Creative Writing Program

Michael Knight, Director

See Also: Creative Writing Contests & Awards

The University of Tennessee offers a Ph.D. in English with a creative dissertation, and both an MA and a BA in English with a Creative Writing concentration. The idea here is to blend creative work with literary studies for a degree that helps candidates realize their potential as writers and scholars, plus makes them more viable in the marketplace. All of our Ph.D. candidates and the majority of our MAs receive tuition wavers and/or teaching assistantships and we provide generous financial support for travel to conferences. In the past few years, we’ve brought to campus editors and agents and a host of writers— Richard Bausch, Lucille Clifton, Jack Gilbert, Barry Hannah, Antonya Nelson and Henry Taylor, to name a few—many of whom not only gave readings but directed workshops and worked one-on-one with students.

And these students—they’re knockout writers and critics and lots of them are publishing before they finish their degrees. Our creative faculty (Margaret Lazarus Dean, Marilyn Kallet, Michael Knight, Arthur Smith and Allen Wier) is as deeply committed to the teaching of writing as to writing well. The English Department has an outstanding record for job placement for Ph.D.s and our MAs and undergrads have gone on to further study at the top universities in the country, though it’s not unusual for them to continue their work with us. We think that speaks highly not only of the program and of the people here, this community of writers, but also of the place itself. The old stomping grounds of James Agee and Cormac McCarthy, Knoxville is defined by a fusion of urban and Americana—downtown lofts and the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, coffee houses and bluegrass venues, poetry slams and big time college football.

It’s a good place to do your best work.

For more information about the Creative Writing Program, contact Michael Knight at mknight@utk.edu.