Sarah Elizabeth Schantz

BA, Writing & Literature, Naropa University; MFA, Writing & Poetics, Naropa University

BA Creative Writing & Literature, MFA Creative Writing (Low-Residency,) MFA Creative Writing & Poetics

The Ghost, The Glimmer (SWP Workshop) / Special Topics: The Gothic & The Grotesque (MFA) / Rooting in the Archives (MFA low-res) / Writing and the Occult (MFA) / Villain Craft (MFA low-res)

Sarah Elizabeth Schantz is a writer living on the outskirts of Boulder, Colorado, with her family in a Victorian-era farmhouse where they are surrounded by open sky, century-old cottonwoods, and coyote. Her first novel Fig debuted from Simon & Schuster in 2015 and was selected by NPR as A Best Read of the Year before winning a 2016 Colorado Book Award. Schantz’s short fiction, essays, and poetry have won several awards, and she has been published by literary journals such as The Third Coast, Los Angeles Review, Hunger Mountain, Midwestern Gothic, The Adirondack Review, Maggot Brain, and others.

She has a special interest in fairytales, coming-of-age narratives, Gothic literature, mental illness, women’s literature, monsters, and mother-daughter relationships. In addition to teaching at Naropa, she teaches for Lighthouse Writers Workshop and leads her own private workshop series, (W)rites of Passage where she also offers creative writing midwifery for clients one-on-one.

• Modern Grimoire: Contemporary Fairy Tales, Fables & Folklore (Indigo Ink Press, 2013)
• Fig (Simon & Schuster, 2015)
• Down in the Water (a chapbook from Gesture Press, 2021)