The Formal Lounge in the Grewcock Student Union might not be Tabard Inn from “The Canterbury Tales,” but Associate Professor of English Patricia R. Bart encouraged students to explore the opportunities group input can offer writers.

Bart spoke to students at the Tower Light’s first-ever Authorial Convivium Sept. 23 about the importance of cultivating creative culture on campus. Bart serves as the Tower Light’s creative adviser, a position filled by a member of the English department’s faculty every year. 

“I want people to feel more normal and comfortable,” Bart said. “Not lazy, but normal and comfortable with writing literature. Just roll it out. Roll it out to your friends.”

From Geoffery Chaucer to T. S. Elliot, Bart examined a few short texts united under the theme of creative pursuit. Although she claimed she’s mostly an academic writer, Bart said she believes she can offer guidance to budding creative writers. 

She spent a large portion of her talk on the importance of considering the audience when writing. 

“I’m usually in my office,” Bart said. “I can often take people just coming in and wanting to talk about their piece. If people want me to be their audience, I’m fine with that. I’m here for that.”

Senior Meera Baldwin, Tower Light’s fall editor-in-chief, said the turnout at this event was the best she had seen in her three years on the board.

“I’ve never seen more than a few people show up,” Baldwin said. “I really wanted to do some sort of lecture instead of what we’ve done in the past. I thought that that would bring more people in and actually be more helpful and inspiring. Things like this appeal to a wider audience.”

Attendee and Tower Light board member sophomore Kara Miller, said she learned how to draw from the past in her creative writing. 

“As a member of the board of the Tower Light, I find that there’s a lot of pressure to be original,” Miller said. “It feels like when dealing with literature and the arts in general, there’s pressure to be original because you feel like everything has been done before. Dr. Bart emphasized that we don’t need to feel pressured to originality when looking at literature because you have to recognize that a lot of the traditions of classic literature that we read borrow from each other.”

In addition to aiding the Tower Light’s board members in examining submissions and compiling their bi-annual editions, Bart said her main goal is to inspire writers. 

“There may be genres that we know not of, right?” Bart said. “Maybe you’d be the groundbreaker of some new thing — a new way to look at culture.”