If its summer, dont ask poet Robert Wrigley to come to your literary festival or writers conference.

Hell be gone fishing.

Like many in the teaching profession, the Moscow, Idaho, resident and University of Idaho creative writing instructor tries to make the most of his summers off.

Only in his case, hes doing just about anything but writing.

I dont write in the summertime very often; I make notes. And we fish and we camp and we raft and we backpack. We do all the things that it seems to me we have to do, living where we do, he said by phone from his home on Moscow Mountain. There, the 55-year-old author of Earthly Meditations and other collections has a studio with a view of Oregons Wallowa Mountains.

Come the inevitable colder, darker, shorter days at the back of the calendar, Wrigley holes up and hunkers down to teaching and writing award-winning poems. The two are twin tasks in that, when the writing goes well, so does the teaching.

But when he gets called to a conference such as The Nature of Words, its time to call in the sub, and soon: The literary event kicks off Thursday evening at the Tower Theatre in Bend (see If You Go).

Thats one of the good things about The Nature of Words conference, as far as were concerned: Its at a great time of year, Wrigley said.

As far as readers, writers and those who are both are concerned: With workshops, readings, a panel discussion and open mic event, the conference is probably the best way in Central Oregon to rub elbow patches with literary figures. This years roster consists of Alexandra Fuller, James Galvin, David Guterson, Linda Hussa, Lawson Inada, Craig Lesley, Robert Michael Pyle and Wrigley.

The great thing about hanging around with other writers of all sorts of levels is that you can get inspired pretty easily, Wrigley said. You can hear things, you can see things, you can think things that you would not otherwise hear or see or think. You can just get to talk about the art.

Wrigley is scheduled to read and sign books on Friday evening, along with Guterson, Pyle and Hussa.

On Friday and Saturday, Wrigley will conduct workshops on The Place I Am, exploring, in part, how a poem can flesh out a place in a way that a photo cannot, and can say something about the person as well.

He will also serve, along with the other seven authors, on Saturday evenings panel discussion, whose topic is Whose Frontier is this, Anyway?

Wrigley did not attend the inaugural event last year, when his wife, Kim Barnes, a memoirist and fellow University of Idaho writing professor, participated.

She cant come this year with me, because we both teach full time and write, so weve got two full-time jobs … its difficult for us, he said. If one of us is gone, one probably needs to stay home and work.

Shell miss a year to rival 2005, when The Shipping News author Annie Proulx enlivened the conversation.

This years field of poets, fiction authors and memoirists includes David Guterson, author of the Snow Falling on Cedars, 1995 winner of The PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction and, more recently, Our Lady of the Forest.

The art of writing slowly

Instead of conducting a writing workshop in Cascades Hall, as all the other authors will, Guterson will do a question-and-answer session from 1 to 3:30 p.m. in the rotunda of the COCC-OSU-Cascades library.

Guterson told The Bulletin he co-founded a new conference himself, Fields End, held on Bainbridge Island, Wash., where he lives. We had our first conference (this year), so I have a feeling what the organizers there are going through trying to put it together, he said, laughing. Its a challenge.

Guterson, 50, was a high school English teacher for a decade. Thats when I was doing a lot of teaching, he said. He requested a one-year leave of absence to promote Snow Falling on Cedars.

After that, I told them, I wont be coming back, he said. Since then, its been about 12 years of working out of my home, and primarily working on novels, and doing some other things, too.

He no longer has to wake up early on weekdays to squeeze in his writing or spend all summer that way, as he did when teaching full-time.

I have more time now, so its a little more leisurely. And I can put more time into it at a relaxed pace … it is (a joy); Im really grateful for the situation, he said.

Guterson has a novel thats three-quarters done. He declined to reveal its plot, but said he may read from it Friday, which I havent done before, so that will good be for me to consider.

He said his deadline isnt for another year, but added that his books take a while to write and are spaced about four or five years apart.

Critics have noted the languid pacing of Gutersons plots, and the fact that, eventually, things do come together. I really enjoy plotting, he said. I like thinking through the intricacies.

However, The choices you make about plot are related to the choices you make about character, and choices you make about point of view and landscape are related to both. You dont make any choices in a vacuum, so maybe the word … balance is right, or integrating things, he said.

Youve got to grapple with all the conventions of storytelling, and youve got to make them all work, organically … together.

Asked what kind of advice he gives aspiring writers, Guterson said, Im sort of loathe to give advice, because I always feel like everyones in a different situation. Every writer is different. The circumstances are always different, and there isnt any general principle you can really give anybody.

You just have to get to know them as individually as you can, and understand their circumstances before you can really be helpful.

Memoirist wont overprepare

Alexandra Fuller, a memoirist who will read Thursday evening with Galvin, Lesley and Inada, takes an approach similar to Gutersons.

Fuller, author of Dont Lets Go to the Dogs Tonight: An African Childhood and Scribbling the Cat: Travels with an African Soldier said shes not really preparing ahead for her workshop because it really depends on what people want from me, she said. It might be any of a hundred things.

The workshop, Finding Your Noisy Voice in a Noisier World Irreverence and the Art of Memoir, will be offered twice, once on Friday and again on Saturday.

If I sit there and prepare stuff and then come with that, its like finding a round hole and saying, But Ive come with a square peg, and trying to shove it in anyway.

I think the thing I can really show people in terms of memoir writing is that the greatest thing to overcome is the noise of critics. Whether its starting small, with your family Oh my God, whats my family going to say? and then, going out from that What are my friends going to say? Whats the town I grew up in going to say? Whats the press going to say? even before you put the pen on the page, you silence yourself.

So I think finding your voice and really finding your own, authentic voice, is the gift that I can give people.

Rest of the fest

The other Nature of Words participants are:

James Galvin, author of the novel Fencing the Sky and the prose work The Meadow, as well as several collections of poetry. His workshops will reflect his versatility: The Role of Nonfiction in Fiction (9 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. Friday) and Poetry: Thinking and Feeling (9 to 11:30 a.m. Saturday).

Craig Lesley, author of the memoir Burning Fence and four novels, including Storm Riders and Winterkill. The winner of three Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Awards, Lesley will teach Creative Nonfiction: The Left Behind Workshop (1 to 3:30 p.m. Saturday) and Fiction: Gaining an Edge (Friday 1 to 3:30 p.m.)

Robert Michael Pyle, author of Chasing Monarchs: Migrating with the Butterflies of Passage and Wintergreen, winner of the 1987 John Burroughs Medal for Distinguished Nature Writing. He will teach Nonfiction: Writing in the Wild Tense (9 to 11:30 a.m. Friday and 9 to 11:30 a.m. Saturday).

Linda Hussa, author of three books of poetry, including the compilation Sharing Fencelines, Three Friends Write from Nevadas Sagebrush Corner and Blood Sister, I Am To These Fields. Hussa, winner of the 1999 Nevada Writers Hall of Fames Silver Pen Award, will conduct Poetry: Uncommon Writing for the Everyday Life (9 to 11:30 a.m. Friday and 1 to 3:30 p.m. Saturday).

Lawson Inada, Oregons Poet Laureate and author of Before The War and Legends From Camp, for which he received the American Book Award. Inada will teach Poetry: Writing from a Sense of Place (1 to 3:30 p.m. Friday) and Poetry: Sharing Your Voice (9 to 11:30 a.m. Saturday).