Iowa Writers' Workshop

The Program in Creative Writing, more commonly known as the Iowa Writers' Workshop, at the University of Iowa in Iowa City, Iowa is a graduate-level creative writing program in the United States. Writer Lan Samantha Chang is currently the director of the Workshop.

The program began in 1936, with the gathering together of poets and fiction writers under the direction of Wilbur Schramm. Graduates earn a Master of Fine Arts in English; Iowa was the first program in the country to offer this degree.

The program has a minimal curriculum, requiring students to take a small number of classes each semester, including the Graduate Fiction Workshop or Graduate Poetry Workshop itself, and perhaps one or two additional literature seminars. The modest curricular requirements are intended to prepare the student, in a sense, for the realities of professional writing, where self-discipline is paramount.

The program revolves around the Graduate Workshop courses, which meet once a week. Before each three-hour class, a small number of students will have submitted material for critical reading by their peers. The class itself consists of a round-table discussion during which the class and the instructor offer impressions, observations, and analysis about each piece. The specifics of how the class is conducted vary somewhat from teacher to teacher, and between Poetry and Fiction workshops. The ideal result of the process is not only that authors come away with insights into the strength and weaknesses of their own work, but that the class as a whole derives some insight, whether general or specific, about the process of writing.

Iowa Writers' Workshop alumni have won sixteen Pulitzer Prizes (most recently Philip Schultz in 2008), as well as numerous National Book Awards and other major literary honors. Four recent U.S. Poets Laureate have been graduates of the Workshop. In 2003, the Workshop received a National Humanities Medal from the National Endowment for the Humanities. It was the first Medal awarded to a university, and only the second given to an institution rather than an individual." [The University of Iowa Writer's Workshop Webpage: [http://www.uiowa.edu/~iww/about.htm About the Workshop] ]

Pulitzer Prizes of Writers' Workshop Graduates and Faculty

The University of Iowa's Writers' Workshop has 28 affiliated Pulitzer Prizes earned by various faculty and graduates, and over 40 attributed to graduates and faculty of The University of Iowa.

Writers' Workshop graduates have produced 16 Pulitzer Prizes since 1947.

Fiction

*Robert Penn Warren, 1947 Pulitzer for "All the King's Men", former faculty member.
*Wallace Stegner, 1972 Pulitzer for "Angle of Repose", MA, 1932; PhD, English, 1935.
*James Alan McPherson, 1977 Pulitzer for "Elbow Room", MFA, 1969; current faculty member.
*John Cheever, 1979 Pulitzer for "The Stories of John Cheever", former faculty member.
*Jane Smiley, 1992 Pulitzer for "A Thousand Acres", MA, 1975; MFA, English, 1976; PhD, English, 1978.
*Philip Roth, 1998 Pulitzer for "American Pastoral", former faculty member.
*Michael Cunningham, 1999 Pulitzer for "The Hours", MFA, English, 1980.
*Marilynne Robinson, 2005 Pulitzer for "Gilead", current faculty member.

Journalistic

*Tracy Kidder, 1982 Pulitzer in general nonfiction for "The Soul of a New Machine", MFA, 1974.

Poetry

*Karl Shapiro, 1945 Pulitzer for "V-Letter and Other Poems", former faculty member.
*Robert Lowell, 1947 Pulitzer for "Lord Weary's Castle", 1974 Pulitzer for "The Dolphin", former faculty member.
*Robert Penn Warren, 1958 Pulitzer for "Poems 1954-56, Now and Then", 1980 Pulitzer for "Poems 1976-78", former faculty member.
*W.D. Snodgrass, 1960 Pulitzer for "Heart's Needle", BA, 1949; MA, 1951; MFA, 1953.
*John Berryman, 1965 Pulitzer for "77 Dream Songs", former faculty member.
*Anthony Hecht, 1968 Pulitzer for "The Hard Hours", attended Workshop but did not graduate.
*Donald Justice, 1980 Pulitzer for "Selected Poems", alumnus and former faculty member.
*Carolyn Kizer, 1985 Pulitzer for "Yin", former faculty member.
*Rita Dove, 1987 Pulitzer for "Thomas and Beulah", MFA, 1977.
*Mona Van Duyn, 1991 Pulitzer Prize for "Near Changes", MA, English, 1943.
*James Tate, 1992 Pulitzer for "Selected Poems", MFA, 1967.
*Louise Glück, 1993 Pulitzer for "The Wild Iris", former faculty member.
*Philip Levine, 1995 Pulitzer for "The Simple Truth", MFA, 1957; former faculty member.
*Jorie Graham, 1996 Pulitzer for "The Dream of the Unified Field", MFA, English, 1978; former faculty member.
*Charles Wright, 1998 Pulitzer for "Black Zodiac", MFA, 1963.
*Mark Strand, 1999 Pulitzer for "Blizzard of One", MA, 1962; former faculty member.
*Robert Hass, 2008 Pulitzer for "Time and Materials", frequent visiting faculty member.
*Philip Schultz, 2008 Pulitzer for "Failure", MFA, English, 1971.

