{"id":75178,"date":"2013-04-04T08:25:51","date_gmt":"2013-04-04T12:25:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=75178"},"modified":"2013-04-16T11:39:38","modified_gmt":"2013-04-16T15:39:38","slug":"class-of-2013-alyssa-palazzo-future-writer-advocate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2013\/04\/class-of-2013-alyssa-palazzo-future-writer-advocate\/","title":{"rendered":"Class of 2013: Alyssa Palazzo, Future Writer, Advocate"},"content":{"rendered":"

This article is part of a series featuring some of this year\u2019s outstanding graduating students, nominated by their academic school or college or another University program in which they participated. Check for additional profiles of students in the Class of 2013<\/a> on UConn Today from now through Commencement.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Alyssa<\/a>
Alyssa Palazzo ’13 (CLAS). (Peter Morenus\/UConn Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It is hard to imagine that award-winning non-fiction author Alyssa Palazzo, a senior English major and women\u2019s studies minor from Glastonbury, failed her English classes in middle school.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was a really avid reader, but my writing was horrible,\u201d says Palazzo. \u201cBut then in 8th grade my writing really picked up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since then, Palazzo has become involved in numerous creative writing projects, including working for UConn\u2019s Creative Writing Program, writing press releases, and coordinating events for writers visiting UConn\u2019s campus.<\/p>\n

Sean Forbes, acting director of the Creative Writing Program and adjunct professor in the English Department, says Palazzo is a very hard worker.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlyssa is just really trying to leave her mark at UConn,\u201d says Forbes.<\/p>\n

Aside from her work at the Creative Writing Program, Palazzo has won numerous honors, including the 2012 Aetna Creative Non-Fiction Award for a piece called \u201cLeave-Taking,\u201d and again this year for a piece called \u201cEnd Time.\u201d Palazzo also won the 2012 and 2013 Collins Literary Prize.<\/p>\n

Palazzo\u2019s writing, including \u201cLeave-Taking\u201d and \u201cEnd Time,\u201d is inspired by her desire to speak out against domestic violence.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople just don\u2019t talk about sexual abuse and domestic violence,\u201d says Palazzo. \u201cWhen you put a feminist twist on your work, you get criticized.\u201d<\/p>\n

Palazzo got a taste of negative criticism from readers when The Hartford Courant<\/i> published her short essay about violence against women in its young essayist column called \u201cFresh Talk\u201d this February.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had one awful comment, but then I got eight emails from people saying how happy they were that I wrote about domestic violence,\u201d Palazzo says.<\/p>\n

Apart from creating her own work, Palazzo also enjoys working with other authors as the editor-in-chief of UConn\u2019s award-winning literary magazine, the Long River Review<\/i>. The Long River Review,<\/i> in conjunction with UConn\u2019s Design Center, publishes a collection of UConn students\u2019 fiction, non-fiction, poetry, original translations, and artwork.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe really try to publish work that makes us physically react,\u201d says Palazzo. \u201cWe want pieces that evoke an emotion.\u201d<\/p>\n

Darcie Dennigan, assistant professor-in-residence in the English Department and faculty advisor for the Long River Review,<\/i> says Palazzo has an ambitious vision for the magazine.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Long River Review<\/i> is supposed to be student-run, but from what I understood from faculty who have overseen the course in the past, that meant lots of faculty intervention. Not so with Alyssa,\u201d says Dennigan. \u201cShe has a vision for the journal, and I work with her to help her execute it if I can.\u201d<\/p>\n

Palazzo has been working hard to raise money to have a full color cover for this year\u2019s magazine to be released this month. The Long River Review<\/i> staff came up with an entertaining fundraising strategy. If they raised $300 by March 15, they would perform Romeo and Juliet in tights in the middle of Fairfield Way.<\/p>\n

The Long River Review<\/i> surpassed its goal and raised over $400, and although it was not enough to cover the expenses of a full color cover, Palazzo says they are in the process of planning what will surely be an amusing performance.<\/p>\n

According to Palazzo, people should support the work that Long River Review<\/i> publishes because of literature\u2019s incalculable worth \u2013 \u201cwhen you read the magazine and find these little moments of happiness,\u201d she says. \u201cWe\u2019re producing work that will be cherished forever.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the future, Palazzo says she is interested in pursuing a career in women\u2019s advocacy, but immediately after graduation, she would like to go back to Manhattan and work for W.W. Norton & Co. where she interned last summer.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to go into publishing; I want to be a writer; I want to go into politics,\u201d says Palazzo. \u201cThere\u2019s just so much I want to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The editor-in-chief of Long River Review, UConn’s literary magazine, Alyssa Palazzo ’13 (CLAS), is a talented writer, editor, and advocate for women’s issues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":58,"featured_media":74766,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[117],"class_list":["post-75178","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-08 00:56:31","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75178","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/58"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75178"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75178\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":76093,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75178\/revisions\/76093"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/74766"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75178"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=75178"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=75178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}