MFA in Creative Writing program In August, John Dalton opened the latest chapter of the Master’s of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program at the University of Missouri–St. Louis. He was named director of a program started in 1998 by David Carkeet. The two novelists’ roles bookend Mary Troy’s run of nearly 13 years as director. Dalton credits Troy, a novelist and short story writer, with nurturing the MFA in Creative Writing to where it is today: a reputable program that attracts talented writers from across the country, produces the semiannual literary journal Natural Bridge and graduates award-winning poets and fiction writers. And it’s not finished there. “Our program is growing, especially on the fiction side,” Dalton says. “We’re getting more and more appliPhoto by August Jennewein
cants. And we’re getting better and better students every year.”
He sought a job teaching high school
ence his acclaimed debut novel,
But the reception has been good.
He points to talents like student
English. But that objective was short-
“Heaven Lake,” which was also
It probably helps that Dalton
Angela Mitchell, one of four Riverfront
lived after being saddled with five
published by Scribner.
navigates the darkness with great
Times MasterMinds recipients this
warmth in writing his characters.
year. She was recognized for her
The Wall Street Journal praised
award-winning short stories and a
his prose calling it “polished and
promising beginning to her first novel.
crisp.” Entertainment Weekly
Dalton says the goal moving forward
perhaps best nailed down the
is to bolster the poetry side of the
dynamic of the novel: “While
program. To help do this, the program
some of what’s described is
recently received approval for adding
anything but pleasant, reading
a tenure-track poet to the Department
it certainly is.”
of English faculty.
With two successful novels now
“Our current MFA poetry students are
on the shelf, Dalton is settling
terrific, and we have faculty members
into his new role as director of
with excellent books of poetry and great
an MFA in Creative Writing pro-
teaching skills,” Dalton said. “But we
gram that is gaining prominence
need to find an eager and accomplished
with each passing year. That’s
new poet to push the program forward.”
consecutive seventh grade classes at his first teaching gig.
Upon returning stateside, he enrolled in a prestigious MFA in creative writ-
“I worked harder than I ever worked
ing program, graduated and returned
in my life just trying to control these
to his roots in St. Louis and UMSL.
kids and keep up with all of the pa-
He then wrote two books.
perwork,” he says. “It wasn’t that I was a terrible teacher, it was those seventh graders. I couldn’t control some of those classes.”
His latest, “The Inverted Forest.” focuses its first half on a fortnight at fictional Kinderman Forest Camp in the Ozarks of Missouri. The inexpe-
His teaching contract was not
rienced counselors struggle to man-
renewed. Dalton says he remembers
age a group of mentally disabled
feeling like a huge failure.
campers. The second half deals with
“As so often happens in cases
the fallout from a disastrous camp
of failure, it sort of makes you do
encounter.
something drastic,” he says.
“I was a little worried about how
a long way from a futureless
In his case, that meant moving away.
‘Heaven Lake’ readers would receive
career as a pot scrubber or failed
To Taiwan. There he taught English,
a book that was darker, stranger
high school teacher. Is it luck?
paid off his student debt and gained
and went to a few uncomfortable
Maybe. If so, Dalton has made
an experience that would later influ-
places,” Dalton says.
his own luck.
Visit umsl.edu/~mfa to learn more about the MFA in Creative Writing program.
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