Notable alumni

Notable alumni of the program include:Articleissues
laundrylists = March 2008

*Daniel Alarcon
*Antler (did not graduate)
*Chris Adrian
*Jon Anderson
*Robert Antoni
*Nick Arvin
*Reza Aslan
*Kirsten Bakis
*Tom Barbash
*Emily Barton
*Richard Bausch
*Marvin Bell
*Karen Bender
*Suzanne Berne
*Clark Blaise
*Robert Bly
*T. Coraghessan Boyle
*Kevin Brockmeier
*Sarah Shun-lien Bynum
*Bruce Brooks
*Suzanne Buffam
*Sara Caldwell
*Ethan Canin
*Raymond Carver (did not graduate)
*John Casey
*Lan Samantha Chang
*G. S. Sharat Chandra
*Kate Christensen
*Sandra Cisneros
*Joshua Clover
*Arda Collins
*Peter Craig
*Michael Cunningham
*Robert Dana
*Charles D'Ambrosio
*Stephen Dobyns
*Rita Dove
*Norman Dubie
*Andre Dubus
*Stuart Dybek
*Kim Edwards
*Nathan Englander
*Paul Engle
*Steven Erikson
*Joe Frank
*John Gardner
*Robert Girardi
*Diane Glancy
*Gail Godwin
*Albert Goldbarth
*Jorie Graham
*Lucy Grealy
*Robin Green
*Debora Greger
*Linda Gregerson
*Allan Gurganus
*Jennifer Haigh
*Joe Haldeman
*Oakley Hall
*Ron Hansen
*Matthea Harvey
*Kent Haruf
*Kathryn Harrison
*Adam Haslett
*Daniel Hecht
*Brenda Hillman
*A.M. Homes
*Jay Hopler
*Pai Hsien-yung
*James Hynes
*John Irving
*Jeremy Jackson
*Mark Jarman
*Gish Jen
*Denis Johnson
*Kimberly Johnson
*Thom Jones
*Donald Justice
*Galway Kinnell
*W.P. Kinsella
*Suji Kwock Kim
*William Kittredge
*Sana Krasikov
*Robert Lacy
*William Lashner
*Nam Le
*Katy Lederer
*Philip Levine
*Larry Levis
*Yiyun Li
*Paul Lisicky
*William Logan
*David Wong Louie
*Thomas Lux
*Haki R. Madhubuti
*Aaron McCollough
*Elizabeth McCracken
*James Alan McPherson
*David Milch
*Leslie Adrienne Miller
*Dow Mossman
*Bharati Mukherjee
*John Murray
*Thisbe Nissen
*Alice Notley
*Flannery O'Connor
*Thomas O'Malley
*Chris Offutt
*Peter Orner
*Julie Orringer
*ZZ Packer
*Ann Patchett
*Bob Perelman
*Aimee Phan
*Jayne Anne Phillips
*D. A. Powell
*Lia Purpura
*Srikanth Reddy
*Lewis Robinson
*Matthew Rohrer
*Tomaž Šalamun
*Leonard Schrader
*Philip Schultz
*Jane Smiley
*W.D. Snodgrass
*Bob Shacochis
*Curtis Sittenfeld
*David Shields
*Jim Simmerman
*David St. John
*Jane Smiley
*Wallace Stegner
*Richard G. Stern
*Mark Strand
*Mary Swander
*Robert Sward
*Anthony Swofford
*Jonathan Thirkield
*Edilberto K. Tiempo
*Danielle Trussoni
*Lewis Turco
*Justin Tussing
*Chase Twichell
*Michael Tyrell
*Brady Udall
*Leslie Ullman
*W.D. Valgardson
*Jennifer Vanderbes
*Abraham Verghese
*Jeff Vintar
*Ellen Bryant Voigt
*Margaret Walker
*Barrett Watten
*John Edgar Wideman
*Joy Williams
*Sam Witt
*Ellen Wittlinger
*Daniel Woodrell
*Charles Wright

Faculty

Over the years, permanent and visiting faculty have included prominent fiction writers and poets, including:

Fiction writers

Nelson Algren,Jonathan Ames, Mike Anderson,Madison Smartt Bell, Vance Bourjaily, T. Coraghessan Boyle, Kevin Brockmeier, Ethan Canin, Edward Carey, John Casey, John Cheever, Frank Conroy, Robert Coover, Jim Crace, Charles D'Ambrosio, Nicholas Delbanco, Stuart Dybek, Deborah Eisenberg, Tony Eprile, Richard Gehman, Judith Grossman, Barry Hannah, Ron Hansen, Adam Haslett, James Hynes, Thom Jones, Margot Livesey, Paule Marshall, Elizabeth McCracken, James Alan McPherson, Bharati Mukherjee, Chris Offutt, ZZ Packer, Francine Prose, Marilynne Robinson, Philip Roth, James Salter, Bob Shacochis, Scott Spencer, Elizabeth Tallent, Barry Unsworth, Jennifer Vanderbes, Kurt Vonnegut, Joy Williams, Meg Wolitzer, and Richard Yates.

Poets

Simon Armitage, John Ash, Marvin Bell, Ted Berrigan, John Berryman, Gillian Conoley, Mark Doty, Lynn Emanuel, Paul Engle, Kathleen Fraser, James Galvin, Forrest Gander, Louise Gluck, Jorie Graham, Robert Hass, Lyn Hejinian, Brenda Hillman, Anselm Hollo, Donald Justice, Claudia Keelan, Galway Kinnell, Carolyn Kizer, August Kleinzahler, Sukrita Paul Kumar, Ann Lauterbach, Mark Levine, Larry Levis, Robert Lowell, Thomas Lux, Jack Marshall, Heather McHugh, Sandra McPherson, Bob Perelman, Carl Phillips, Claudia Rankine, Donald Revell, Mary Ruefle, Tom Sleigh, Gerald Stern, Mark Strand, Robert Sward, Thomas Swiss,Cole Swensen, James Tate, Susan Wheeler, Emily Wilson, C.D. Wright, and Dean Young.

References

External links

* [http://www.uiowa.edu/%7Eiww/ University of Iowa Writers' Workshop Webpage]
*http://www.uiowa.edu/admissions/undergrad/after-grad/pulitzers.html