give major credit to Yurina for really pushing the affinity groups forward and making it happen and believing in it as a way to grow The Porch community at large,” says Felts. “I would love to see all of those groups continue to flourish.”
The Porch has a lot to be proud of, including a relatively new program called Writing for Good, in which a cohort of teaching artists leads groups from vulnerable communities through writing and sharing exercises as a therapeutic tool to express themselves.
“Approached with the opportunity to volunteer as a writing mentor at Mending Hearts, a residential treatment center for women in addiction recovery, I almost declined for fear of overcommitment and too-muchness,” says McDougall. “But I pushed myself to say yes, and mentoring led to workshop facilitation, and from there, way led to way. Eighteen months later, The Porch has Writing for Good.”
Tonya Abari is an independent journalist, author and host of the Nashville Black Storytellers, and she credits The Porch with changing the trajectory of her writing career. Through support and encouragement, The Porch made her feel confident enough to continue writing.
“I’ve published three children’s books and have placed essays in local and national publications,” Abari tells the Scene by email. “I’m also now a teaching artist as well as host of a Porch affinity group. I feel honored to give back to a literary community that has given so much to me.”
Making sure The Porch is around for the long term is important to McDougall and Felts. At some point in the future, when they decide to step back, they want to know it’s safe and in good hands, that it has deep roots.
“Over my desk I have this David Bowie quote that says, ‘I don’t know where I’m going. But I promise it won’t be boring.’” Felts says. “That is true about my life, so I want it to be true about The Porch.”
“The Porch is not me — and that’s important,” she continues. “I want for it to continue to have its own identity and spread out and have other people who are its carriers and nurturers.”
