Rachel Kesselman

Rachel Kesselman is an American-born, French-naturalized writer.

Born and raised in Northeastern Pennsylvania, Rachel Kesselman has lived in Paris for thirteen years, where she writes, teaches, and serves as Workshop Director at La Muse Artists and Writers Retreat. She is currently pursuing a Master of Studies in Creative Writing at the University of Oxford, where she was awarded a Kellogg College Scholarship. 

Rachel's work has appeared in Rivers, Ridges, and Valleys: Essays on Rural Pennsylvania with Catamount Press, Appalachian Review, and The Wellington Square. One of her essays was selected as a finalist for North American Review's 2021 Terry Tempest Williams Prize, and in 2022, her memoir was longlisted for the Santa Fe Writers Project Literary Awards. At her Substack Salon Nouveau, she writes bi-weekly meditations on literature, music, and art from Paris. 

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A writing retreat enthusiast, Rachel has been granted residencies at the Sundress Academy of the Arts in Knoxville, TN, Welcome Hill Studios in West Chesterfield, NH, and Moniack Mhor in the Scottish Highlands. She received the Carlisle Family Scholarship for the Squaw Valley Community of Writers Workshop, the Mathey Family Scholarship for the Mendocino Coast Writers' Conference, and the Frederick E. Hart Scholarship for Excellence in Nonfiction at the Leopardi Writing Conference in Recanati, Italy. 

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Rachel holds a BA in French and English with a Concentration in Creative Writing from Bryn Mawr College and a Master's in Comparative Literature and Education from the Sorbonne. She has taught English language and literature as a professeur certifiée since 2015. An amateur soprano, she performs regularly in Paris and founded the recital series Un Voyage Lyrique in 2022 with the aim of creating performance opportunities for amateur singers. ​

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She is currently at work on a novel, which was awarded support from the F. Lammott Belin Arts Scholarship Program in 2025.