Muldoon resigns as CWR director

In his poem, "Why Brownlee left," creative writing professor Paul Muldoon writes, "Why Brownlee left, and where he went/Is a mystery even now./For if a man should have been content/It was him."

Muldoon will step down as director of the University's creative writing program on July 1. But unlike Brownlee in his poem, Muldoon will be content with his quietly effective term as head of the program and with no mystery as to his next move.

Creative writing professor Edmund White, who teaches fiction classes, will succeed Muldoon.

Muldoon plans to spend more time teaching and writing. He will continue to play an integral role in the program, he said.

Incoming director White praised his predecessor's leadership style.

"I think Paul Muldoon has done a great job," he said. "He handles everything quietly, very low-key administrative operation, with a total emphasis on teaching and the readings given by the department.

"I have nothing to complain about in Paul's regime. I only hope I can be as good as he was," White said.

The Howard G.B. Clark Professor of the Humanities and Creative Writing, Muldoon has received numerous awards for his poetry, including the American Academy of Arts and Letters Award in Literature in 1996. He also serves as president of the Poetry Society and holds the honorary position of Professor of Poetry at Oxford University.

Muldoon had only compliments for his successor. "It's important to allow new intelligence to come into play," he said. "I'm delighted that White is taking over."

White has received Guggenheim and Ingram Merrill Fellowships and the Award for Literature from the American Academy.

Several colleagues suggested to Muldoon in 1990 that he succeed English professor James Richardson as director of the program.

As director, Muldoon's aim was clear. "My vision," he said, "has been to make what was already an outstanding creative writing program the best in the country."

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Founded in 1939, the Program in Creative Writing admits students by application, on a course-by-course basis. Despite some changes over the years, its mission to give undergraduates the opportunity to work with professional writers in developing their talents has remained the same.

Muldoon takes pride in the program that exists today, both in its depth of faculty talent and in the opportunities it offers student writers.

"One only has to look at the appointments over the last few years to realize that what we have here is second to none," Muldoon noted.

He is pleased with the most recent faculty addition, widely acclaimed novelist Chang-rae Lee.

As director, Muldoon has expanded the increasingly popular speaker series.

"I've tried to raise the profile of that, to bring in high-profile writers from the U.S. and around the world," he said.

The readings have become popular not only among students, but also among the broader community, he said.

Just recently, the program sponsored a public reading by Irish poet Seamus Heaney, who won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1995.

Muldoon "has a genius for putting together and hosting events, which is great for the morale of the entire writing community," Richardson said in an e-mail.

Muldoon credits much of the program's success to the strength of its faculty and the collegial work environment.

"It's a great bunch of people," Muldoon said. "Creative writing programs are famously factional, but we get on very well. We have a sense of what our responsibilities are."

For Muldoon, the main responsibility of the faculty in the program lies in guiding undergraduates along their way to better writing. With few exceptions, those students selected for courses within the program relish their work with their professors.

"Creative writing classes have been the most rewarding part of my academic experience here," said Jay Katsir '04, who has taken several creative writing courses. "The size and atmosphere of the workshops allow each student's personality to have a real impact, more than anything else I've encountered at Princeton. We get direct feedback from professionals who are already accomplished writers, and this is exciting for people like me who aspire to a career in creative writing."

However, some students have criticized the selective nature of the program. Muldoon hopes that the program can reach out to more students, especially in light of the planned increase in undergraduate population.

"I do think we will have to expand a little bit," Muldoon said. "One thing we are aiming to do is to improve, not to become self-satisfied."

Muldoon's pride in the program he has helped shape is deep but not possessive.

Administrative jobs such as director "shouldn't be done by anyone who wants to do them," he said. "There's a mistaken view that there's some sort of power attached to them, and that's not the case. Everyone within the program has a chance to contribute to how the program should go. It is not a dictatorship."