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Miranda K. Pennington is the author of A Girl Walks into a Book: What the Brontës Taught Me about Life, Love, and Women’s Work (Seal Press, 2017). Her work has appeared on The Toast, The American Scholar online, The Ploughshares blog, and The Catapult Podcast. Pennington received her MFA in creative nonfiction from Columbia University, where she also was a University Writing Instructor. In addition, she has taught academic writing at Touro College, SUNY Empire State, and the LEDA Institute, and she has led creative writing workshops for the AmpLit festival and Uptown Stories. This fall, Pennington will join the writing faculty of American University in Washington, D.C.

The post Non-Fiction by Non-Men: Miranda K. Pennington appeared first on E.B. Bartels.

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I woke up at 3 a.m. to pee the other night. This was not unusual. I like to drink tea before bed, and I usually wake up at least once in the night to relieve myself. What was unusual was that before falling asleep, I read a story by Daisy Johnson. I dreamt of deep pools thick with eels, of lips dripping with human blood, of an albatross standing on the kitchen table. This time, when I got up to use the bathroom, I was not fully awake, so heavy pressed the dreams. My shadow seemed to move on its own; the walls of my apartment appeared to be breathing. And when I heard a rustling on the other side of the bedroom door, never did it occur to me that it was just my boyfriend, puttering around the apartment after a late bartending shift. I stared at the door certain that a pack of violent foxes was clawing at the other side. I gasped and screamed and, finally, woke myself from the dreams.

The post Review of Fen by Daisy Johnson appeared first on E.B. Bartels.

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As part of Wellesley Underground’s ongoing Wellesley in Art series, WU Assistant Editor, E.B. Bartels ’10, had the chance to interview Maryam Eisler ’89. Eisler was born in Iran, left in 1978 before the Revolution, and was then raised in Paris before attending Wellesley. After receiving her BA, Eisler pursued an MBA at Columbia University, spending the first part of her career working in marketing for L’Oreal and Estée Lauder. Now, Eisler is not only a trustee of Wellesley College, but she is also co-chair of the Tate Middle East North Africa Acquisitions Committee, a Tate International Council member, a trustee of the Whitechapel Gallery in London, as well as a member of the Guggenheim Middle East Circle. In the last five years, Eisler has contributed to four book titles, co-published by TransGlobe Publishing and Thames and Hudson, including Sanctuary: Britain’s artists and their Studios, as well as Art Studio America: Contemporary Artist Spaces. Eisler was also just voted by Artnet as one of 100 most influential women in the art world.

So how did Eisler move from business to art? WU spoke with Eisler to find that out and more.

The post Wellesley in Art: Interview with Maryam Eisler ’89 appeared first on E.B. Bartels.