Faculty in Fiction
Permanent Faculty
Ethan Canin is the author of five books of fiction, among them the novel, Carry Me Across the Water, the collection of long stories, The Palace Thief, and the collection of short stories, Emperor of the Air. His fiction has appeared in numerous publications, including The Atlantic Monthly, Esquire, The Paris Review, Granta, and The New Yorker, which named him one of 20 "writers for the new millennium." He is also a physician.
Lan Samantha Chang is the author of a collection of short fiction, Hunger (1998), and a novel, Inheritance (2004). Her work has been translated into nine languages and has been chosen twice for The Best American Short Stories. She has received creative writing fellowships from Stanford University, Princeton University, the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
James Alan McPherson is the author of Hue and Cry, Railroad, Elbow Room, Crabcakes, Fathering Daughters, and A Region not Home. He is the recipient of many national literary awards, including a Pulitzer Prize and a MacArthur Prize Fellows Award.
Marilynne Robinson is the author of the novels Housekeeping and Gilead (which won the Pulitzer Prize in 2005), and the nonfiction works The Death of Adam and Mother Country. Housekeeping was included in The New York Times Books of the Century and listed as one of the 100 greatest novels of all time by the UK Guardian Observer. In 1997 she received a Strauss Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
Visiting Faculty, Spring 2008
Edward Carey is the author of Observatory Mansions and Alva & Irva. Five of his plays have been produced in London, Romania, and Lithuania. He has also worked as a set designer and illustrator.
Elizabeth McCracken is the author of three books of fiction, Niagara Falls All Over Again, The Giant’s House, and Here’s Your Hat, What’s Your Hurry? She is the recipient of the Harold Vursell Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the PEN/Winship Award. She has received grants from the Guggenheim Foundation, and Michener foundation, the Fine Arts Center in Provincetown, and the National Endowment for the Arts. She was also honored as one of Granta’s 20 Best Writers Under 40.
Visiting Faculty, Fall 2007
Jonathan Ames is the author of I Pass Like Night, The Extra Man, What's Not to Love?, My Less Than Secret Life, Wake Up, Sir!, and I Love You More Than You Know. He's the editor of Sexual Metamorphosis, and his graphic novel, The Alcoholic, will be published in 2008 by DC Comics. He's the winner of a Guggenheim Fellowship and has been a recurring guest on the Late Show with David Letterman. His website is www.jonathanames.com.
Anthony Swofford, a 2001 graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, is the author of the memoir Jarhead (Scribner, 2003). A film adaptation directed by Sam Mendes was released in 2005. His novel Exit A (Scribner) was published in January of 2007. His writing has appeared in Harper’s, The New York Times, The New York Times Magazine, The Guardian, and The Telegraph Magazine, among other places. He has taught at St. Mary’s College and Lewis and Clark College. His awards include the PEN Art of the Memoir award for Jarhead, and a James Michener/Copernicus Society Fiction Fellowship.
Visiting Faculty, 2006-2007
Tony Eprile is the author of Temporary Sojourner and Other South African Stories (1989) which was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, and The Persistence of Memory (2004), which won the Koret Jewish Book Award. The Persistence of Memorywas a New York Times Notable Book of the Year and was listed as a best book of 2004 by the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times. He has taught at Northwestern University, Williams College, Bennington College, and Lesley University.