Photo by Nina Subin for High Res Photo.

Junot Diaz has been selected as California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) 2017 Katie Jacobson Writer-in-Residence. Diaz, who was awarded the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for his novel The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, will work with students in CalArts’ MFA Creative Writing Program. He will also offer public readings from his work at CalArts on February 16 at 7 pm and at REDCAT (Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater) in downtown Los Angeles on February 17 at 8:30 p.m.

“We’re thrilled to have Junot Diaz come to CalArts and REDCAT as our 2017 Katie Jacobson Writer in Residence, said Maggie Nelson, director of CalArts MFA Creative Writing Program and 2016 McArthur Fellowship recipient. “We’ve been hoping that Junot could accept an invitation from us for some time now, and his acceptance couldn’t have come at a better moment. Junot is both a celebrated writer of fiction—he’s received a Guggenheim, a MacArthur, and a Pulitzer!—and also a fierce, necessary voice for resistance, hope, and fortitude in difficult political times (which is to say, all times, but especially this time).”

A new feature of the CalArts MFA Creative Writing Program, the Katie Jacobson Writer in Residence program is designed to bring a prestigious writer to campus for a public reading, a classroom visit, and to meet with our students in one-to-one sessions. The Writer in Residence Program offers a unique opportunity for students to gain hitherto unprecedented access to leaders in their field, to discuss professional working methods, and to receive feedback on their own work.

Junot Díaz was born in the Dominican Republic and raised in New Jersey. He is the author of the critically acclaimed Drown; The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, which won the 2008 Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award; and This Is How You Lose Her, a New York Times bestseller and National Book Award finalist. He is the recipient of a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship, PEN/Malamud Award, Dayton Literary Peace Prize, Guggenheim Fellowship, and PEN/O. Henry Award. A graduate of Rutgers College, Díaz is currently the fiction editor at Boston Review and The Rudge, and is the Nancy Allen Professor of Writing at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Established in 2013, the Katie Jacobson Writer-in-Residence Program was named in memory of Creative Writing Program MFA student Katie Jacobson, and was created by the generous support of her parents Leslie Jacobson and Jeanine Caltagirone. The program launched with the residency of short fiction writer and translator Lydia Davis. Critic and novelist Samuel R. Delany was CalArts 2014 Writer-in-Residence. Click here to learn more about the residency program.

Calendar Editors Please Note:

What:
Junot Diaz, CalArts’ 2017 Katie Jacobson Writer-in-Residence, will read from this work at CalArts and REDCAT

At California Institute of the Arts (CAlArts)

When:
Thursday, February 16 at 7pm

Where:
Langley Hall on CalArts campus, 24700 McBean Parkway, Valencia, CA 91355-2340
Click here for directions

Admission:
Free

REDCAT

When:
Friday, February 17 at 8:30 pm

Where:
631 West 2nd Street, Los Angeles, CA 90012
Click here for directions

Admission:
General: $10, Members: $5
Reserve tickets at REDCAT.org or call 213 237-2800

CalArts’ School of Critical Studies brings together internationally recognized writers, poets, scholars and thinkers working in both new and traditional forms across a wide variety of disciplines, extending from narrative fiction, performance and multimedia to cultural criticism and political theory. The school offers two graduate programs: the Master of Fine Arts Creative Writing Program and the Master of Arts Aesthetics and Politics Program. In both programs, the expertise of Institute faculty is complemented with an extensive series of readings, lectures, workshops and longer-term residencies by a diverse range of visiting writers, theorists and artists.