Our Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Program is a two-year graduate degree in fiction or poetry writing. Consistently ranked among the top MFA programs in the nation, the program is full-time and workshop-based, with a small, but aesthetically diverse group of students and faculty. Our next application deadline is December 15, 2013. Prospective applicants can find out more about our program by visiting our MFA Admissions page and our About the Program page.  Most MFA programs advise applicants to read the work of their faculty before applying, but we think an even better suggestion is to read some books by recent graduates. For a list of recent U.Va. MFA publications, please see our MFA Alumni Books page.

At the undergraduate level, U.Va. offers an Area Program in Poetry Writing, which is an English major with a specialization in poetry. All of our graduate and undergraduate creative writing courses are taught through U.Va.'s outstanding English Department.

If you live in the area and would like to receive e-mails about the creative writing readings and events we sponsor, please add your e-mail to this list.
 

MFA News

• Drew Johnson (Fiction, 2007) has a new collection of short fiction about long bus rides, 7 Greyhounds, available at The Cupboard.
• Callie Wright's (Fiction, 2004) "Love All" gets a rave review in People Magazine's Stylewatch.
• Faculty member Debra Nystrom's poem "Pronghorn" appears in the May 13, 2013, New Yorker.
• Emma Eisenberg (Fiction, 2014) has her story "There Was" in the current Gulf Coast.
• Thomas Pierce (Fiction, 2013) has a new story, "The Critics," in the May 2013 Atlantic. 
• Safiya Sinclair (Poetry, 2014) is the winner of the 2013 Driftless Prize in Poetry from Devil's Lake for her poems “Woman, Wound“ and “Notes on the State of Virginia, I."
• Thomas Pierce (Fiction, 2013) has a new story, "The Real Alan Gass," in the current issue of Subtropics.
• Mary Beth Keane (Fiction, 2005) has her new novel, Fever, receive stellar reviews in the Boston Globe  and USA Today.
• Faculty Member Lisa Russ Spaar's (Poetry, 1982) new collection, Vanitas, Rough, is reviewed in the LA Times.
• Peter Kline (Poetry, 2006) won a  2014 Amy Clampitt Residency Award.
• UVA MFA professor emeritus Charles Wright wins the 2013 Bollingen Prize.
• Megan Fishmann (Fiction, 2010) has her story  "The House On Blackburn Avenue" up on Five Chapters.
• One of our current students, Thomas Pierce, has his short story "Shirley Temple Three" in the New Yorker.  
• MFA faculty member Chris Tilghman's The Right-Hand Shore makes the New York Times Sunday Book Review 100 Notable Books of 2012 list.
• Emma Eisenberg (Fiction, 2014) is the runner up in Gulf Coast's Donald Barthelme Prize for Short Prose; her story "There Was" will appear in Gulf Coast's spring print issue.
• Mary Beth Keane (Fiction, 2005) interviews all the 2012 National Book Award Finalists, Louise Erdrich (2012 winner), Junot Díaz, Dave Eggers, Ben Fountain, and Kevin Powers.
• William Boast (Fiction, 2007) blogs on the Paris Review Daily about the Cork International Short Story Festival and going back to his old hometown. 
• Eleanor Henderson's (Fiction, 2005) Ten Thousand Saints and Chad Harbach's (Fiction, 2004) The Art of Fielding are at it again, appearing as nominees (in very good company) for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award.
• Reed Johnson (Fiction, 2010) has his story "Triage" in Narrative.  The story, Reed's first published work, was the second place winner Narrative’s Spring 2012 Story Contest.
• Emma Rathbone (Fiction, 2006) writes on haunted house-sitting in The New Yorker.
• Paul Legault's (Poetry, 2009) Emily Dickinson Reader is reviewed on Salon.
• Charles McLeod (Fiction, 2005) has his first novel, American Weather (Read more), and  his first collection of stories, National Treasures, come out in US editions. Read more.
• Callie Wright (Fiction, 2004) has her debut novel, Love All, slated for publication from Henry Holt in June 2013. Read more.
• William Boast (Fiction, 2007) has sold his memoir, The Pantomime Horse, to W.W. Norton. Read more.
• Hannah Holtzman (Fiction, 2011) has her short story "Sensei" published in the New England Review's 2012 spring issue. Read more.
• Taylor Antrim (Fiction, 2004) had his short story "Pilgrim Life," which was originally published in American Short Fiction, selected for Best American Short Stories 2012. Read more.