Contact Us/Faculty
Glenda Leznoff
Email: leznoffg@douglas.bc.ca
BA, MFA (British Columbia)
Screenwriting, Personal Narrative, Fiction
Glenda Leznoff is a writer, college instructor and visual artist. Her writing spans several genres. She has written magazine articles for publications such as McLean's, Flare and Vancouver. Her fiction has appeared in literary reviews. As a script writer, she has had work produced in theater, animation and television. She has written children’s books and plays. Glenda’s work is noted for its humour and character-based drama. Her paintings are exhibited in galleries, group shows and private collections in Canada and the United States. She has been teaching Creative Writing courses at Douglas College for over twenty years.
Rick Maddocks
Email: maddocksr@douglas.bc.ca
BA (Guelph) MFA (British Columbia)
Fiction, Personal Narrative
Rick Maddocks’s fiction and non-fiction have appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies throughout Canada. His collection of linked stories, Sputnik Diner, was published by Knopf and Vintage Canada. He received his MFA in Creative Writing from UBC, where he was fiction editor for Prism International. He was Editor of EVENT: The Douglas College Review from 2006 to 2010. His work has appeared in such anthologies as Write Turns: New Directions in Canadian Fiction (Raincoast) and AWOL: Tales for Travel-Inspired Minds (Vintage). Rick is also a songwriter. He has written and performed music with The Beige, an atmospheric roots quintet whose second album, El Ángel Exterminador, was released in 2010. His experimental “gospel funk opera”, The Meal, premiered at the PuSh International Performing Arts Festival in 2011 and will be restaged in Spring 2012.
Teaches CRWR 1103, CRWR 1202, CRWR 2202
Calvin Wharton, Chair
Email: whartonc@douglas.bc.ca
Dip Creative Writing (David Thompson) MFA (British Columbia)
Fiction, Poetry, Personal Narrative
Calvin Wharton's work has been published in a variety of literary magazines and anthologies and broadcast on CBC radio. He has published a book of poetry, Visualized Chemistry (Tsunami Editions) and co-edited the poetry anthology East of Main (Arsenal Pulp). In 1994 he published the book Rowing with Silken Laumann (Stoddart). His collection of short stories, Three Songs by Hank Williams, was published by Turnstone in spring 2002. He was the editor of Event from 1996 to 2001.
Ellen Schwartz
BSc (Wisconson) MFA (British Columbia)
Writing Children's Literature
Ellen Schwartz has published 13 books, 12 of them for children, ranging from picture books to middle-reader novels to young adult non-fiction. Her three latest titles, all 2007, are Stealing Home (Tundra), Yossi's Goal (Orca), and Abby's Birds (Tradewind). Abby's Birds was nominated for the BC Book Prizes. Ellen has taught courses in writing for children for Simon Fraser University's Continuing Studies program, and for Douglas College.
Elizabeth Bachinsky
BA, MFA (British Columbia)
Poetry
Elizabeth Bachinsky is the author of three collections of poetry, Curio (BookThug, 2005), Home of Sudden Service (Nightwood Editions, 2006), and God of Missed Connections (Nightwood Editions, 2009). Her work has been nominated for the Pat Lowther Award (2010), the Kobzar Literary Award (2010), The George Ryga Award for Social Awareness in Literature (2010) the Governor General's Award for Poetry (2006), and the Bronwen Wallace Award (2004) and has appeared in literary journals, anthologies, and on film in Canada, the United States, France, Ireland, England, China, and Lebanon. She lives in Vancouver where she is an instructor of creative writing and Editor for Event magazine.
John Vigna
BA (Calgary)
Dip. Professional Writing (Douglas College)
MFA (British Columbia)
Fiction, Personal Narrative
John Vigna attended the prestigious Iowa Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa and is a graduate of the MFA program at UBC. His fiction and non-fiction has appeared in Cabin Fever: The Best New Canadian Non-Fiction, Grain, Event, sub-Terrain, The Antigonish Review, and Exact Fare 2: Stories of Public Transportation. He is the recipient of the Dave Greber Award for Freelance Writers, winner of the sub-Terrain Lush Triumphant fiction contest and finalist for a Western Magazine Award, the Event creative non-fiction contest, and the CBC literary non-fiction contest. He teaches at Douglas College, the University of the Fraser Valley and Vancouver Island University.