In New York, Everywhere a Writing Nook

When I was writing my son's memoir, I primarily wrote in coffee shops and in bookstores. With people all around me I was less likely to cry ... though I could only write for an hour at a time before exhaustion set in.

In other instances I wrote in the woods or on a mountain bluff. The natural settings connected me with life at its most elemental level and reminded what a gift life and parenthood (although my experience was limited to nine years) is.

I had 3 places that I used to go to in order to write undisturbed.
One was a safe deposit vault, I'd take out my box and get a room, you couldn't get any quieter than that.
Another quiet place to write is in a cemetery.
I also like writing in a bar or sometimes on the LIRR.

This is true. I've written on my laptop at parks, cafes, movie lobbies, at the bench at Broadway/Lafayette station, the Winter Garden, you name it. It's some of why I love our city

Interesting topic, thanks. It's striking how these dramatic authors work best in environments with a lot of environmental distraction... subway cars, bars, the middle of Times Square, restaurants, windy gardens, busy parks. Hardly a "nook" in sight! I wonder, is this more common with dramatic writers than with writers in other genres?

Someone please explain to Michael Weller that there is no "Red Line" on the NYC Subways, only, #2, 3, 4, 5, 6 or A, B, C, D, E, F, etc...
The circle might be red, but the number or letter is what you need to know to get where you are going.

This article reminded me of a book I just saw recently called Windows on the World:Fifty Writers, Fifty Views. It has drawings from fifty authors of what they see when they look up from where they are writing. Mostly, they are city views out of windows but not all of them. It is interesting to contrast the world without with the writer's world within their plots.

As April is National Poetry Month I have wanted to allow myself some time to devote to the writing of poetry, a retreat of sorts but as I have no money, I can't go far or support a great deal of time or expensive location. This article and the aforementioned book reminds me that all I really need to find a space for creation is to think outside the box. The lobby of our art museum, one of the many colleges nearby, the nature center, many local coffee shops, the public market, etc. I look forward to my retreat!

Having taken the F from Manhattan to Park Slope at least a thousand times, I admire Ms. Collier's focus. I should probably buy her book just to put my money where my mouth is.

This piece describes the whimsical and often eccentric element of writing, where NY authors disperse to pen their thoughts and ideas, spaces laced with inspiration, comfort and the special energy that provides the magic to create, often with a pain au chocalat or chocolate bread bearing witness.

So they sometimes open the writer's space to non-members and sometimes they even provided the outside public day-old leftover snacks? Isn't that so proletarian of them. Meanwhile, not one of the writers mentioned museums as a space to write. That does not surprise me. Later, comrades...

Surprised nobody has mentioned the lobby of the Signature Theatre. Free wifi, coffee available, and it has turned into a de facto town square for a lot of people in the theatre community. Almost whenever I go there I run into somebody I either know or want to know.