Creative Writing

We invite you to join an international community of authors, publishers, artists, translators, and critics, as you bring your writing into dialogue with other forms of art and media. Our program encourages you to deepen the quality of your writing by exploring multiple genres and to appreciate the nuances of language and culture through literary translation. As you create connections between your academic study and your creative production, you will gain an extensive knowledge of literature in its historical and geographical contexts. This insight will come coupled with well-informed attention to linguistic and cultural diversity and close analysis of the details of literary production, which will prove crucial to improving your writing as well as your workshop discussion.  

The educational goals for this major are as follows:

• You will demonstrate knowledge of the history of literary forms, and of the techniques involved in the creation of contemporary literary works and works from earlier periods, across several genres and in more than one culture.
• You will analyze literary works, reflect on their qualities, and show awareness of appropriate methods in literary criticism.
• You will create literary works in one chosen genre which are complete, carefully edited, and which show awareness of the conventions of the genre.
• You will demonstrate advanced capacities in the use of the English language as a creative and communicative tool, and basic capacities in your understanding of the relation between English and French, and show awareness of the challenges involved in translation.

Your classes will be taught by literary and artistic practitioners. Here, you will produce original work, develop creative and professional skills, and acquire the capacity to reflect upon, analyze, and evaluate your work. You will take part in advanced workshops, while enjoying individual mentorship from your advisor and other faculty. You will develop and articulate a personal focus for your reading and your creative production, culminating in a portfolio that combines academic and creative work, along with a senior project in the final year.

With every single one of our majors, you’ll find a carefully curated medley of core courses and electives, which will provide you with the tools you need to establish an unshakeable foundation in the principles and concepts fundamental to your growth within your disciplines of choice. Many majors also enable you to specialize further within the broader area of study.

BROWSE ALL MAJORS AND REQUIREMENTS

The Creative Writing core courses, which you must take as part of the major requirements, will provide you with the tools you’ll need to ground your present and future studies. Your introduction to the history of world literature and to the fundamentals of Creative Writing will help pave the way for your successful completion of other Creative Writing courses. When you have acquired specialized skills in your elective courses, you develop them in the core Advanced Creative Writing Projects course, which serves as a capstone to the major and a gateway to the Honors Thesis.