The Nance Writer-in-Residence Program was created in 2012 by Sally Crane Cox, who chairs the Nance Committee at Thurber House, to honor her late husband, John E. Nance, who was a critically acclaimed photojournalist, author, and Associated Press Bureau Chief in Manila. The Nance Residency is a partnership between Thurber House and The Ohio State University.

Every year, we offer one talented author a month-long residency at Thurber House in Columbus, Ohio. The residency allows the author to focus on his/her own project(s) and is designed to provide a writer with the gift of time to develop a work in progress. The winning writer stays in the fully furnished, two-bedroom apartment on the third floor of Thurber House, the historic family home of James Thurber, and receives a $5,000 stipend.

For more information about the Nance Writer-in-Residence Program, contact us at thurberhouse@thurberhouse.org.

ABOUT THE John E. Nance RESIDENCY

The four-week residency at the historic home of author, humorist, and New Yorker cartoonist James Thurber offers a $5,000 stipend. The resident stays in a two-bedroom apartment at Thurber House and must be available for at least three community outreach opportunities.

2019 John E. Nance Writer-In-Residence

Phil Cousineau was the 2019 John E. Nance Writer-in-Residence. Cousineau resided for four weeks at the historic home of author, humorist, and New Yorker cartoonist James Thurber in November 2019.

Phil Cousineau is an award-winning writer, filmmaker, teacher, editor, lecturer, travel leader, storyteller, and TV host. His fascination with the art, literature, and history of culture has taken him from Michigan to Marrakesh, Iceland to the Amazon, in a worldwide search for what the ancients called the “soul of the world.”

With more than 35 books and 15 scriptwriting credits to his name, the “omnipresent influence of myth in modern life” is a thread that runs through all of his work. His books include Stoking the Creative Fires, Once and Future Myths, The Art of Pilgrimage, The Hero's Journey, Wordcatcher, The Painted Word, The Oldest Story in the World, The Book of Roads, and The Accidental Aphorist.