Welcome to the
Fiction Writing Department at Columbia College, home to the Story Workshop
approach and one of the largest, most successful creative writing programs in
the country.
The Fiction Writing Department offers four-year
undergraduate BA and BFA majors in Fiction Writing and in Playwriting
(Interdisciplinary with the Theater Department), as well as minors in Fiction,
Creative Nonfiction (with English and Journalism), and Playwriting (with
Theater). It also offers graduate programs leading to an MFA in Creative
Writing—Fiction, to an MA in the Teaching of Writing, and to a Combined Degree.
The nearly 700 students registered in the Fiction Writing
Department come from very diverse backgrounds; and the approach, as well as
course offerings, are designed both to engage that diversity of voices,
cultures, and visions and to prepare students for successful work in novel,
short story, and creative nonfiction essay, as well as in playwriting,
publishing, electronic applications of fiction writing training, and the
teaching of writing. In addition, training received in core Story Workshop
classes and in the most extensive offering of supplementary Specialty and
Critical Reading & Writing courses of any program in the country enhances
skills essential for success in a wide variety of professions.
At Columbia,
you will be trained in all aspects of the creative process, not simply the
editing skills developed in traditional workshops found at other creative
writing programs. The nationally renowned Story Workshop method of teaching
writing, originated and developed by former Department Chairperson John Schultz and used in the four-level
core sequence, focuses on helping you hear your own individual voice and
provides a supportive, interactive, and challenging environment for developing
your reading, writing, listening, speaking, critical thinking, and imaginative
problem-solving capacities.
In addition to specially designed discovery activities in
class, you will receive direct guidance from personal conferences with faculty
whose own excellent writing is matched only by their commitment to excellent
teaching. An unparalleled range of other supports and opportunities await you,
including Story Workshop peer tutoring, the Fiction Writers at Lunch mentoring
program, study abroad in Prague, residence at the Semester in L.A. program,
Story Workshop tutor training and community outreach teaching, excellent
internships, editing on department journals, an annual Career Night, and a host
of undergraduate and graduate open mic and other readings.
The Fiction Writing Department sponsors the acclaimed Story
Week Festival of Writers each spring, cosponsors Creative Nonfiction Week each
fall, and offers an active Visiting Writer program, including numerous class
visits by writers, agents, editors, and publishers on a regular basis, all of
which will expose you to the best professionals in the writing world. Visiting
writers such as Irvine Welsh, Edwidge Danticat, Jane
Hamilton, Junot Diaz, Hubert Selby, Jr., Dave Eggers, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, Richard Price, Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Valerie Wilson Wesley, Sherman Alexie, Dorothy Allison, Charles
Johnson, Sandra Cisneros, Salman Rushdie, John McNally, Jonathan Lethem, Anchee Min and
many others reflect the rich diversity of voices that the department seeks to
foster among its students.
The Fiction Writing Department is home to two journals. F Magazine, the nationally distributed
journal primarily devoted to novels in progress, features the work of
award-winning writers from Columbia
and around the world, and has won a number of Illinois Arts Council prizes. And
the student-edited, award-winning magazine Hair
Trigger, featuring the best of the best from Story Workshop and other
classes in the Fiction Writing program, is a perennial winner of national
prizes, including first-place awards from the Associated Writing Programs, from
the Coordinating Council of Literary Magazines, and from the Columbia University
Scholastic Press Association.
Every year, our student writers in Hair Trigger win top CSPA individual awards in Traditional Fiction,
Experimental Fiction, creative nonfiction Essay, and Humor categories. "A
beautiful, impressive magazine," the CSPA judge commented on Hair Trigger 26, which won a Silver
Crown award in March 2005. "The stories are exceptional in their scope and
ambition, and range of styles or genres—from realism to parody to fantasy or
'magical realism.' The creative nonfiction constitutes some of its best
writing. The essays reach and take risks at the same time as they adopt a fearless
honesty toward their subjects."
Gold Crown CSPA awards to Hair Trigger 14, 17, 23, 25, 27 and 28 are among the over twenty top prizes given to this magazine in
national competitions. Of Hair Trigger
14, the AWP judge said, "Hair
Trigger walks away with first prize."
Writing students work with a faculty of professionals
engaged in writing novels, short stories, creative nonfiction essays, plays,
radio scripts, screenplays, prose for children and young adults, and various types
of genre fiction. The work of Fiction Writing students reflects this rich
variety of forms, modes, and genres. At Columbia,
you will also learn how to put your imaginative, conceptual, critical thinking,
organizational, and communication skills to work flexibly and well in a wide
range of jobs and professions.
We invite you to peruse our web site and contact us for more
information about the tradition of excellence in the Fiction Writing Department
at Columbia College Chicago. Let us help you learn how to tell the stories you
want to tell and, in the process, open up new possibilities for a more
fulfilling future.
Randall Albers
Chairperson
Fiction Writing Department
