FARMINGTON —The University of Maine at Farmington is excited to present essayist, journalist and storyteller Onnesha Roychoudhuri as the first reader of the 2026 spring semester schedule of its popular Visiting Writers series.
Roychoudhuri’s book “The Marginalized Majority: Claiming Our Power in a Post-Truth America” (Melville Press) was a 2018 Kirkus best book of the year and has been praised by The San Francisco Book Review, The Rumpus, and Book Riot among others.
Roychoudhuri will read from her work at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 26 in the Landing in the UMF Olsen Student Center. The reading is free and open to the public.
Roychoudhuri regularly leads writing and storytelling workshops for organizations across the country, including the Moth and the Reproductive Health Access Project. A journalist, essayist and storyteller, Roychoudhuri teaches creative non-fiction at Colby College.
Roychoudhuri herself is focused on delivering targeted storytelling training to advocates working on the frontlines of the fight for social justice and equity. “The Marginalized Majority” makes the case that our plurality of identities is not only our greatest strength, but is also at the indisputable core of successful progressive change throughout history.
Kirkus Reviews calls the book “A stirring defense of ‘identity politics’ and the need to reclaim narratives as well as a powerful account of the transformation of a journalist into an activist … with literary flair and a conversational, common-sense approach that seems far more heartfelt than dogmatic.”
A 2013 fellow at the Center for Fiction, Roychoudhuri’s writing has appeared in Rolling Stone, Kenyon Review, n+1 and The Boston Review, She is a 2011 and 2012 Pushcart Prize nominee, and has been awarded residencies at Hedgebrook and Blue Mountain Center.
The Visiting Writer Series is sponsored by the UMF Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Program.
As the only Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program in the state of Maine and one of only three in all of New England, the UMF program invites students to work with faculty, who are practicing writers, in workshop-style classes to discover and develop their writing strengths in the genres of poetry, fiction, and non-fiction. Small classes, an emphasis on individual conferencing, and the development of a writing portfolio allow students to see themselves as artists and refine their writing under the guidance of accomplished and published faculty mentors.
Students can pursue internships to gain real-world writing and publishing experience by working on campus with The Sandy River Review, a student-run literary magazine; or The Farmington Flyer, a university newspaper.
