• Home
  • News
    • Politics & Government
    • Business & Economy
    • Crime / Courts
    • Health / Medicine
  • Sports
    • High School Sports
    • Radio Iowa Poll
  • Affiliates
    • Affiliate Support Page
  • Contact Us
    • Reporters

Radio Iowa

Iowa's Radio News Network

You are here: Home / Education / Head of Writer’s Workshop in Iowa City dies

Head of Writer’s Workshop in Iowa City dies

April 7, 2005 By admin

The head of the Iowa Writer’s Workshop has died. Frank Conroy announced last summer that though he’d undergone successful treatment for colon cancer, he wanted to step down from teaching and leading the world-renowned program at the University of Iowa. Chris Offut was once a student of Conroy’s, and has been a visiting professor several times now. It says it was “terrific,” a dream come true after he’d been a student fifteen years earlier and then had the opportunity to return and teach at the workshop. He says it was great not only getting to give back to the program, but to work across the hall from Frank. Their classes met at the same time, so every day he’d meet with Conroy at his office before class. Offut says his enthusiasm and passion for teaching “was the same every week as it had been when I was a student. In that way he was still helping to inspire me, both as a teacher and a writer.” He says Conroy put literature ahead of everything. Offut expects that once arrangements are made there will be memorials in Iowa City and also in New York, the nation’s literary and publishing capital. “We’ve lost not just a director of the Writer’s Workshop, but we;ve lost a great leader in American literature.” Among the many writers to come through the workshop and become best-seller authors are novelist Ann Patchett and Iowa writer Jane Smiley. Conroy held the reins for 18 years before stepping down as head of the workshop and four finalists have made presentations in recent weeks to succeed him, but no final decision has been made.

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • Twitter

Filed Under: Education Tagged With: University of Iowa

Featured Stories

Iowans 65+ now eligible in next phase of Covid vaccinations

Bill would remove transfer limits in five Iowa school districts

Former Iowa sports talk host sentenced to federal prison for ticket scams

Feenstra only member of Iowa delegation not at Biden’s inauguration

Congresswoman Axne favors Biden pandemic relief plan, Hinson not ruling out a ‘yes’

TwitterFacebook
Tweets by RadioIowa

UNI adds two nonconference games to basketball schedule

Iowa State-Kansas postponed

Iowa-Michigan State postponed

Fire damage to Riverfront Stadium electrical system will cost Waterloo thousands

Iowa State at Kansas State postponed

More Sports

eNews and Updates

Enter your email address:

Delivered by FeedBurner

Archives

Copyright © 2021 ยท Learfield News & Ag, LLC