Terry Tempest Williams – The Glorians Are Among Us
Bioneers | Published: April 23, 2026 Nature, Culture and Spirit Video
Terry Tempest Williams, one of our nation’s living literary treasures and a guiding light for many of us regarding ethics and citizenship, shares how she emerged from a dream during the pandemic in 2020 with a renewed vow she had forgotten. In this time of political and climate chaos, as we seek beauty and cohesion wherever we can find its glimmer, Terry focused on “The Glorians,” the overlooked presences—animal, plant, memory, moment—that reveal our shared vulnerability and interconnectedness with the natural world and how they can inspire us to carry forward with grace. “The Glorians are reaching out to us,” she writes,” inviting us to dream a new world into being.”
This talk was delivered at the 2026 Bioneers Conference.
Terry Tempest Williams, a writer, educator, and environmental activist known for her lyrical and impassioned prose, is the author of over twenty creative nonfiction books including the environmental literature classic, Refuge – An Unnatural History of Family and Place, and: The Open Space of Democracy, Finding Beauty in a Broken World, When Women Were Birds, and Erosion – Essays of Undoing. Her most recent book is the The Glorians – Visitations from the Holy Ordinary (spring ’26). A Recipient of Guggenheim and Lannan literary fellowships, Ms. Williams’ work has appeared widely, including in The New York Times, The New Yorker, The Progressive, and Orion, and has been translated worldwide. A member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, she is currently Writer-in-Residence at the Harvard Divinity School.
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