Feb 27th, 2017
Dr. Ryan Guth, assistant professor of English, hones his craft outside of the classroom by staying busy as a creative writer. His most recent work, Body and Soul, was a featured title at the 2015 Southern Festival of Books and has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize.
Guth was most recently interviewed by author and editor Dustin Pickering regarding Body and Soul. The interview was published in the journal Lummox (vol. 5, 2016). The dialogue discusses the book and the creative process for writing it.
Body and Soul came about through Guth's personal acquaintance with an adult survivor of childhood sexual abuse. "The stories I heard were so compelling that they sort of took me over," he stated. The account was fictionalized as needed, but the ultimate goal was to "...articulate the emotional and psychological truth of those experiences."
Since the publication of Body and Soul, Guth has embarked on another literary journey with a mixed-genre novel tentatively titled Livings. According to Guth, the new work takes place in a mid-19th century industrial village in the north of England. The story is built around the famous Bronte family, four highly-gifted, highly-strung adult siblings who, for various reasons, have failed to establish themselves in the outside world. They now find themselves back in their childhood home with their father, an elderly Anglican pastor.
Though this latest work is still in progress, Dr. Guth read excerpts from Livings at the Louisville Conference on Literature and Culture on Thursday, February 23.