The Iowa Writers' Workshop, at the

University of Iowa The University of Iowa (UI, U of I, UIowa, or simply Iowa) is a public research university in Iowa City, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1847, it is the oldest and largest university in the state. The University of Iowa is organized into 12 co ...

, is a celebrated graduate-level

creative writing Creative writing is any writing that goes outside the bounds of normal professional, journalistic, academic, or technical forms of literature, typically identified by an emphasis on narrative craft, character development, and the use of literary ...

program in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

. The writer

Lan Samantha Chang Lan Samantha Chang (張嵐; pinyin: Zhāng Lán) is an American writer of novels and short stories. Life Lan Samantha Chang was born in Appleton, Wisconsin, and attended Yale University, where she earned her bachelor's degree in East Asian S ...

is its director. Graduates earn a

Master of Fine Arts A Master of Fine Arts (MFA or M.F.A.) is a terminal degree in fine arts, including visual arts, creative writing, graphic design, photography, filmmaking, dance, theatre, other performing arts and in some cases, theatre management or arts ...

(MFA) degree in Creative Writing. It has been cited as the best graduate writing program in the nation, counting among its alumni 17

Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made ...

winners.

History

*The program began in 1936 with the gathering of poets and fiction writers under the direction of

Wilbur Schramm Wilbur Lang Schramm (August 5, 1907 – December 27, 1987) was a scholar and "authority on mass communications". He founded the Iowa Writers' Workshop in 1935 and served as its first director until 1941. Schramm was hugely influential in establish ...

. *The workshop's second director, from 1941 to 1965, was

Paul Engle Paul Engle (October 12, 1908 – March 22, 1991), was an American poet, editor, teacher, literary critic, novelist, and playwright. He is remembered as the long-time director of the Iowa Writers' Workshop and as co-founder of the International W ...

, a

Cedar Rapids, Iowa Cedar Rapids () is the second-largest city in Iowa, United States and is the county seat of Linn County, Iowa, Linn County. The city lies on both banks of the Cedar River (Iowa River), Cedar River, north of Iowa City, Iowa, Iowa City and north ...

, native. Under his tenure, the Writers' Workshop became a national landmark. He successfully secured donations for the workshop from the business community for about 20 years, including locals such as

Maytag The Maytag Corporation is an American home and commercial appliance company owned by Whirlpool Corporation since April 2006. Company history The Maytag Washing Machine Company was founded in 1893 by businessman Frederick Maytag. In 1925, ...

and

Quaker Oats The Quaker Oats Company, known as Quaker, is an American food conglomerate based in Chicago. It has been owned by PepsiCo since 2001. History Precursor miller companies In the 1850s, Ferdinand Schumacher and Robert Stuart founded oat mills. ...

, as well as U.S. Steel and ''

Reader's Digest ''Reader's Digest'' is an American general-interest family magazine, published ten times a year. Formerly based in Chappaqua, New York, it is now headquartered in midtown Manhattan. The magazine was founded in 1922 by DeWitt Wallace and his wif ...

''. Between 1953 and 1956, the

Rockefeller Foundation The Rockefeller Foundation is an American private foundation and philanthropy, philanthropic medical research and arts funding organization based at 420 Fifth Avenue, New York City. The second-oldest major philanthropic institution in America, aft ...

donated $40,000.

Henry Luce Henry Robinson Luce (April 3, 1898 – February 28, 1967) was an American magazine magnate who founded ''Time'', ''Life'', ''Fortune'', and ''Sports Illustrated'' magazine. He has been called "the most influential private citizen in the America ...

, the publisher of ''

TIME Time is the continued sequence of existence and event (philosophy), events that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various me ...

'' and ''

Life Life is a quality that distinguishes matter that has biological processes, such as signaling and self-sustaining processes, from that which does not, and is defined by the capacity for growth, reaction to stimuli, metabolism, energy ...

