William Wright, Jr. is an ambitious young writer from San Diego, California. He is the son of two Navy veterans, Margo Wright and William Wright, Sr. He is also the youngest and the only boy among his two siblings, China Wright and Casaundra Camille Robinson, nee Wright. It took him some time to discover his talent for writing poetry, and to this day there are still many lessons for him to learn. As a child, William originally dreamed of becoming a naturalist and of traveling the world with his childhood friend, Jason Nivens. In middle school, he dreamed of becoming a historian and of having his own TV show on the History Channel. In high school, William’s dreams shifted towards becoming a comic book artist, and no matter what his family and friends told him, he was going write comic books with his best friend, after graduating high school. Once again, circumstances had changed and yet another aspiration had taken his full attention.

However, this aspiration remained with him far longer than the rest. After a difficult first semester of college, William fell into a deep depression and felt as if he had no true purpose in life. He was not sure of who he was or who he wanted be. There were so many questions swirling around in his mind that he became overwhelmed, and just had to find a way to purge them from his thoughts. He would relieve his frustrations by writing anger-fueled rants into a notebook every day. These rants were about feeling alienated; they were about his anxiety and his seemingly endless search for a place and a purpose. Over time, the long paragraphs of these rants were shortened and he began to insert more poetic imagery into his sentences. The shortened paragraphs of these rants, were broken up into stanzas and slowly they evolved into poems.

Through constantly writing, he discovered a new passion for words and for the incredible power they wield. People were quick to lend compliments for his eloquence and the vivid imagery employed in his poetry. He always accepted and appreciated their kind words, but kept in mind that there was always room for improvement. William devoted most of his days to writing, which often resulted in him neglecting his pursuit of a higher education. Through his hard work and dedication to writing, he was featured in his first publication in May of 2012, in an anthology titled: “The Survivor’s Guide to Bedlam.” It was welcome and exciting news but it was quickly overshadowed by a steep decline in his grades. William dropped out of college a year later, and devoted his time to finding employment and searching for more publishing opportunities. In the years following his departure from college, he self-published five poetry books, which received little to no feedback and sparked a long period of depression and great uncertainty. After two years of contemplation, temporary jobs, a series of failures and poor decisions, and a few poetry anthology features, William decided to re-enroll in college and to continue working toward a degree. He registered for the spring semester of 2015, and today he is still in college, maintaining a 4.0 GPA in his pursuit of a degree in English. He is still searching for his voice as a writer, and is even stepping out of his comfort zone of poetry, to try his hand at writing a novel. Even through the hardship, the humiliation and the months of self-doubt and self-destruction, William Wright, Jr. has held true to his dream. And thanks to the people at Creative Talents Unleashed, that dream is fast becoming a reality.