Executive Artistic Director:

Diana Norma Szokolyai is a writer and Executive Artistic Director of Cambridge Writers’ Workshop. Her edited volume, CREDO: An Anthology of Manifestos and Sourcebook for Creative Writing, will be released by C&R Press on March 7, 2018.  She is author of the poetry collections Parallel Sparrows (honorable mention for Best Poetry Book in the 2014 Paris Book Festival) and Roses in the Snow (first runner-­up Best Poetry Book at the 2009 DIY Book Festival). She also records her poetry with musicians and has collaborated with several composers including David Krebs (US), Robert Lemay (Canada), Claudio Gabriele (Italy), Peter James (UK), Jason Haye (UK), and Sebastian Wesman (Estonia). Diana Norma is a founding member of the performing arts groups Sounds in Bloom, ChagallPAC, and The Brooklyn Soundpainting Ensemble.  Her poetry-music collaboration with Flux Without Pause, “Space Mothlight,” hit #16 on the Creative Commons Hot 100 list in 2015, and can be found in the curated WFMU Free Music Archive. Her work has been recently reviewed by The London Grip and published in VIDA: Reports from the Field, The Fiction Project, Quail Bell Magazine, Lyre Lyre, The Boston Globe, Dr. Hurley’s Snake Oil Cure, The Dudley Review and Up the Staircase Quarterly, The Million Line Poem, The Cambridge Community Poem, and elsewhere, as well as anthologized in Our Last Walk, The Highwaymen NYC #2, Other Countries: Contemporary Poets Rewiring History, Always Wondering, and Teachers as Writers.  She is currently at work on her next book and an album of poetry & music.  Diana Norma holds a M.A. in French (UCONN, La Sorbonne) and an Ed.M in Arts in Education (Harvard).

Executive Creative Director:

Rita Banerjee is the Executive Creative Director of the Cambridge Writers’ Workshop and editor of CREDO: An Anthology of Manifestos and Sourcebook for Creative Writing (C&R Press).   She is the author of the poetry collection Echo in Four Beats (Finishing Line Press), which was nominated for the 2019 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize at the Academy of American Poets, featured on the Ruth Stone Foundation podcast, and named one of Book Riot’s “Must-Read Poetic Voices of Split This Rock 2018”, and was selected by Finishing Line Press as their 2018 nominee for the National Book Award in Poetry.  Banerjee is also the author of the novella “A Night with Kali” in Approaching Footsteps (Spider Road Press), and the poetry chapbook Cracklers at Night (Finishing Line Press).  She is the co-writer and co-director of Burning Down the Louvre (2022), a documentary film about race, intimacy, and tribalism in the United States and in France.  She received her doctorate in Comparative Literature from Harvard and her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Washington, and she is a recipient of a Vermont Studio Center Artist’s Grant, the Tom and Laurel Nebel Fellowship, and South Asia Initiative and Tata Grants.  Her writing appears in the Academy of American Poets, Poets & Writers, PANK, Nat. Brut., The Scofield, The Rumpus, Painted Bride Quarterly, Mass Poetry, Hyphen Magazine, Los Angeles Review of Books, Electric Literature, VIDA: Women in Literary Arts, AWP WC&C Quarterly, Queen Mob’s Tea House, Riot Grrrl Magazine, The Fiction Project, Objet d’Art, KBOO Radio’s APA Compass, and elsewhere. She is an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at the George Polk School of Communications at LIU Brooklyn and an Associate Scholar of Comparative Literature at Harvard University.  She is currently working on a novel, a book on South Asian literary modernisms, and a collection of lyric essays on race, sex, politics, and everything cool.  Her writing is represented by agents Jeff Kleinman and Jamie Chambliss of Folio Literary Management.

Yoga & Arts Coordinator:

Elissa Lewis is the Yoga & Arts Coordinator of the Cambridge Writers’ Workshop.  She began her journey with yoga in 2006, when she moved to France and made the practice part of her daily routine. She saw yoga as a lifestyle, not only a class, helping her to clear her mind and have more compassion for herself and others. In 2010 she moved to New York and completed her teacher training at Laughing Lotus, a creative, soulful yoga studio that teaches the student to ‘move like yourself.’ She’s taught private and group classes in Manhattan and Brooklyn ever since. Visit her website for informative yoga sequences and information.

Editing and Communication Interns:

Maya Alusin

Adi Hernández is a Chicana/Latina writer from Atlanta, GA with roots in San Luis Potosi, Mexico. She serves as a youth counselor for marginalized youth at a community center in southwest Atlanta through Americorps. She earned her B.A. in Creative Writing from Knox College in Galesburg, IL and aspires to continue studying for her M.F.A. Adi currently has the honor of being mentored by Randy Ribay through the Writers & Illustrators of Color Mentorship Program offered by People of Color in Publishing. She is currently at work on her first novel along with a short story collection, both of which focusing on family ties in the Latino culture.

Corrine Previte is currently working at North Shore Christian School in Lynn, Massachusetts as a 5^th grade teacher and as an assistant cross-country/track coach at Gordon College. Previously, Corrine graduated from Gordon College in 2017 with a B.S. in Elementary Education and a B.A. in English, where she took courses in creative playwriting, literary journal, British and Irish Literature. During her time at Gordon, she not only was captain of the track team but she was also the News Editor for the college’s newspaper: The Tartan and a member of the Sigma Tau Delta English Honors Society. She is currently working on her master’s in English as a Second Language and Middle School English at Gordon College, where she has taken courses in writing for publication, developing and advanced writers. Corrine Previte is an avid writer and has been since the age of 6. She has a love for children’s books and travel writing. Her favorite authors that inspire her include Patricia Polacco, Jane Brett and Elizabeth Gilbert. Previte is excited to work for Cambridge Writer’s Workshop, she states that she hopes to “gain hands-on experience with editors and publishers in order to better understand the writing world. I also hope to be inspired with my own writing and develop productive writing routines.” During this time, Previte’s childrens book manuscript is under review.

Executive Board Members:

Gregory Crosby‘s poems have appeared in Court Green, Epiphany, Copper Nickel, Leveler, Ping Pong & Rattle, among others. He is co-curator of the long- running EARSHOT reading series and is co-editor, with Jillian Brall, of the online poetry journal Lyre Lyre.  He has served as a host and panelist for several Cambridge Writers’ Workshop events, including 2012 & 2013 Brooklyn Lit Crawl, the 2012 Mass Poetry Festival, and  our live radio shows.

Jonah Kruvant is one of the Cambridge Writers’ Workshop’s  NYC area program organizers, a writer, English teacher, and student of the world. Jonah Kruvant received his Bachelor’s degree from Skidmore College, his Master’s degree in Teaching from Fordham University, and his MFA degree from Goddard College. His debut novel, The Last Book Ever Written, was published by PanAm Books, and his work has appeared in Digital Americana, On the Verge, and LIMN Literary and Arts Journal.