Writers on Writing: Brian Thorstensen
Thorstensen’s first play, Heading South, was nominated for a 1995 Bay Area Critics Circle Award in 1995. His play Summerland was named to the 2000 Bay Area Playwrights Festival, had a workshop production at the 2000 Z Space Festival of New Performance and was produced off-off Broadway at Wings Theatre Co. Summerland is published in the anthology Plays and Playwrights 2002. As a poet Thorstensen has had work published in Transfer, Six Thousand Five Hundred and Fourteen Hills. He was an artist-in-residence at Blue Mountain Center in 1999 and 2001 and the Djerassi Resident Artists Program in 1996. Thorstensen is a founding member of the Z Collective and has worked as an actor at The Magic Theatre, Eureka Theatre, Intersection for the Arts and Theatre Rhinoceros. He made his feature-film debut as Clifford in Haiku Tunnel. He received his Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from SF State.
The Creative Writing Department opens its Writers on Writing course to the public every Monday evening of the semester. Taught by Professor Camille Dungy, the course features faculty and visiting writers reading from their works and discussing their creative process.