UC names Thea Lim, UC Alumna and former UC Writing Centre instructor, as the Barker Fairley Distinguished Visitor for 2022-23

Award-winning novelist and essayist Thea Lim will be UC's next Barker Fairley Distinguished Visitor. Thea's first novel, An Ocean of Minutes, published by Penguin Random House, was one of only five novels shortlisted for the prestigious Giller Prize in 2018. Her essays, short fiction, and reviews have appeared in Granta, the Nation, the Paris Review, Best Canadian Stories, the Guardian, the Globe and Mail, Guernica, and Hazlitt, among other venues. Her short story “If You Start Breathing” appeared in Best Canadian Stories 2020. She has received multiple grants, fellowships, and awards for her writing, starting with first prize in The Hart House Review’s Short Story Competition when she was a U of T student.

Thea graduated from University College with a B.A. Hons summa cum laude in English Literature and Political Science in 2004. She received an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from the University of Houston in 2012. She taught at the UC Writing Centre, among other U of T centres, between 2013 and 2016. She also taught Analyzing Creative Nonfiction for three years in Innis College's Writing and Rhetoric program. Between 2017 and 2022, Thea served as  professor of Creative Writing & Publishing at Sheridan College. 

In 2022-23, students will be available to meet with Thea Lim to discuss novels, short stories, and narrative nonfiction. Check back at this site in the summer for more details.

See the official announcement of Thea Lim's appointment as Barker Fairley Distinguished Visitor on the UC website.