Talkin' about writing at Writers House

While there are some who believe that creative writing is unrelated to literary theory, Cornell University Comparative Literature Professor Jonathan Monroe sees a connection between the two. That was one of the issues Monroe discussed last night in a speech and poetry reading at the Kelly Writers House, where he compared creative writing to other forms of prose. Monroe, who is also an author, poet, editor and director of Cornell's prestigious Knight Writing Program, was in the area because the program is collaborating with Temple University on a creative writing project. He read poems from his books Hinge of Speech and Demosthenes' Dictionary and discussed his ideas about creative writing and the differences between it and other types of writing. One key difference Monroe discussed was how different forms of writing are taught. While students usually write and critique their own poems in creative writing courses, other more general writing classes teach composition. Eli Goldblatt, the writing director at Temple, brought up the point that while different types of writers may "fight with each other," any actual division is an illusion. Part of the problem, he added, is that poets don't produce physical commodities that they can sell, unlike some others who express themselves creatively. "I'd like to think that there's not a divide between creative writing and literary theory," Monroe said, explaining that different genres of writing are not irreconcilable. He conceded, however, that this is not always the case. Literary theory writers generally have doctoral degrees while creative writers usually do not have that level of formal education. Those in attendance also debated what methods are best for teaching students how to write. Monroe's feeling is that cross-genre writing should be encouraged. "It's a disservice to [students] to lead them to believe that there's only one genre of writing," he said. "I'd like to see an institutional arrangement in which all three [undergraduate, creative and theory writing] interact, but it doesn't happen." Such discussion was the reason Katherine Newman, a College sophomore, attended the event. She is interested in writing and wanted to know if it could be practical at all. "I heard he was going to talk about 'writing' versus 'creative writing.'" College senior Kirsten Thorpe, a double major in Psychology and English with a concentration in creative writing, opened the program by reading some of her poetry. In honor of Monroe's visit, she chose to read poetry from a recent creative writing assignment. One of her poems was inspired by a poem by Monroe.