A Literary Life
Imaginative reasoning is key to the literary life. Poetry, fiction, memoir: all hinge on the imagination and the intellect, on rhyme and reason, on technique and design. In our creative writing workshops, students refine their voices, develop their aesthetics, strive for originality, reflect on their cultures, research the past, consider the future. They engage the senses, play with words, experiment with form; they invent, provoke, inspire, speculate; they question and answer. All the while they gain insights into human nature and the world around them. And they hone the professional skills that prepare them for a workplace that’s driven by communication, social networking, and the articulate and precise expression of complex ideas.
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Literary Readings & Events
Creative Writing Reading Series
The Department of English hosts readings and discussions by acclaimed and renowned poets, novelists, and memoirists; in past years, we’ve featured Roxane Gay, Natasha Tretheway, Jesmyn Ward, and others.
Creative Writing Month
Every October, the Department of English hosts a month-long celebration of fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction, with readings, panel discussions, and other events and projects. Creative Writing Month includes Publishing Week, featuring literary agents and editors. We also prepare for November’s National Novel Writing Month.
National Poetry Month
April is National Poetry Month, and UNL English hosts readings and discussions, as well as Poem in Your Pocket Day and other poetry projects, throughout the month.
No Name Reading Series
The No Name Reading series features the best in poetry and prose from graduate student writers in the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. The monthly readings take place at Barrymore's, an 18+ venue adjacent to Lincoln's Rococo Theatre.
Publications & Projects
Prairie Schooner
Prairie Schooner, founded in 1926 at the University of Nebraska, is widely recognized as one of the premiere literary magazines in the nation. Glenna Luschei Editor-in-Chief Kwame Dawes and Managing Editor Siwar Masannat lead a team of undergraduate interns, graduate editorial staff, and alumni readers who help publish the quarterly literary magazine.
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American Life in Poetry
American Life in Poetry is a free weekly column for newspapers and online publications featuring a poem by a contemporary American poet and a brief introduction to the poem by curator and editor Kwame Dawes. The project was founded in 2005 by former U.S. Poet Laureate Ted Kooser, in partnership with the Poetry Foundation and the Library of Congress. The Department of English provides administrative support and is home to the project's offices.
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Laurus
Laurus, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's undergraduate literary magazine, publishes fiction, poetry, non-fiction and visual artwork created and edited exclusively by UNL undergraduates. The magazine publishes and prints its annual issue every spring, and publishes additional mini-issues online throughout the year.
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Slam Poetry
The UNL Slam Poets are a group of students promoting creative expression through the writing and performing of slam poetry. Poetry slams held throughout the year feature visiting poets and give students an opportunity to perform their original poetry. Each spring, a team of student poets compete in the national College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational (CUPSI).
Jonis Agee
Adele Hall Chair of English
Fiction, creative nonfiction, and modern and contemporary American literature
Stephen Behrendt
George Holmes Distinguished Professor of English
British Romanticism, later 18th-century British literature, women writers of the Romantic period, literature and the other arts, Blake, the Shelley circle, and creative writing (poetry)
James Lowell Brunton
Assistant Professor of Practice and Coordinator of Film Studies
Film and media studies, literary and critical theory, LGBTQ studies, and reative writing (poetry)
Joy Castro
Willa Cather Professor of English and Ethnic Studies
Director of Institute for Ethnic Studies
Memoir, fiction, film, U.S. ethnic literatures, women's literatures, and modernism
Rachel Cochran
Lecturer
Creative writing (fiction and creative nonfiction), 19th-century studies, Victorian and neo-Victorian writing, children's literature, and women's literature
Kwame Dawes
George Holmes Distinguished Professor of English and Glenna Luschei Editor of Prairie Schooner
Post-colonial literature and theory, African American literature, Caribbean literature, African literature, reggae aesthetics, poetry, and playwriting
Scott Guild
Lecturer
Creative writing (fiction), novel writing, composition and rhetoric, literary and cultural studies, and anti-racist pedagogy
Amelia María de la Luz Montes
Associate Professor of English and Ethnic Studies
Chicana and Chicano literature, Latina and Latino literature, LGBT literature, theories of identity, creative writing, fiction, and memoir
Chigozie Obioma
James E. Ryan Associate Professor of English
Creative writing, fiction, literary studies (metaphysical literature, mystical and conceptual realities in fiction, African diasporic literature), African literature and poetics, and religion and history
Shawn Rubenfeld
Lecturer
Creative writing (fiction), composition and creative writing pedagogy, Jewish-American literature, and graphic literature
Katie Schmid Henson
Lecturer and Associate Director of Composition and Rhetoric
Creative writing (poetry)
Pascha Sotolongo Stevenson
Assistant Professor of Practice
Ethnic literatures, women writers, contemporary fiction, literary slipstream, creative nonfiction, and children's literature
Hope Wabuke
Associate Professor
African and African diasporic literature, African American literature, women's and gender studies, literary and cultural criticism, and creative nonfiction/essay
Stacey Waite
Susan J. Rosowski Associate Professor and Chair of the Graduate Program
Composition, rhetoric, and literacy, queer theory/queer pedagogies, teaching of writing, feminist and gender studies, and creative writing/poetry