To learn more about the Writers Center and its many activities throughout the Chautauqua season, simply browse through our pages by clicking the buttons to your left. Then join us in one (or more!) of our many summer workshops for both aspiring and accomplished poets and writers.
The Writers Center at Chautauqua is located on the grounds of historic Chautauqua Institution, where F.D.R. delivered his "I Hate War" speech, Amelia Earhart landed her plane, John Ciardi spent many of his summers, and countless artists come to perform, practice, and study. This is a place where opera singers, musicians, actors, visual artists, and writers mix it up with politicians, sociologists, anthropologists, theologians, and sports stars. It's a place unlike any other you have ever visited.
A gated community of 740 acres on a pristine western New York lake, Chautauqua Institution is located on Route 394, between Jamestown and Mayville. The Institution features its own symphony, ballet company, theatre troupe, and opera company and offers dozens of free daily lectures during its nine-week, theme-based summer programs. The Institution was founded 126 years ago in the belief that all people should be all that they can be. Though it looks like a quaint Victorian community, this National Registry historic landmark community with carpenter Gothic as its main architectural style, Chautauqua strives to be at once pioneering and unconventional.
For more information about Chautauqua Institution -- about gate passes, parking permits, and housing -- simply return to the Chautauqua Institution web site.