2004 Visiting Fellowship in Creative Writing

 British poet Peter Abbs was selected Lyon College’s first Visiting Fellow in Creative Writing. Abbs was in residence on the Lyon College campus from March 11 to April 19, 2004. 

            Peter Abbs is professor of creative writing in the Graduate Research Centre in the Humanities at the University of Sussex, England, has lectured on poetics and given poetry readings and workshops in Britain, Australia, India, and the United States. He has also written widely on the nature of creativity and the place of literature in education.   He is the author of eight volumes of poetry.

            Abbs was accompanied during the six-week residency by Lisa Dart, author of short fiction and poetry. Dart directs the Talented Programme at Saint Bede’s School in England and is a doctoral candidate in poetry at the University of Sussex.  While she was in the United States, she gave a reading and participated in the Poetry Matters events at Lyon College.  Before she returned to England, Dart learned that a selection of her poems had been chosen runner-up for the prestigious Grolier Poetry Prize.

            The Visiting Fellowship is a biennial, six-week residency for an emerging or established creative writer in poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, playwriting, or screenwriting. While the Visiting Fellowship is considered mainly an opportunity for the writer to spend time on his or her own writings, he or she also gives a public reading and/or lecture, one-day workshop, and teaches a three-credit advanced creative writing course in the genre of his or her expertise.

            The next Visiting Fellowship will be in fiction and will take place during the spring of 2006.  For application information and Fellowship guidelines, please click on the following link: 2006 Visiting Fellowship in Creative Writing of Fiction.