Kristen Iversen is an American writer of nonfiction and fiction. Her books include ''Full Body Burden: Growing Up in the Nuclear Shadow of Rocky Flats'' , ''Molly Brown: Unraveling the Myth'' and ''Shadow Boxing: Art and Craft in Creative Nonfiction,'' as well as the anthologies ''Don't Look Now: Things We Wish We Hadn't Seen'' and ''Doom with a View: Historical and Cultural Contexts of the Rocky Flats Nuclear Weapons Plant.'' She is a Professor in English and Creative Writing at the University of Cincinnati and Literary Nonfiction Editor of ''The Cincinnati Review''. Iversen was chosen to be a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Bergen, Norway in 2020-2021.
Life and work
Kristen Iversen was born in
Des Moines,
Iowa
Iowa () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States, bordered by the Mississippi River to the east and the Missouri River and Big Sioux River to the west. It is bordered by six states: Wisconsin to the northeast, Illinois to th ...
, and grew up in
Arvada
Arvada () is a home rule municipality located in Jefferson and Adams counties, Colorado, United States. The city population was 124,402 at the 2020 United States Census, with 121,510 residing in Jefferson County and 2,892 residing in Adams Cou ...
,
Colorado
Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the wes ...
, near the
Rocky Flats
The Rocky Flats Plant was a U.S. manufacturing complex that produced nuclear weapons parts in the western United States, near Denver, Colorado. The facility's primary mission was the fabrication of plutonium pits, which were shipped to ot ...
nuclear weaponry facility. Her father was a small-town attorney and her mother worked as a public health nurse. The eldest of four children, Iversen attended
Colorado State University and then transferred to the
University of Colorado at Boulder
The University of Colorado Boulder (CU Boulder, CU, or Colorado) is a public research university in Boulder, Colorado. Founded in 1876, five months before Colorado became a state, it is the flagship university of the University of Colorado sy ...
, where she received a BA in English/Creative Writing. She worked as a travel writer in Europe for several years before returning to the states to earn a Ph.D. in English and Creative Writing from the
University of Denver
The University of Denver (DU) is a private research university in Denver, Colorado. Founded in 1864, it is the oldest independent private university in the Rocky Mountain Region of the United States. It is classified among "R1: Doctoral Univ ...
.
Iversen has taught at universities around the country, including the MFA programs at
San Jose State University
San José State University (San Jose State or SJSU) is a public university in San Jose, California. Established in 1857, SJSU is the oldest public university on the West Coast and the founding campus of the California State University (CSU) sy ...
and
Naropa University. She served as director of the MFA Program in Creative Writing at the
University of Memphis
}
The University of Memphis (UofM) is a public research university in Memphis, Tennessee. Founded in 1912, the university has an enrollment of more than 22,000 students.
The university maintains the Herff College of Engineering, the Center for Ea ...
and as editor-in-chief of
The Pinch, an award-winning literary journal. During the summers, she has taught in the MFA Low-Residency Program at the
University of New Orleans
The University of New Orleans (UNO) is a public research university in New Orleans, Louisiana. It is a member of the University of Louisiana System and the Urban 13 association. It is classified among "R2: Doctoral Universities – High rese ...
, held in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, and Edinburgh, Scotland. She is also a Faculty Mentor in th
Mile High MFA programat Regis University in Denver, Colorado. As of August 2014, Iversen teaches in the Ph.D. program in Creative Writing at the
University of Cincinnati
The University of Cincinnati (UC or Cincinnati) is a public research university in Cincinnati, Ohio. Founded in 1819 as Cincinnati College, it is the oldest institution of higher education in Cincinnati and has an annual enrollment of over 44,0 ...
, where she also serves as Literary Nonfiction Editor o
The Cincinnati Reviewand was
Fellow at the Taft Research Center She also serves as Director of th
Prose, Poetry, and Passion Seminarin San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.
She is the author of
Full Body Burden: Growing Up in the Nuclear Shadow of Rocky Flats', a book of memoir and investigative journalism that traces her experience of growing up in a small Colorado community near Rocky Flats, a secret nuclear weapons plant once designated as “the most contaminated site in America.” Iversen later worked at the plant herself. ''Full Body Burden'' won th
2013 Colorado Book Awardand th
Reading the West Book Award in Nonfiction It was also chosen one of the Best Books of 2012 by Kirkus Reviews and the American Library Association, and 2012 Best Book about Justice by ''The Atlantic''. The book was a finalist for the Barnes & Noble Discover Award and the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence. In 2012, an excerpt from ''Full Body Burden'' was published in the June 11th edition of
The Nation
''The Nation'' is an American liberal biweekly magazine that covers political and cultural news, opinion, and analysis. It was founded on July 6, 1865, as a successor to William Lloyd Garrison's '' The Liberator'', an abolitionist newspaper t ...
.
