Creative Writing

Published by students and produced by the InterArts department, Parallax is a national award-winning literary journal with both print and online iterations. Parallax was ranked “Superior” in the 2022 NCTE Recognizing Excellence in Art and Literary Magazines (REALM).

Gain real-life exposure and insights by learning directly from industry professionals. Prior guest teachers include:

Claudia Rankine, National Book Critics Circle Award, Los Angeles Times Book Award, and NAACP Image Award winner for Citizen: An American Lyric; author of Don’t Let Me Be Lonely; professor of Creative Writing at Yale University, Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets

Janet Fitch, author of White Oleander, Paint it Black, and Revolution of Marina M.

Jane Wong, author of Overpour, published in Best American Poetry series, professor at Western Washington University

Allison Benis White, author of Self-Portrait with Crayon, Please Bury Me in This, Small Porcelain Head, professor of Creative Writing at UC Riverside

Natashia Deon, author of Grace, practicing attorney, law professor, UCLA Creative Writing professor

William Lucas Walker is an Emmy Award-winning writer and producer whose television credits include Frasier, Will & Grace and Roseanne. He co-created the critically-acclaimed one-hour Showtime comedy series The Chris Isaak Show. He regularly blogs for The Huffington Post in his column Spilled Milk, the first recurring humor column by a gay parent to appear in a major U.S. publication.

Ruth McKee is a founding member of the Ovation-Award winning theatre company Chalk Rep, and serves as the Literary Manager for the Black Dahlia Theatre. She is a member of the Los Angeles Playwrights Union, and teaches playwriting and screenwriting at Cypress College and the California Summer School of the Arts.

Richard Bausch, novelist and short story writer: Rebel Powers (Random House 1997), Violence (Random House 1997), Good Evening Mr. & Mrs. America And All The Ships At Sea (Harper Perennial 1997), In The Night Season (Harper Perennial 1999), Hello To The Cannibals (Harper Perennial 2003), Thanksgiving Night (Harper 2006), and Peace (Vintage 2009); and the story collections Spirits (Penguin 1988), The Fireman’s Wife (W.W. Norton & Co. 1991), Rare & Endangered Species (Houghton Mifflin 1994), SomeoneTo Watch Over Me (Harper Perennial 2000), The Stories of Richard Bausch (Harper Perennial 2004), Wives & Lovers (Harper Perennial 2004), Something Is Out There (Knopf 2010). His novel, The Last Good Time(Vintage 1995) was made into a feature-length motion picture, directed by Bob Balaban, starring Armin Meuhler-Stahl, Maureen Stapleton, and Lionel Stander, released in April 1995, and Peace was awarded the 2010 Dayton International Literary Peace Prize. Editor of The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction.  Professor at Chapman University.

Curtis Perdue, poet and editor: You Will Island (H_NGM_N 2012).  Poems have appeared in Bateau, Horse Less Review, LEVELER, Vinyl Poetry, Willow Springs, and elsewhere. Founder and editor of Inter|rupture(www.interrupture.com)

Nate Pritts, poet and editor: Sensational Spectacular (BlazeVOX 2007), Honorary Astronaut (Ghost Road Press 2008),The Wonderfull Yeare: a shepherd’s calendar (Cooper Dillon Books 2010), Big Bright Sun(BlazeVOX 2010),Sweet Nothing ( Lowbrow Press 2011). Founder and editor of H_NGM_N and H_NGM_N BKS.

Hilary Plum, novelist, short story writer, essayist, editor: They Dragged Them Through the Streets (FC2, 2013). Co-director of Clockroot Books, consulting editor with the Kenyon Review.

Laura Wetherington, poet and editor: A Map Predetermined and Chance (Fence Books 2011). Poems appear in Sonora Review, BathHouse Hypermedia Journal, Fence, Levure Littéraire, Otoliths, Verse, Eleven Eleven, Bombay Gin, Oxford Magazine, and Just Magazine. Co-founder and editor for textsound.org.