'' magazines, and

Gardner Cowles Jr. Gardner "Mike" Cowles Jr. (1903–1985) was an American newspaper and magazine publisher. He was co-owner of the Cowles Media Company, whose assets included the ''Minneapolis Star'', the ''Minneapolis Tribune'', the ''Des Moines Register'', ''L ...

(1903–1985), who published '' Look'' magazine, provided publicity for the workshop's events. *From 1965 to 1969, George Starbuck directed the Workshop. * John Leggett was the director from 1969 to 1986 and attracted writers such as

T.C. Boyle Thomas Coraghessan Boyle, also known as T. C. Boyle and T. Coraghessan Boyle (born December 2, 1948), is an American novelist and short story writer. Since the mid-1970s, he has published sixteen novels and more than 100 short stories. He won the ...

Ethan Canin Ethan Andrew Canin (born July 19, 1960) is an American author, educator, and physician. He is a member of the faculty of the Iowa Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa. Canin was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, while his parents were vacatio ...

Michael Cunningham Michael Cunningham (born November 6, 1952) is an American novelist and screenwriter. He is best known for his 1998 novel '' The Hours'', which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the PEN/Faulkner Award in 1999. Cunningham is a senior lectur ...

Gail Godwin Gail Godwin (born June 18, 1937) is an American novelist and short story writer. Godwin has written 14 novels, two short story collections, three non-fiction books, and ten libretti. Her primary literary accomplishments are her novels, which have ...

Denis Johnson Denis Hale Johnson (July 1, 1949 – May 24, 2017) was an American novelist, short-story writer, and poet. He is perhaps best known for his debut short story collection, '' Jesus' Son'' (1992). His most successful novel, ''Tree of Smoke'' (2007) ...

, and

Jane Smiley Jane Smiley (born September 26, 1949) is an American novelist. She won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1992 for her novel ''A Thousand Acres'' (1991). Biography Born in Los Angeles, California, Smiley grew up in Webster Groves, Missouri, a su ...

. *From 1987 until his death in 2005, Frank Conroy directed the workshop and was Engle's longest-lasting successor. *

became the director in 2006.

Organization

The Program in Creative Writing, at the

Iowa City, Iowa Iowa City, offically the City of Iowa City is a city in Johnson County, Iowa, United States. It is the home of the University of Iowa and county seat of Johnson County, at the center of the Iowa City Metropolitan Statistical Area. At the tim ...

, is more commonly known as the Iowa Writers' Workshop graduate-level

program in the

. Graduates earn a

(MFA) degree in English. Iowa has the oldest creative writing program in the country offering an MFA credential.

Faculty and alumni

''See category: '' As of September 2020, the workshop's faculty are

Jamel Brinkley Jamel Brinkley is an American writer. His debut story collection, ''A Lucky Man'' (2018), was the winner of the PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Award and the Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence. It was also a finalist for the National Boo ...

Charles D'Ambrosio Charles Anthony D'Ambrosio, Jr (born 1958) is an American short story writer and essayist. Life The son of Charles D'Ambrosio, Sr (1932-2011), a professor of finance at the University of Washington, D'Ambrosio grew up with two brothers and four s ...

Margot Livesey Margot Livesey (born 1953) is a Scottish-born writer. She is the author of nine novels, a collection of short stories, a collection of essays on writing and the co-author, with Lynn Klamkin, of a textbook. Among other awards, she has earned a Gu ...

in fiction;

in English and creative writing; James Galvin,

Mark Levine Mark Andrew LeVine is an American historian, musician, writer, and professor. He is a professor of history at the University of California, Irvine. Education LeVine received his B.A. in comparative religion and biblical studies from Hunter ...

Tracie Morris Tracie Morris is an American poet. She is also a performance artist, vocalist, voice consultant, creative non-fiction writer, critic, scholar, bandleader, actor and non-profit consultant. Morris is from Brooklyn, New York. Morris' experimental so ...

