Rachel Kesselman

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

Born and raised in Northeastern Pennsylvania, Rachel Kesselman divides her time between Paris and La Muse Artists and Writers Retreat, where she acts as Workshop Director. 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 and in Appalachian Review. 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. 

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A writing retreat enthusiast, Rachel has been to residencies including 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. An amateur soprano, she has always loved studying music alongside literature. In 2022, she founded the annual Paris recital series Un Voyage Lyrique.​

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