What does it take to be the next great American writer? It takes lots of reading, lots of writing practice, and dedicated mentorship. Who provides this mentoring? Richard Lyons, emphasis director, and Catherine Pierce teach poetry writing; Becky Hagenston and Michael Kardos teach fiction writing. We offer workshops in poetry writing and fiction writing for beginners and advanced students, both undergraduate and graduate.
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In the fall we run an Undergraduate Writing Contest judged by a select group of graduate students.
The top winners in that contest have their work submitted to the Southern Literary Festival Competition. This competition is part of a Festival run by an association of 100 colleges and junior colleges from Mobile to Memphis. Each year, one member school judges the best of the best from the participating schools and publishes the top winning entries. Each year, another member school hosts the actual festival of visiting professional writers and participants on campus. MSU last hosted a highly successful Southern Literary Festival in 1997 at the M Club on campus. We look forward to hosting the festival again in the near future.
The creative-writing faculty also runs student symposia and coordinates the Jack H. White High-School Literary Competition. The University Honors Program Council screens the high-school entries, and the best graduate students judge the winners. Each year, the high-school winners are invited to the Honors Banquet on campus.
The most important service the creative writing emphasis performs for the University is the planning and execution of the Robert Holland Visiting Writers Series. We usually host four visiting writers a year, both up-and-coming writers and major authors. We urge readers of the newsletter to consult our impressive record on the University website. Our visiting authors make as much time as possible to interact with students, especially the students who hope to go for advanced degrees in creative writing and literature.
Each spring after the May 1 st deadline, the creative writing faculty has the pleasure of evaluating the manuscripts submitted for the Eugene Butler Creative Writing Scholarships. We try to give two scholarships a year, and each scholarship is renewable for a second year if the student winner maintains good academic standing. Applications can be downloaded from the University website.
We also encourage our students and faculty to attend writing festivals and conferences off campus like The Eudora Welty Festival at Mississippi University for Women in Columbus, the Southern Literary Festival, the Mississippi Philological Association, and the University of Montevallo Literary Festival in Montevallo, Alabama, south of Birmingham. Students also attend the national conference in our field: the Associated Writing Programs Conference. Last year it was held in Atlanta, and this year it will be held in New York City.
We take great pride, too, in our recent graduates’ successes, as evinced in their publications and professorial positions. Emily Stinson, M.A. 2006, has published a story and a critical essay. James Miller, B.A. 2002, Susan Bailey, M.A. 2000, Melissa McCool, M.A. 2003, Taylor Polk, M.A. 2003, have published poems in various good journals. Alicia Aiken, M.A. 2006, has published fiction and poetry in several good journals. Sarah Miller, M.A. 2006, has published a piece of creative nonfiction.
Elizabeth Harmon , B.A. 2006, won a full scholarship and assistantship to the M.A. in creative writing at the University of Cincinnati. Jason Burge, M.A. 2005, is studying for his Ph.D. in fiction writing at the University of Wyoming. James Miller, B.A. 2002, who transferred from our M.A. to earn a M.F.A. at Southern Illinois University, is beginning his Ph.D. in poetry writing at Georgia State in Atlanta. Linda “Raven” Woods, M.A. 2004, completed her M.F.A. in fiction writing at Georgia College & State University, and she has a novel represented by P.M.A. Film and Literary Management in New York City. Bliss Green, M.A. 1990, and Bryan Johnson, M.A. 1992, both earned a Ph.D. in creative writing. Dean Karpowicz, M.A. 1996, is teaching literature and creative writing at the University of Wisconsin—Parkside. He also published a critical essay. Lisa Lishman, M.A. 1996, and Billy Reynolds, M.A. 1996, hold Ph.Ds in creative writing at Western Michigan University and teach at Abraham Baldwin College in Tifton, Georgia. Billy has published poems in three journals and won a tuition scholarship to Breadloaf Writers’ Conference 2007. He was also selected to serve on the poetry admissions panel for Breadloaf 2008. He also published an interview with poet Rodney Jones. Brad Watson, B.A., is a professor in the writing program at the University of Wyoming. His short story collection Last Days of the Dog-Men received the Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction from the Academy of Arts and Letters. W. W. Norton published his first novel TheHeaven of Mercury in 2002. Many of our graduates are teaching or have taught at various colleges, junior colleges, and high schools in Mississippi, especially around the Jackson area.
The faculty of the creative-writing emphasis in the Department of English is proud of its contribution to the students and the community of Mississippi State University. With generous support from the College of Arts & Sciences, the University Honors Program, family members of the English Faculty, as well as the benefactors of the Eugene Butler Creative Writing Scholarship and the Robert Holland Visiting Writers Series, we have come to see ourselves as the “glue” of the intellectual community for all those on campus and off who are interested in the language arts.
We also must recognize MSU’s most famous alumnus John Grisham for his support of a Visiting Professorship in Fiction Writing. James Wilcox, now the director of the writing program at Louisiana State University, held that position for two years. Price Caldwell is now teaching in Japan. Brad Vice is now teaching in the Czech Republic. Gary Myers is now interim Dean of Arts & Sciences. These professors have all made indelible impressions on generations of undergraduate and graduate MSU students. Carlene Hatchett and Joyce Harris are the pillars of the English Department office. Without them, nothing would be possible.
Rich Lyons,
Director of Creative Writing,
Becky Hagenston,
Associate Professor