Elan Durham MFA
P.O. Box 1485
Burlington, Vermont 05402
beechwood770@hotmail.com
Professional & Personal Biography
Born in South Carolina, I grew up playing on the grounds of the Greenville City Art Museum. I
played barefoot throughout the mansion, became a young critic of art of sorts, and tapestries,
modern painting, sculpture, and strangely a gold harp were my playthings. By the age of seven, I
was reading Shakespeare and poetry, scripting my own television shows, and performing as a
young Shakespearean actor in my backyard. Fast forward many decades …
Following the deaths of my mother and brother, I recently traveled for almost two years across
some 100,000 miles in the US, Europe, Canada, and Thailand. For a month in the spring, I drove
up and down Scotland, watching the lambs fold, and feeding strawberries to the tamed deer. I
also stayed for a month in London, Paris, Copenhagen, and Crete visiting museums, walking the
soles off my shoes, and wishing I could continue my world tour forever. Any position which
requires me to be mobile, I would welcome.
I have lived in the states of California, New York, South Carolina, Louisiana, North Carolina, and
Oregon. During my years in Los Angeles as a struggling theatre actor (1979-1990), I catered the
Academy Awards, and worked in fine arts and crafts galleries. In one Brentwood gallery, I foiled
an armed robbery of Warhols by tackling the bandit and when he escaped, I gave pursuit into the
parking lot yelling: ‘Stop that man, he’s an art thief!’ Afterwards, I was offered a job with the
LAPD but declined.
In New York, from 1992-1994, I sold luxury residential real estate with The Corcoran Group, some
15 million dollars in a little over a year. The properties I showed and sold include a TriBeCa loft
for the Italian apparel firm ETRO and a co-op at Jackie Onassis' building 1040 Fifth Avenue. After
my sales, I was offered an opportunity to work with Donald Trump alongside a senior VP at
Corcoran; instead, I returned to graduate school for my MFA in Writing and Literature. However,
I designed the marketing program which sold the ETRO Loft, and recently sent ETRO ideas for a
new advertising program for Vogue and W.
From 1998 to 2005, I taught for seven years at the University of North Carolina in English. By
2005 I had taught in three departments, all together ten different courses from freshman to
graduate level courses. The Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs and Dean of Arts and Sciences
recognized my service to graduating students citing my ‘significant impact’ on their lives.
It was an important time for me as well. During this time, I completed a collection of short stories
‘Borrowed Light’ well-reviewed by an agent of a Pulitzer Prize winning author, and other editors
at major magazines and journals. And while my writing is still my pre-occupation it has not
proved lucrative, yet, something I hope to change within the next year by concentrating on a
literary murder mystery. Perhaps you will be the person to help make this a possibility.
Education:
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MFA Masters of Fine Arts, Fiction Writing and Literature
University of North Carolina-Wilmington
BA Advanced Bachelor of Arts, Comparative Humanities (Literature and Culture) University of
Alabama-New College
Louisiana State University (18 graduate hours) Writing and Literature
University of Alabama, Advanced Fiction Writing
Duke University, Creative Writing
UCLA, Screenwriting
Other: University of Oregon. Literature and Performance
Theatrical Training and Experience:
The Actor’s Studio, Stella Adler, Royal Shakespeare Company, Thom Kibbe, Diane Shalet; The
Groundlings, and Theatre Gym, NYC. Appeared in plays at California Institute for the Performing
Arts, Ensemble Studio Theater, The Cast Theatre, and The Dramatist Guild.
Selected Professional Experience:
Administration & Marketing: 1992-1998
Skills: Marketing and sales of multi-million dollars properties, public relations, coordination
and community outreach; fundraising, administrative assistance, editing, grant writing.
Administrative Assistant: The Corcoran Group, 660 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10022
Habitats/7,000 Square Feet for Sale in TriBeCa
Managing Editor & Assistant to the Coordinator of Creative Writing: Louisiana State
University, Baton Rouge. Creative Writing Department. Edited proofs, interfaced with the
publisher to redesign the journal, and established an advertising base for the national literary
journal New Delta Review. Penned a successful State Arts Grant supporting the journal for the
following year, and assisted the Poets and Writers readings series in Creative Writing, which
brought internationally known writers such as Paul Muldoon to the program.
