“My liberal arts education has been foundational to my professional life as a musician, novelist, and literature teacher.”
Major: European Studies
Lives in: Paris, France
What work looks like: “I write novels and walk people around Paris, telling them stories about modernists, existentialists, and Nazis, oh my.”
What he loves about it: “The best thing is meeting people from all walks of life and forever learning more about one of the most edifying cities in the world.”
What he gained from a liberal arts education: “It provided me with a Cubist approach to understanding the world, which means we must look at the ‘truth’ from various angles. Learning about the confluence of history and art, in particular, has taught me how to approach my own creative work in the context of the 21st century, keeping sight of the importance of radical authenticity when it comes to being oneself and recognizing the underlying movements and zeitgeists that influence each successive generation. My liberal arts education has been foundational to my professional life as a musician, novelist, and literature teacher. I taught creative writing at the Sorbonne for six years thanks to my academic background, but I now teach literature in the streets of Paris thanks to my more holistic liberal arts education. I am so grateful for the opportunity to have the time, space, and intellectual support to become more of the writer and thinker I was meant to be.”