Author visits St. Ben’s

On Feb. 9, students and faculty joined the Literary Arts Institute (LAI) in welcoming author Jenny Boully to campus.

The Literary Arts Institute aims to foster creative writing, publishing and interaction between students and writers.

They said they work to bring authors to CSB + SJU so that the community can benefit from the knowledge, expertise and entertainment from their words.

Director of LAI and Professor of English Matthew Harkins welcomed Boully, describing her work as experimental and inventive, before reading the land acknowledgment.

Boully began by sharing a coming-of-age piece, called “pet cemetery”, that takes place in her hometown of San Antonio, Texas and will be in her forthcoming memoir, which has been two years in the making.

The essay discusses her childhood, relationship with her mother and her desire to find love.

“Joseph had been my way out; he was the darkest thing that could take me away from me,” Boully said in her essay, alluding to the fact that she used romance as a way to distract from her own troubles and fears.

Her essay “pet cemetery” also discusses the process of loss and reinvention that she faced while growing up and watching her mother’s relationships.

After the reading, she then took questions from students and faculty in attendance.

When asked what time of day she typically writes, Boully said that she works best right when she wakes up because the language is coming easily and she is in a “dreamish state.”

She was also asked what the best advice she ever received was.

“It’s okay to write about the same thing over and over again, because life and different parts of life filter through,” Boully said in response.

Boully is the author of six books: Betwixt-and-Between: Essays on the Writing Life, not merely because of the unknown that was stalking toward them, The Book of Beginnings and Endings: Essays, [one love affair], of the mismatched teacups, of the single-serving spoon: a book of failures and The Body: An Essay.

She talked about the reason that she first got published was only because of her persistence.

She said that rejection is a part of the process, and when she finally got published in her first magazine, it was more gratifying because of her previous failures.

Boully specializes in “experimental and inventive creative nonfiction,” a genre that she herself said was rather unorthodox.

During the Q&A, she said that following curiosity is the most important quality to have as a writer – allowing the essay to take you somewhere new.

“The best of the strangest nonfiction writers possesses an amazing ability to morph and bend,” Boully said.