Prominent Local Author Named UM’s Kittredge Distinguished Visiting Writer

MISSOULA – University of Montana alumnus Nicholas Triolo will serve as UM’s 2027 Kittredge Distinguished Visiting Writer in Environmental Studies. Working as an author, editor and educator from his home in Missoula, Triolo has spent more than a decade in publishing and has taught place-based writing at UM, the Wild Rockies Field Institute, the Missoula Writing Collaborative and Oxford Academia, among others.

His memoir, “The Way Around: Walking a Reimagined Path,” was selected as Montana’s 2026 Great Reads from Great Places adult title and will represent Montana in the Library of Congress.

“My career as a writer, editor and educator was forever changed after studying with previous Kittredge Distinguished Visiting Writers such as Janisse Ray, William deBuys and Amy Irvine during my graduate school years at UM, so to take on this position – and this tradition – is a complete honor,” Triola said. “I do not accept it lightly.”

Triolo will read from his book, “The Way Around: Walking a Reimagined Path,” at 6:30 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 8, at the Missoula Public Library. He will discuss his writing in a conversation with author and W.A. Franke College of Forestry and Conservation Environmental Studies Professor Mark Sundeen during the event, which also celebrates the paperback release of “The Way Around.”

In the 10 years since receiving his master’s in environmental studies at UM, Triolo has published two books, including “The Way Around: A Field Guide to Going Nowhere.” His writing, films, photography and audio have been featured in Orion, Outside, Emergence, Longreads, The Dark Mountain Project, Best American Poetry Blog, JuxtaProse, Terrain.org, Trail Runner, Whitefish Review, Montana Quarterly, Clackamas Review, Patagonia’s “The Dirtbag Diaries” podcast, Wild and Scenic Film Festival, Camas and others.

“Kittredge’s legacy, the high level of discourse, the urgent need right now to engage in narratives of place and ecological relations on the page – these are things I’ve been working on for 20 years now, both in the publishing world as an editor and creatively as a writer,” Triolo said. “Teaching at UM brings it all full circle to a campus and a community that I am deeply invested in. I can hardly wait.”

Triolo will teach a graduate workshop in environmental writing, in which students write primarily nonfiction that interrogates the relationship with the non-human world. It is open to students in all departments, with priority given to Environmental Studies students.

“Nick is doing the most important kind of writing today,” Sundeen said. “Instead of just getting to the top of the next hill, he’s exploring the spiritual and cultural paths that have connected us to mountains for generations.”

UM’s Kittredge Distinguished Writer in Environmental Studies is funded by generous donors and is named in honor of Bill Kittredge (1932-2020), who taught creative writing at UM and inspired three decades of students. Previous Kittredge Distinguished Visiting Writers in Environmental Studies include Terry Tempest Williams, Rebecca Solnit, Craig Childs, Amy Irvine, Chris La Tray and, most recently, Cassidy Randall.

Graduate students interested in studying with Triolo can email mark.sundeen@umontana.edu for more information.

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Contact: Jess Abell, UM director of marketing and communications, W.A. Franke College of Forestry and Conservation, 406-243-5554, jessica.abell@mso.umt.edu; Mark Sundeen, chair and associate professor, UM Department of Environmental Studies, 406-243-6273, mark.sundeen@umontana.edu.