Terry
Tempest Williams has been called "a citizen writer,"
a writer who speaks and speaks out eloquently on behalf of an
ethical stance toward life. A naturalist and fierce advocate
for freedom of speech, she has consistently shown us how environmental
issues are social issues that ultimately become matters of justice.
"So here is my question," she asks, "what
might a different kind of power look like, feel like, and can
power be redistributed equitably even beyond our own species?"
Williams, like her writing,
cannot be categorized. She has testified before Congress
on women’s health issues, been a guest at the White House,
has camped in the remote regions of Utah and Alaska wildernesses
and worked as "a barefoot artist" in Rwanda.
In 2006, Williams received
the Robert Marshall Award from The Wilderness Society, their
highest honor given to an American citizen. She also received
the Distinguished Achievement Award from the Western American
Literature Association and the Wallace Stegner Award given by
The Center for the American West. She is the recipient of a
Lannan Literary Fellowship and a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship
in creative nonfiction.
Terry Tempest Williams
is currently the Annie Clark Tanner Scholar in Environmental
Humanities at the University of Utah. Her writing has appeared
in The New Yorker, The New York Times, Orion
Magazine, and numerous anthologies worldwide as a crucial
voice for ecological consciousness and social change. She and
her husband, Brooke Williams, divide their time between Castle
Valley, Utah and Jackson Hole, Wyoming
•••
“At the heart
of all [Williams’] work— as a writer, a naturalist,
and a crusader for protection of the nation’s wilderness...the
common theme is restoration: restoring our connection to the
land, to the sacred, and to each other.”