, Elizabeth Willis in poetry;

Marilynne Robinson Marilynne Summers Robinson (born November 26, 1943) is an American novelist and essayist. Across her writing career, Robinson has received numerous awards, including the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2005, National Humanities Medal in 2012, and t ...

; and Program Director

. Visiting faculty are

Alexia Arthurs Alexia Arthurs is a writer who grew up in both Jamaica and the United States of America. She writes about the variability of experiences of black identity of immigrants from African countries, Jamaica, and other countries of the West Indies from r ...

Tom Drury Thomas Jay Drury is an American writer. Drury was born in Iowa, in 1956, grew up in the small town of Swaledale and received his bachelor's degree in journalism from the University of Iowa in 1980. For the next five years, Drury worked at a ...

and Amy Parker.

Curriculum and courses

The program's curriculum requires students to take a small number of classes each semester, including the Graduate Fiction Workshop or Graduate Poetry Workshop itself, and one or two additional literature seminars. The modest requirements are intended to prepare the student for the realities of professional writing, where self-discipline is paramount. The graduate workshop courses meet weekly. Before each three-hour class, a small number of students submit material for critical reading by their peers. The class itself consists of a round-table discussion during which the students and the instructor discuss each piece. The specifics of how the class is conducted vary from teacher to teacher and between poetry and fiction workshops. The ideal result is not only that authors come away with insights into the strengths and weaknesses of their own work, but that the class as a whole derives insight, whether general or specific, about the process of writing.

Pulitzer Prizes won by graduates and faculty

, faculty and graduates affiliated with the Iowa Writers' Workshop have won 29

s, including 18 won by alumni since 1947, as well as numerous

National Book Award The National Book Awards are a set of annual U.S. literary awards. At the final National Book Awards Ceremony every November, the National Book Foundation presents the National Book Awards and two lifetime achievement awards to authors. The Nat ...

s and other literary honors. Eight U.S. Poets Laureate have been graduates of the workshop. Graduates and faculty of the

have won over 40

Fiction

Robert Penn Warren Robert Penn Warren (April 24, 1905 – September 15, 1989) was an American poet, novelist, and literary critic and was one of the founders of New Criticism. He was also a charter member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers. He founded the lit ...

, 1947 Pulitzer for ''

All the King's Men ''All the King's Men'' is a 1946 novel by Robert Penn Warren. The novel tells the story of charismatic populist governor Willie Stark and his political machinations in the Depression-era Deep South. It was inspired by the real-life story of U ...

'', former faculty member. *

Wallace Stegner Wallace Earle Stegner (February 18, 1909 – April 13, 1993) was an American novelist, short story writer, environmentalist, and historian, often called "The Dean of Western Writers". He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1972 and the U.S. National Boo ...

, 1972 Pulitzer for ''

Angle of Repose The angle of repose, or critical angle of repose, of a granular material is the steepest angle of descent or dip relative to the horizontal plane to which a material can be piled without slumping. At this angle, the material on the slope fac ...

'', MA, 1932; PhD, English, 1935. *

James Alan McPherson James Alan McPherson (September 16, 1943 – July 27, 2016) was an American essayist and short-story writer. He was the first African-American writer to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and was included among the first group of artists who re ...

, 1977 Pulitzer for '' Elbow Room'', MFA, 1969; former faculty member. *

John Cheever John William Cheever (May 27, 1912 – June 18, 1982) was an American short story writer and novelist. He is sometimes called "the Chekhov of the suburbs". His fiction is mostly set in the Upper East Side of Manhattan; the Westchester suburbs; ...

, 1979 Pulitzer for ''

The Stories of John Cheever ''The Stories of John Cheever'' is a 1978 short story collection by American author John Cheever. It contains some of his most famous stories, including "The Enormous Radio", "Goodbye, My Brother", "The Country Husband", " The Five-Forty-Eight" ...

