Creative Writing Students Showcased During Gulf Coast Readings

Popular Reading Series Returns to Rudyard’s British Pub Feb. 8

Houstonians soon will sample three talents from the University of Houston’s acclaimed Creative Writing Program (CWP). Poets Caitlin Maling and Frances Justine Post will join writer Dickson Lam at the next installment of the Gulf Coast Reading Series.

Each fall and spring, Gulf Coast readings showcase the works of student writers at Rudyard’s British Pub (2010 Waugh Dr.). The next edition of this popular series kicks off at 7 p.m., Feb. 8. Admission is free.

Master of Fine Arts (MFA) candidate Maling’s work has been published in several Australian publications including Blue Dog, Westerly, Quadrant, Going Down Swinging, The Australian and The Sun Herald Extra. She is a recipient of the John Marsden Poetry Prize, Varuna Center Fellowships and the Department of Culture and the Arts International Scholarship.

Nonfiction MFA candidate Lam has taught in schools in New York, Oakland and San Francisco, where he was a founding teacher at June Jordan School for Equity. He earned a MFA in fiction from Rutgers-Newark University. At UH, he is working on a memoir detailing his relationship with his father.

Post is a doctoral candidate and an editor for UH’s literary journal Gulf Coast. Her poetry has been published in The Boston Review, Denver Quarterly, The Kenyon Review and Pleiades.

The Gulf Coast Reading Series is an extension of UH’s acclaimed Gulf Coast, A Journal of Literature and Fine Art. Founded in 1986 by Donald Barthelme and Philip Lopate, the journal spotlights the literary and visual arts communities. Gulf Coast is a partnership between CWP, the Museum of Fine Arts-Houston and the Menil Collection. It reviews submissions from artists and writers from around the country. To learn more about the Gulf Coast journal and the reading series, visit www.gulfcoastmag.org.

As part of UH's English department, CWP offers fiction and non-fiction writers and poets intensive training in both creative writing and literary studies. It offers two graduate degrees: the Master of Fine Arts and Doctor of Philosophy. CWP's noted faculty includes award-winning authors and poets such as novelist Antonya Nelson, poet and non-fiction writer Nick Flynn, graphic novelist Mat Johnson and poet Tony Hoagland. To learn more about the program, visit www.class.uh.edu/cwp/.