Many universities have chosen ''Full Body Burden'' for their
First Year Experience The First-Year Experience (FYE) (also known as the Freshman-Year Experience or the Freshman Seminar Program) is a program at many American colleges and universities designed to help students prepare for the transition from high school to college. FY ...
/Common Read programs and it has been translated into several languages. This book is being made into a forthcoming documentary film
Full Body Burden and it has been optioned for a television series.
Iversen also edited an anthology of essays and articles about Rocky Flats by various experts around the country entitle
''Doom with a View: Historical and Cultural Contexts of Rocky Flats'' published in October 2020. A collection of literary essays
''Don't Look Now: Things We Wish We Hadn't Seen'' co-edited wit
David Lazar was published in November 2020 and features the work of leading writers of literary nonfiction.
Iversen's textbook,
Shadow Boxing: Art and Craft in Creative Nonfiction', was the first in its field to cover the subgenres of creative nonfiction. Her first book,
Molly Brown: Unraveling the Myth'' is a biography of
Margaret Tobin Brown, known to history as “the Unsinkable Molly Brown.” The book won the Colorado Book Award for Biography and the Barbara Sudler Award for Nonfiction and formed the basis for seven documentaries, including the A&E Biography ''Molly Brown: An American Legend'' and
Molly Brown: Biography of a Changing Nation'. A new edition of the book was published in 2018. In 2020, a revival o
the musical ''The Unsinkable Molly Brown''opened in New York, based on Iversen's book. Iversen's essays and stories have appeared in
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
, The Guardian
The American Scholar and many other publications. In 2023 she was awarded a Taft Fellowship for Fall 2023 in support of a book-in-progress on the KKK in the West.
Kristen Iversen is currently completing a literary biography of Nikola Tesla entitled ''Friend and Faithful Stranger: Nikola Tesla in the Gilded Age'', which has involved extensive research trips throughout the United States and Europe.
Iversen is married to George Vujnovich, a pilot, and she has two grown sons. She divides her time between Cincinnati, Ohio and Westcliffe, Colorado.
''Full Body Burden'' summary
''Full Body Burden: Growing Up in the Nuclear Shadow of Rocky Flats'' is a 2012 work of memoir and investigative journalism fusing Iversen's personal story of growing up in Cold War America with the history of the former
Rocky Flats Nuclear Plant near
Denver, Colorado
Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...
, once called by the Department of Energy “the most contaminated site in America.”
From 1952 to 1989 there were many fires, leaks, and other mishaps at Rocky Flats. The area became severely contaminated, and little attention was paid to containment and environmental remediation.
Carl J. Johnson, director of health between 1973 and 1981, led research into contamination levels and adverse effects on public health, until his employment was terminated. His research results were supported and confirmed by many subsequent studies.
Recent studiesindicate that areas on and near the Rocky Flats site are still contaminated with plutonium and may pose a significant health risk.
Books
*
Doom with a View: Historical and Cultural Contexts of Rocky Flats'. Fulcrum Books, 2020.
*
Don't Look Now: Things We Wish We Hadn't Seen'. Co-edited with David Lazar. Ohio State University Press, 2020.
*
*
ref>
See also
*Physicians for Social Responsibility Colorado’
Symposium on Rocky Flats: Impacts on the Environment and Health April 23, 2022
*
Radioactive contamination from the Rocky Flats Plant
The Rocky Flats Plant, a former U.S. nuclear weapons production facility located about 15 miles northwest of Denver, caused radioactive (primarily plutonium, americium, and uranium) contamination within and outside its boundaries. The contamination ...
*
Dark Circle (film)
''Dark Circle'' is a 1982 American documentary film directed and produced by Judy Irving, Christopher Beaver and Ruth Landy that focuses on the connections between the nuclear weapons and the nuclear power industries, with a strong emphasis on ...
*
Making a Real Killing: Rocky Flats and the Nuclear West
*
Rocky Flats Truth Force The Rocky Flats Truth Force was a grass-roots non-violent anti-nuclear group formed during protests at the Rocky Flats Nuclear Weapons Plant near Golden, Colorado during the late 1970s. Demonstrations and track blockages at the Rocky Flats Plant in ...
*
Nuclear and radiation accidents by country
This is a List of nuclear and radiation fatalities by country.
This list only reports the proximate confirmed human deaths and does not go into detail about ecological, environmental or long-term effects such as birth defects or permanent loss ...
*
Downwinders
Downwinders were individuals and communities in the intermountain area between the Cascade and Rocky Mountain ranges primarily in Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah but also in Oregon, Washington, and Idaho who were exposed to radioactive contam ...
www.kristeniversen.com
References
External links
Official websiteKristen Iversen on NPR "Fresh Air"
{{DEFAULTSORT:Iversen, Kirsten
American memoirists
American biographers
Living people
University of Colorado alumni
University of Denver alumni
American women memoirists
American women biographers
1958 births
21st-century American women