[This is a hybrid Ruby event (with 2 weeks meeting IRL at the Ruby and 2 weeks meeting virtually), a 4-week workshop that will take place on Wednesdays, September 7 (IRL), September 14 (Zoom), September 21 (IRL), September 28 (Zoom), from 6:30 pm to 8:30 pm PST. Zoom info and more details to follow with registration. We have discounted scholarship rates of $75 available for a BIPOC/LGBTQ nonmembers unable to pay the full fee; please email staff@therubysf.com by August 24.]

I love texts that immerse the reader into their worlds by intense, sensory experience: but really, I’m interested in exploring the body as a writer on a more fundamental level. The body—living, breathing, eating, looking, stretching, sitting, working; holding a child, pulling off a sweater, petting a dog—is the most important tool we have as writers. How to embody these experiences more fully in the moment: to be attentive to them, can make our writing richer and more deep no matter how attentive we are to our characters’ bodies on the page.

I offered this as a two-part online workshop earlier this year, and found it opened so much space and so many more questions I'd like to explore together. I'd also like to revisit some of the same places we went in the last session, to see if/how things have shifted. If you were able to join us last time, you will find much that is new. If you are joining for the first time you are welcome—no prior experience required. Together, we’ll move, we’ll write, we’ll sit in meditation. We'll discuss some texts that deal with the body. We'll engage in low-stakes creative correspondence. This class is not unrelated to one about mindfulness, but will keep a creative center. I want to give space to the experience of our bodies: vital, precious, and so alive.

About Shruti Swamy

Shruti Swamy is the author of the story collection A House Is a Body, which was a finalist for the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize and the Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction, and was longlisted for the Story Prize. Her work has been published by the Paris Review and McSweeney’s, and anthologized in the O. Henry Prize Stories. Her debut novel, The Archer, was published by Algonquin Books in September 2021. She lives in San Francisco.

Health, Safety, and Accessibility

We ask all non-members for proof of vaccination at the door (Ruby members themselves are required to be vaccinated so they've already been checked). Masks are required for IRL sessions and we have KN95s available at the front desk.

Please let us know if you have any accessibility or support requests at staff@therubysf.com with "Breathing the Body" in the subject line.