Joshua Marie Wilkinson, poet, editor, filmmaker: Lug Your Careless Body out of the Careful Dusk (University of Iowa Press 2006), The Book of Whispering in the Projection Booth (Tupelo Press 2009), Selenography(Sidebrow Books 2010), Figures For a Darkroom Voice (Tarpaulin Press 2007), Suspension of a Secret in Abandoned Rooms (Pinball Publishing, 2005).  Tour documentary about the band Califone: Made a Machine by Describing the Landscape (IndiePix Films 2011). Founder: Rabbit Light Movies, Letter Machine Editions.Editor: 12X12: 21st Century Poetry and Poetics (with Christina Mengert), Poets on Teaching, (both University of Iowa Press). Editor: The Volta.  Assistant professor, University of Arizona.

Kazim Ali, poet, novelist, essayist: Orange Alert (University of Michigan Press 2010) The Far Mosque (Alice James Books 2005), The Fortieth Day (BOA Editions 2008), The Disappearance of Seth (Etruscan Press 2009), Bright Felon: Autobiography and Cities (Wesleyan 2009), Quinn’s Passage (BlazeVox Books 2005).  Co-founder: Nightboat Books.  Recipient of Individual Excellence Award from the Ohio Arts Council. Poetry featured in Best American Poetry. Columnist for the American Poetry Review.  Contributing editor for the Association of Writers and Writing Programs’ Writer’s Chronicle. Professor at Oberlin College.

Zach Savich, poet: Full Catastrophe Living (University of Iowa Press 2009, winner of the 2008 Iowa Poetry Prize and recipient of a New American Poet honor from the Poetry Society of America), Annulments(University Press of Colorado 2010, winner of the 2010 Colorado Prize for Poetry). A chapbook, The Man Who Lost His Head, will be published by Omnidawn.  Professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

David Shook, poet, translator, reviewer, editor: co-founder and managing editor of Molossus: an online broadside of world literature. Poetry, translations, and criticism have appeared in Oxford Magazine, Poetry, PN Review, World Literature Today, and many other publications.  A chapbook of his translations of Isthmus Zapotec poet Víctor Terán is available from the Poetry Translation Centre. Idyllwild Arts alum.

Chase Twichell, poet, publisher: Horses Where the Answers Should Have Been (Copper Canyon Press, 2010), The Snow Watcher (Ontario Review Press, 1998), The Ghost of Eden (Ontario Review Press, 1995), Perdido (Farrar, Straus, & Giroux, 1991), Northern Spy: Poems (University of Pittsburgh Press, 1981), Dog Language (Copper Canyon Press, 2005),The Odds (University of Pittsburgh Press, 1986). Editor: The Practice of Poetry: Writing Exercises From Poets Who Teach (edited with Robin Behn: HarperPernnial, 1992),founder of Ausable Press. Winner of the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award, among others.

Lehua Taitano, fiction writer, poet: appalachiapacific (Merriam-Frontier award-winning chapbook, University of Montana), A Bell Made of Stones (forthcoming from TinFish Press). Featured in: The Fiction at Work Bi-Annual Report, USO’s on Freeways: Anthology of Pacific Island Writers in/from the U.S., Micronesia Anthology: Indigenous Writers of Micronesia, and Transpacific Poetics.

Oliver Mayer, playwright: Author of over twenty plays, including his two newest plays, Fortune is a Woman and Members Only, the sequel to his groundbreaking play Blade to the Heat. Professor at USC.

Chard deNiord, poet: The Double Truth (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2010), Night Mowing (The University of Pittsburgh Press, 2005), Sharp Golden Thorn (Marsh Hawk Press, 2003), Asleep in the Fire (University of Alabama Press, 1990).  Associate professor at Providence College.

Alba Cruz Hacker, poet, translator: No Honey For Wild Beasts (Plain View Press, 2008). Served as Managing and Poetry Editor for The Pacific Review and as a Faculty Advisor for The Coachella Review and Planet Mexicali Magazine.

Daniel Rabuzzi, novelist: The Choir Boats (ChiZine, 2009), The Indigo Pheasant (ChiZine 2012). Executive at Year Up in New York City.

Students have the opportunity to share their work publicly at dedicated Creative Writing reading events, “Coffee House” style events, and spoken word performances both on and off campus throughout the school year.

Students can participate in exciting projects, showcases, and performances on campus and beyond, including the fully student produced New Works play festival, Arts Enterprise Laboratory (AEL) projects, and more!