Zhanel Mektepbayeva is currently a second-year MA student at Nazarbayev University. Her research interests include relationships between trauma and art, postmemory, and death.

From a very young age, she collected flowers to make herbaria. She adored the process because it helped her keep the past beauty of things. She started writing at the age of 16 for the same reason– to preserve memories, feelings, and even people, probably because she felt the unsteadiness of coming adulthood.

Her favorite genre is the lyric essay, or poetic purple prose. She thinks that her real-life stories can bring more than anything she could ever squeeze out of her imagination.

She loves creating new words, she loves whales, Ray Bradbury’s short stories, Russian rock, and any kind of poetry.