Zhenevere Sophia Dao

Zhenevere Sophia Dao, a transgender woman, is a poet, novelist (Penguin Books), playwright, and existential and cultural philosopher. She was a Stegner Fellow in poetry at Stanford University, after which she relinquished a Jones Lectureship position in Poetry and Creative Writing at Stanford, leaving academia for the equestrian and blacksmithing professions, and to become an independent scholar. She is the founder of Mythosomatics, an original body of mythopoetic movement art, and the philosophies of Post-Daoism and Neo-Romanticism. She teaches workshops in INTEGRITAS: Inversions of Power Through Spiritualized Martial Arts, as well as VOICE & VOICE: Profound Experimental Theaters of Body & Song, with her companion, vocalist Willa Roberts. She is the founding director and a principal player of SACRa Theater. Zhenevere makes the better part of her living as a blacksmith, farrier (horseshoer), and horse trainer.