Step into the space between, where thought becomes language, and stories unfold in unexpected directions. Join us for an intimate series on creativity, reflection, and storytelling as inquiry.
Step into the space between, where thought becomes language, and stories unfold in unexpected directions. Join us for an intimate series on creativity, reflection, and storytelling as inquiry.
This intimate workshop—limited to 20 participants—invites you to reimagine your relationship with writing as an act of exploration rather than explanation.
We’ll examine how fiction, essays, and hybrid forms can hold space for uncertainty and questions that resist easy answers.
Through guided readings, discussions, and generative writing exercises, you’ll learn to write with curiosity instead of conclusion, tapping into a more honest, elastic, and personally resonant creative voice.
This fireside chat brings together three acclaimed writers and journalists — Xu Xi, Devi Asmarani, and Maggie Tiojakin — whose works confront uncertainty with empathy, craft, and courage.
Moderated by Maggie Tiojakin, the conversation explores how writers can use language to hold ambiguity rather than resolve it, finding meaning in what remains open, fluid, and in-between.
Xu Xi is an Indonesian-Chinese-American author of 16 books of fiction and nonfiction, best known as one of Hong Kong’s leading English language authors and literary activists. In 2026, her selected stories, Hong Kong Horizon, will be published by Gaudy Boy Books, New York. Until 2025, Xu Xi held the Jenks Chair in Contemporary Letters at the College of the Holy Cross, Massachusetts and was also a writer-in-residence at Iowa, Arizona State, the City University of Hong Kong, among others, and directed two international MFA’s in creative writing and literary translation.
Xu Xi is an Indonesian-Chinese-American author of 16 books of fiction and nonfiction, recognized as one of Hong Kong’s foremost English-language writers and literary activists. Her upcoming collection, Hong Kong Horizon, will be published by Gaudy Boy Books in 2026. She has held distinguished residencies and academic posts across the U.S. and Asia.
Maggie Tiojakin, President and Chief Revenue Officer of The Jakarta Post and Co-Founder of B/NDL Studios, brings 20+ years of experience as a writer, editor, and instructor in the creative and publishing industry.
Devi Asmarani is the co-founder and Chief Editor of Magdalene, a Jakarta-based feminist and inclusive publication known for its critical coverage of gender, identity, and social justice. With over two decades of journalistic experience, she has reported globally for outlets like The Straits Times and The Jakarta Post, amplifying underrepresented voices and reshaping Indonesia’s public discourse.
How do stories function when the world feels fragmented: personally, politically, emotionally? What does it mean to write without resolution, and why does that matter now more than ever?
When reality is unsettled, facts are contested, and identity is politicized, how can writers tell the truth without flattening complexity? What responsibility does the writer carry, not to fix, but to witness?
As communities and nations become more and more divided by ideology, class, race, and belief, how do writers resist the pressure to simplify or take sides? How can storytelling create space for ambiguity, empathy, and difficult questions without falling into false neutrality?
Who gets to tell which stories, and how do cultural, gendered, or diasporic identities shape the way writers engage with the “unfinishedness” of the present?
What isn’t said? What can’t be said? What is deliberately left unresolved? How do omission, pause, and refusal become creative and political choices in themselves?
When everyone is speaking, posting, reacting: what is the role of the writer? How can language act as a refuge, resistance, or reflection when attention spans are short and emotions run high?
How do writers stay creative, engaged, and critical when the world around them feels stalled, polarized, or in crisis? What practices or ways of thinking that help them keep writing through the fog, not after it clears?
It’s a conversation between three storytellers — Xu Xi, Devi Asmarani, and Maggie Tiojakin — whose works span genres, geographies, and generations.
The audience is invited not only to listen, but to sit with questions that may not yet have answers. The tone of this dialogue is honest, spacious, and thought-provoking.
Jl. Palmerah Barat No.142-143, RT.1/RW.2, Gelora, Kecamatan Tanah Abang, Kota Jakarta Pusat, Daerah Khusus Ibukota Jakarta 10270