A Reason to Give to Gemini Ink

Dear Friends:

As a former guest of the Autograph Series -- in fall 1999 and again in spring 2007 -- I can enthusiastically recommend San Antonio's Gemini Ink. This "grassroots literary/literacy program" has inspired so many new readers (and new writers) and brought such distinction to the San Antonio community. The warm atmosphere engendered for the guest writers as well as for the audiences is truly unusual, indeed outstanding. What a great pity it would be if, in this recession year, Gemini Ink should be permitted to expire for want of the public support it needs and so fully deserves!

Sincerely,
Peter Matthiessen
Recipient of the 2008 National Book Award in fiction for Shadow Country (Modern Library/Random House, 2008)

HERE'S A CHALLENGE!

You can help bring prize-winning internationally prominent writers like Peter Matthiessen to San Antonio by joining Gemini Ink's end-of-year giving campaign. In the spirit of the season, Gemini Ink's board of directors has made a challenge to all of you activists for reading and writing. If you collectively give $5,000 between now and the end of the year, they will match it--for a total of $10,000! Support reading and writing for all!

Here's what you need to know:

Every year, your donations to Gemini Ink support community literary arts programs like Writers in Communities, The Autograph Series, Dramatic Readers Theater and University Without Walls. And every year, these programs help more than 5,000 San Antonians find the magic in books and discover themselves through the power of their own words. Our work builds the critical thinking, reading, writing, and verbal skills essential to a healthy and economically thriving populace.

Here's where your money goes:

$25 pays for ...
one hour of creative writing tutelage for an incarcerated teen, a homeless woman, a grade-school child, or any of our Writers In Communities students - many of whom have their first positive experience with language in one of our classes and all of whom attend our workshops free of charge

$50 pays for ...
50 pocket-sized notebooks for our WIC students to maintain a relationship with their own words long after their workshops are over

$75 pays for ...
an actor's performance in one of our Dramatic Readers Theater productions

$100 pays for ...
ten 8 1/2 by 11 anthologies of poems and stories fro

And, let's not forget ...

You are helping Gemini Ink continue to nurture writers and readers and
build a community through literature and the related arts.

Thanks