Author, environmentalist Taylor Brorby to visit CWU March 6

Some people wonder what kind of impact creative writing could have on a real-world issue. Author and environmentalist Taylor Brorby believes creative nonfiction can be highly influential, in part due to its truthful nature.

Author and environmentalist Taylor Brorby will be on the CWU campus March 6.

The author of Boys and Oil: growing up gay in a fractured land will discuss this concept and more Monday, March 6, on the Central Washington University campus as part of the Lion Rock Visiting Writers Series.

Brorby's love for the creative nonfiction genre is the main reason he agreed to bring his message to CWU. The event will consist of a Craft Talk at 3 p.m. at Brooks Library, followed by a reading and lecture at 6 p.m. in the Dean Hall lobby.

Both in-person events are free and open to the public; guests may also attend via Zoom by registering on the calendar listings. Register online for the Craft Talk and for the reading/lecture.

"I think nonfiction helps us see pathways into our own lives and some of the choices we made, or could make, or even should make," said Brorby, who was originally scheduled to visit campus last fall. "I think that's one of the gifts of the genre."

Brorby's memoir, Boys and Oil: growing up gay in a fractured land, explores the complex relationship he has with town where he grew up. He says he never felt like he fit in with the people in his small hometown in North Dakota, but he's never seen a more beautiful landscape.

"I thought part of it is my responsibility to speak out against this [abuse of natural resources] because my family has made its money by unmaking the world," said Brorby, who has made a name for himself as an environmentalist through his creative nonfiction works.

At the afternoon craft talk titled "The Politics of Place and the Landscape of Imagination," Brorby will discuss the connection between the local and the global in terms of narrative and advocacy. His evening reading and thought-provoking lecture will be followed by Q&A and book signing.

Before Brorby's reading at 6 p.m., CWU graduate student Austin Fricke will deliver a reading and introduction. Fricke has a background in secondary English education with major influences from his Arikara and Sioux heritages, writing prose speculative fiction, surrealism, dreamscapes, magical realism, and abstract nonfiction. The English master's candidate will be reading from his book, A Decolonizing of the Cosmos.

Copies of Brorby's memoir are available for purchase at the Wildcat Shop in the SURC. Copies will also be available for purchase at the March 6 reading. Brorby's appearance is sponsored by the CWU English Department, CWU Libraries, and the President's Office.

Media contacts: Email Chris Schedler or Ali Unal, CWU Department of English.

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Note: CWU senior Emma CrowE interviewed Brorby and wrote a draft of this news release.