Associate Professor of English Joy Castro’s critically acclaimed memoir The Truth Book was published about this time last year, and her readings from it were among the most compelling moments on campus last fall.
"But when you’re 38 years old, you’ve only got so many memoirs in you," Castro joked with faculty colleagues as she began her presentation for this year’s Ides of August. Then she described a summer experience that has inspired her teaching and writing and clarified her ideas for her next book.
The writer/teacher spent a week in June at The Murie Center in Moose, Wyoming, exploring Grand Teton National Park with author Terry Tempest Williams as a student and workshop leader at the "Ecology of Residency" seminar, part of the University of Utah’s Environmental Humanities program.
Castro drew inspiration from Williams and guest speakers like writer Jack Turner and other authors, tEarth Justice attorney Doug Honnold, who won the case that allowed the re-introduction of wolves into Yellowstone, as well as from her fellow students.
Castro recalled treks that found her doing unwriterly things like shooting the rapids on the Snake River and crawling on her hand and knees to find a calypso orchid; and work more within her field, like writing a "natural autobiography" and keeping a journal (which swelled to 100-pages plus that week).
"Everything around us was our text," said Castro, who returned from supper one evening to find a moose and her calf laying in the field in front of her cabin.
And she returned to Wabash with the idea, and a title, for her next book, which will discuss with the Wabash community later this fall.