'', former faculty member. *

, 1992 Pulitzer for ''

A Thousand Acres ''A Thousand Acres'' is a 1991 novel by American author Jane Smiley. It won the 1992 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, the National Book Critics Circle Award for fiction in 1991 and was adapted to a 1997 film of the same name. It was premiered as an ...

'', MA, 1975; MFA, English, 1976; PhD, English, 1978. *

Philip Roth Philip Milton Roth (March 19, 1933 – May 22, 2018) was an American novelist and short story writer. Roth's fiction—often set in his birthplace of Newark, New Jersey—is known for its intensely autobiographical character, for philosophicall ...

, 1998 Pulitzer for ''

American Pastoral ''American Pastoral'' is a Philip Roth novel published in 1997 concerning Seymour "Swede" Levov, a successful Jewish American businessman and former high school star athlete from Newark, New Jersey. Levov's happy and conventional upper middle ...

'', former faculty member. *

, 1999 Pulitzer for '' The Hours'', MFA, English, 1980. *

, 2005 Pulitzer for ''

Gilead Gilead or Gilad (; he, גִּלְעָד ''Gīləʿāḏ'', ar, جلعاد, Ǧalʻād, Jalaad) is the ancient, historic, biblical name of the mountainous northern part of the region of Transjordan.''Easton's Bible Dictionary'Galeed''/ref> ...

'', emeritus faculty member. * Paul Harding, 2010 Pulitzer for '' Tinkers'', MFA, English, 2000. *

Andrew Sean Greer Andrew Sean Greer (born November 1970) is an American novelist and short story writer. Greer received the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for his novel '' Less''. He is the author of ''The Story of a Marriage'', which ''The New York Times'' has ...

, 2018 Pulitzer for '' Less'', former visiting faculty member.

Journalism

Tracy Kidder John Tracy Kidder (born November 12, 1945) is an American writer of nonfiction books. He received the Pulitzer Prize for his '' The Soul of a New Machine'' (1981), about the creation of a new computer at Data General Corporation. He has recei ...

, 1982 Pulitzer in general nonfiction for ''

The Soul of a New Machine ''The Soul of a New Machine'' is a non-fiction book written by Tracy Kidder and published in 1981. It chronicles the experiences of a computer engineering team racing to design a next-generation computer at a blistering pace under tremendous ...

'', MFA, 1974.

Poetry

Karl Shapiro Karl Jay Shapiro (November 10, 1913 – May 14, 2000) was an American poet. He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1945 for his collection ''V-Letter and Other Poems''. He was appointed the fifth Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the ...

, 1945 Pulitzer for ''V-Letter and Other Poems'', former faculty member. *

Robert Lowell Robert Traill Spence Lowell IV (; March 1, 1917 – September 12, 1977) was an American poet. He was born into a Boston Brahmin family that could trace its origins back to the '' Mayflower''. His family, past and present, were important subjects ...

, 1947 Pulitzer for ''Lord Weary's Castle'', 1974 Pulitzer for ''The Dolphin'', former faculty member. *

, 1958 Pulitzer for ''Poems 1954–56, Now and Then'', 1980 Pulitzer for ''Poems 1976–78'', former faculty member. *

W. D. Snodgrass William De Witt Snodgrass (January 5, 1926 – January 13, 2009) was an American poet who also wrote under the pseudonym S. S. Gardons. He won the 1960 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. Life Snodgrass was born on January 5, 1926, in Beaver Falls, ...

, 1960 Pulitzer for ''Heart's Needle'', BA, 1949; MA, 1951; MFA, 1953. *

John Berryman John Allyn McAlpin Berryman (born John Allyn Smith, Jr.; October 25, 1914 – January 7, 1972) was an American poet and scholar. He was a major figure in American poetry in the second half of the 20th century and is considered a key figure in th ...