Faculty Coordinator and Producer: UNC-Wilmington. The Vagina Monologues. Coordinated play
rehearsals, publicity, educational materials, and community outreach.
Sales: 1984-2008
Skills: Sales, merchandizing, customer service, special orders, and gallery shows.
Assistant Manager: A Singular Place, Santa Monica, California. The first fine crafts gallery in
Santa Monica featuring Dale Chihuly and other nationally known artists specializing in glass.
Assistant Manager: Martin Lawrence Gallery, Brentwood, California. Showing Warhol, and other
modern and contemporary print artists.
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Assistant Manager: Nature’s Own, Santa Monica, California. Called ‘the best store of its kind’ by
the New York Times, I worked for four years assisting clients such as George Harrison, Cher, Billy
Crystal, Ed Asner, the Sheen family, among many others.
University Instruction: 1998-2005
Skills: Course development and presentation, research, student conferences and
coordination of extra-curricular activities, as well as evaluation of student work from
freshman to graduate student level.
Adjunct Faculty: University of North Carolina-Wilmington, English, Creative Writing, and
Women’s Studies
Courses Taught: ENG 373 The Female Tradition in Literature, ENG 210 Women in Literature,
ENG 110 World Literature Surveys; African American Women’s Literature, ENG 100, 101, 103,
201 College Writing & Reading; CRW 207 Fiction Writing; WMS 210-Introduction to Women’s
Studies, WMS 495-Seminar in Special Topics. Also see the following link:
Masters of Liberal Studies Program
Sample Courses:
English
ENG 373-The Female Tradition in Literature: Study of the ways in which female authors follow
and challenge literary conventions to inscribe their own traditions. Texts: Jane Eyre, Wide
Sargasso Sea, The Awakening, Housekeeping, The Bloody Chamber, Live of Girls and Women
relevant short stories by Atwood; critical essays from Gilbert and Gubar, and others.
·ENG 210-Women in Literature: Twentieth Century Literature by and about women, focusing on
images and roles of women as reflected in fiction and nonfiction. Texts: A Room of One’s Own,
Wide Sargasso Sea, Their Eyes Were Watching God, Beloved, Bridget Jones Diary, White Oleander,
The Lovely Bones, and selections from The Norton Anthology of Literature by Women.
Other Experience: 1989-2001
Skills: Actor, Lecturer, Workshop leader, and Panel Participant
Guest Lecturer, California Institute for the Arts: Critical Studies Program. Los Angeles,
California. Theatre performance and Q & A for students in the BFA playwriting program.
Actor, Dramatist Guild of America: Performances in Los Angeles to assist playwrights in the
development of original works written for the theatre.
Poetry Workshop Leader: The Saturday Academy, College Opportunity Program, UNCW.
Weekend workshop in literary and spoken word skills for middle school students.
Manuscript Mentor/Panel Participant: Literary Festival mentor and participant for
undergraduate students in the BFA program at UNCW.
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Awards and Recognitions:
William Faulkner Festival Scholarship: Awarded LSU Writing Scholarship to attend the
Faulkner Festival in New Orleans, 1998.
Significant Impact: Recognized by the Vice-Chancellor of Student Affairs and Dean of Arts &
Sciences for making a significant impact on UNCW students’ lives, 2003-2005
Champion-McDowell Davis Scholarship: Nominated for artistic excellence by Creative
Writing Department, University of North Carolina Wilmington.
Personal Interests:
Travel, visiting art museums, film, theatre, and international business trends. Reading, nature
walks, tennis, developing new writing ideas, international cuisine, and television from the BBC.
Selected Professional References:
Professor/Writer Rebecca Lee
Department of Creative Writing
UNCW /910.962.3266; leer@uncw.edu
Professor/Writer Clyde Edgerton
Department of Creative Writing
UNCW/910.962.3325; edgertonc@uncw.edu
Barbara Corcoran/President
The Corcoran Group
660 Madison Avenue
New York, New York 10022
212.937.1000/barbara@barbaracorcoran.com