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Leanna Brodie

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Writer. Translator. Librettist. Actor.

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Leanna Brodie

  • Plays
  • Translations
  • Libretti
  • Acting
  • News

Hedgebrook. They care. You write.

November 18, 2019 Leanna Brodie
Fir Cottage
Fir Cottage

One of six perfect cottages, each made for one writer. (Click here to see more.)

When you step out your front door, you are within sight of one other cottage… but only just.

When you step out your front door, you are within sight of one other cottage… but only just.

I love the sculpture of rabbits that is unique to Fir Cottage. Other sculptures are hidden all around the grounds.
I love the sculpture of rabbits that is unique to Fir Cottage. Other sculptures are hidden all around the grounds.
I seldom use a desk to write, but it’s a great place to break out the index cards. You can see the outline I drafted during the week.

I seldom use a desk to write, but it’s a great place to break out the index cards. You can see the outline I drafted during the week.

A tiny perfect woodstove. The stairs to the sleeping loft.

A tiny perfect woodstove. The stairs to the sleeping loft.

This tiny lovely kitchen is well-stocked but no one really cooks here: communal dinners are at the central farmhouse where the chef prepares your lunch for the next day, and you can grab breakfast and snacks from the farmhouse kitchen.

This tiny lovely kitchen is well-stocked but no one really cooks here: communal dinners are at the central farmhouse where the chef prepares your lunch for the next day, and you can grab breakfast and snacks from the farmhouse kitchen.

My nighttime writing spot. And my companions were the journals on that shelf: 30 years of jottings from the women of this cottage. We are wildly different and we have so much in common, especially the struggle to write.

My nighttime writing spot. And my companions were the journals on that shelf: 30 years of jottings from the women of this cottage. We are wildly different and we have so much in common, especially the struggle to write.

My daytime writing spot. Deer, chickadees, spiders, and squirrels came to say hello.

My daytime writing spot. Deer, chickadees, spiders, and squirrels came to say hello.

I am obsessed with this pink blanket. And blessed to come to this extraordinary place again, where there is simplicity and beauty and comfort and silence and support.

I am obsessed with this pink blanket. And blessed to come to this extraordinary place again, where there is simplicity and beauty and comfort and silence and support.

Thanks to the generosity of my friends Ann and Frank Lawler, I was able to take a miraculous third trip to Hedgebrook, a women writers’ retreat on Whidbey Island, in Washington State, that has attracted some of the finest writers in the world. Hedgebrook is a place where you can disappear into your cabin in the woods with no expectations or duties beyond your nightly dinner with the other writers. This was my first time in a residency with non-playwrights: I enjoyed the company of women writing fiction (including mystery, science fiction, fantasy, and romance) and creative non-fiction, and I think they enjoyed having someone who is not remotely shy about sharing work with a group! I drew tremendous strength from the cottage journals, where (over a thirty-year period) writers have confided the fears, insecurities, and triumphs they experienced within those four walls… and they felt so very much like mine. For one thing, I am apparently not the only adult woman who, despite every encouragement and inducement in the world, frequently struggles to feel as responsible TO her own writing as she does FOR other people. For the first time in years, I was able to take time to write something that was not a translation, a libretto, a co-written piece, a doc play… something that was purely my own. As a result, a new play is on the way.

I love all of my many collaborators, in many projects and in many forms, and at the same time, this self-contained creation felt… deeply satisfying. As restorative, in its way, as the epsom salts bath (with wine and music and a book and candles, yes I was living a Cosmo article but don’t judge!) that I indulged in at our beautiful little bath house in the woods, on my final night, after I had a detailed outline and most of the first act of the new play.

The music I played was from my Hedgebrook sister Suzanne Vega, and it made me feel surrounded by all the brilliant women I have ever shared this place with, and the women and non-binary people who have been there before us. This is not a spa or a vacation resort: it’s better than that. Everything about this place has been designed and sustained with care and love and the sole goal of communicating to us that our voices matter, that what we bring to the world matters. It takes care of our needs and discharges us of our obligations. It lets us breathe, and rest, and then do the work we love.

Thank you, Hedgebrook.

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