, 1965 Pulitzer for ''

77 Dream Songs ''The Dream Songs'' is a compilation of two books of poetry, '' 77 Dream Songs'' (1964) and ''His Toy, His Dream, His Rest'' (1968), by the American poet John Berryman. According to Berryman's "Note" to ''The Dream Songs'', "This volume combines ...

'', former faculty member. *

Anthony Hecht Anthony Evan Hecht (January 16, 1923 – October 20, 2004) was an American poet. His work combined a deep interest in form with a passionate desire to confront the horrors of 20th century history, with the Second World War, in which he fought, ...

, 1968 Pulitzer for ''The Hard Hours'', attended Workshop but did not graduate. *

Donald Justice Donald Rodney Justice (August 12, 1925 – August 6, 2004) was an American teacher of writing and poet who won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1980. In summing up Justice's career, David Orr wrote, "In most ways, Justice was no different from a ...

, 1980 Pulitzer for ''Selected Poems'', alumnus and former faculty member. *

Carolyn Kizer Carolyn Ashley Kizer (December 10, 1925 – October 9, 2014) was an American poet of the Pacific Northwest whose works reflect her feminism. She won the Pulitzer Prize in 1985. According to an article at the Center for the Study of the Pacific ...

, 1985 Pulitzer for ''Yin'', former faculty member. *

Rita Dove Rita Frances Dove (born August 28, 1952) is an American poet and essayist. From 1993 to 1995, she served as Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress. She is the first African American to have been appointed since the positi ...

, 1987 Pulitzer for ''Thomas and Beulah'', MFA, 1977. *

Mona Van Duyn Mona Jane Van Duyn (May 9, 1921 – December 2, 2004) was an American poet. She was appointed United States Poet Laureate in 1992. Biography Early years Van Duyn was born May 9, 1921 in Waterloo, Iowa."Van Duyn, Mona (1921–2004)." '' Dictio ...

, 1991 Pulitzer for ''

Near Changes ''Near Changes'' is a 1990 collection of poems by Mona Van Duyn (1921–2004). It was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1991. The poems express appreciation for a range of subjects (such as Fibonacci, a giraffe, and zinnias), with a range ...

'', MA, English, 1943. * James Tate, 1992 Pulitzer for ''Selected Poems'', MFA, 1967. *

Louise Glück Louise Elisabeth Glück ( ; born April 22, 1943) is an American poet and essayist. She won the 2020 Nobel Prize in Literature, whose judges praised "her unmistakable poetic voice that with austere beauty makes individual existence universal". H ...

, 1993 Pulitzer for ''The Wild Iris'', former faculty member. * Philip Levine, 1995 Pulitzer for ''The Simple Truth'', MFA, 1957; former faculty member. *

Jorie Graham Jorie Graham (; born May 9, 1950) is an American poet. The Poetry Foundation called Graham "one of the most celebrated poets of the American post-war generation." She replaced poet Seamus Heaney as Boylston Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory at ...

, 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 Mark Strand (April 11, 1934 – November 29, 2014) was a Canadian-born American poet, essayist and translator. He was appointed Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 1990 and received the Wallace Stevens Award in 2004 ...

, 1999 Pulitzer for ''Blizzard of One'', MA, 1962; former faculty member. *

Robert Hass Robert L. Hass (born March 1, 1941) is an American poet. He served as Poet Laureate of the United States from 1995 to 1997. He won the 2007 National Book Award and shared the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for the collection ''Time and Materials: Poems 1997 ...

, 2008 Pulitzer for ''Time and Materials'', frequent visiting faculty member. * Philip Schultz, 2008 Pulitzer for ''Failure'', MFA, English, 1971.

References

External links

Iowa Writers Workshop website
accessed 5 October, 2021 * *
Historic photos of the Iowa Writers' Workshop from the UI Archives 1950–1969
accessed 4 April 2014 {{Coord, 41.667, -91.535, display=title American writers' organizations Creative writing programs University of Iowa National Humanities Medal recipients 1936 establishments in Iowa