The Guild Complex's new program, the Chicago International Writers' Exchange, aims to create dialogue and ongoing connections between writers and audiences in Chicago and writers from abroad.
It will be a kind of movable think-tank on literary practices and literary cultures from an international perspective, will also present a public program, and will encourage the participants to create long-term projects together, artistic or organizational, between Chicago and the countries and cities represented by the international writers.

The pilot events of the Guild Complex Chicago International Writers' Exchange will take place on Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 27 and 28, 2007, with additional support from the International Writing Workshop at the University of Iowa and the Center for the Writing Arts at Northwestern University. The events will be a roundtable-type discussion on Saturday, with a select audience from the Chicago literary community, and a public reading by the writers from abroad on Sunday at the Chopin Theater. Participating writers include
Indonesia - Nirwan DEWANTO (essayist, poet, editor) is widely published in Indonesian journals, magazines, anthologies and newspapers. A founder of the cultural journal Kalam, he has a collection of essays Sanjakala Kebudayaan ('Twilight of Culture') and a volume of poems, Buku Cacing ('Book of Worms'); the poetry collection Perenang Buta ('Blind Swimmer') is forthcoming. He has founded the arts space Komunitas Utan Kayu in Jakarta, and curates literary arts festivals, most recently the 4th Utan Kayu International Literary Biennale.

Egypt - Hamdy EL GAZZAR (playwright, fiction writer, novelist) has been widely published in the Arab world. He has written and directed several plays and written documentary films for Egyptian TV. His debut novel, Black Magic (2005), won the 2006 prize for the best novel by a writer under 40 from the Sawiris Foundation in Egypt. An English translation of the novel is forthcoming in 2007. Currently, he directs the Research Department of Egypt's Culture TV Channel. He has a new novel in progress.

Russia Ksenia GOLUBOVICH (novelist, fiction writer, literary critic, editor, translator) has published the poetry collection Personae, the travelogue The Serbian Parable and the novel Wishes Granted. She contributes essays on life in contemporary Russia to several newspapers and journals, including Logos, a philosophical magazine. She holds a Master's degree from Moscow University, where she recently taught a special course on poets and power.

Hong Kong Lawrence PUN (fiction, non-fiction, literary criticism) has authored three novels, most recently The Lost Land (2005), and a number of non-fiction works. Among his awards are the Hong Kong Youth Literary Award, a Chinese Literature Creative Award, and the 7th Hong Kong Chinese Literary Biennial Award. His fiction appears regularly in journals and anthologies in Hong Kong and mainland China. He currently teaches creative writing at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. His website and blog are at www.lawpun.com and http://blog.sina.com.cn/lawpun.

Bulgaria Aziz Nazmi SHAKIR-TASH (poet, fiction writer; translator) works in Arabic, Turkish, and English both as a scholar and as a writer. He has authored three books of poetry, most recently A Sky at 33 (2007), and one collection of short stories, Rain Apocrypha (2004). An accomplished translator and editor with more than a dozen translations of poetry and prose to his credit, he publishes both in Bulgaria and in Turkey

Australia Lindsay SIMPSON (novelist, journalist, non-fiction writer) spent twelve years as an investigative journalist with The Syndey Morning Herald and in 1999 was the founding member of the Journalism and Media Studies program at the University of Tasmania. Author of six books of non-fiction, she currently lectures on journalism and writing at James Cook University. In 2006 she published her first novel, The Curer of Souls.