Award-Winning LAS Professor and Poet Christina Pugh Discovers Inspiration Everywhere
Interview with Christina Pugh Heading link
Name: Christina Pugh, Ph.D.
Title: Professor of English
Department: English Department, Program for Writers
Tell me a little bit about your history at UIC/LAS
I’ve been at UIC in the English Department since 2005, when I began as an assistant professor. Over the course of these years, I’ve taught both poetry workshops and courses in literature. I’m now a full professor and was awarded Distinguished Scholar of the Year in Humanities, Arts, Design, and Architecture last spring. Along the way I’ve served as Director of Undergraduate Studies in the English Department, held an Institute for the Humanities Faculty Fellowship, and received awards in graduate student mentoring and teaching here at UIC. I’ve published seven books, and six of them were published while I’ve been at UIC. I’ve worked with amazing, smart, creative undergraduate and graduate students over the years.
What role does research and furthering your own education play in your career?
A very large and indispensable one! As a poet and writer of literary criticism, I am constantly looking for inspiration – whether from other poets’ works (both living poets and historical ones), the visual arts, or travel. For example, my newest book of poetry, titled The Right Hand, was inspired by Gian Lorenzo Bernini’s seventeenth-century sculpture of The Ecstasy of St. Teresa, which I researched in 2020 as a Visiting Artist at the American Academy in Rome.
Do you have any advice for students seeking inspiration?
Look around you — preferably with the phone put away! For me, inspiration is about being open to the world as we experience it with our senses. Don’t limit your definition of inspiration, because it can come from anything you encounter in your life, from a tree to a television show. The other great way to nourish inspiration is to develop a habit of reading poetry or fiction. It really primes the mind to be in a receptive state for writing — not to mention the fact that inspiration often comes directly from other writers’ work.
What interests you about Liberal Arts and Sciences?
I’m a strong believer in Liberal Arts degrees for undergraduates, because this type of study really opens the world up in a unique way. Creative work allows us to access a different type of thinking than may be possible in more positivistic, logic-driven disciplines. Association and imagination have their own logics; and this, in part, is what our branch of Liberal Arts and Sciences pursues.
What do you hope your students will get out of an LAS degree?
I hope they will develop the ability and habit of thinking critically as well as creatively, and that they will discover a passion for their major (and minor, if they have one). I hope they will leave with more experience and confidence in their writing and also in their ability to converse with others in their discipline and outside of it. And of course, I hope they come away with a strong sense of the value in diversity.
How did you become interested in your creative writing?
I was always a reader, and I read and wrote poetry from a very young age. I discovered Emily Dickinson around the age of twelve and E. E. Cummings at fourteen. The passion for poetry stuck with me!
Tell me more about your involvement with the Program for Writers. What do you hope students gain from participation in this unique program?
In the Program for Writers, I work with MA and PhD students in creative writing, both in writing workshops and as director or committee member for their theses and dissertations. The program allows an extended focus on creative work and gives students the opportunity to produce a publishable book of poetry by the time they complete the doctoral degree. I work closely with students on precisely that. Our program is also unusual among graduate programs in creative writing due to its strong literary and critical curricular component, which supplements and enriches the students’ creative work.
Why did you choose to come to UIC and LAS specifically?
I chose UIC because of the excellence of the English department and the Program for Writers, which is the graduate program in creative writing. I really wanted to be a faculty member in a doctoral program in creative writing, which is the opportunity this job offered and continues to offer. Other job offers I considered would not have allowed that particular opportunity. And It didn’t hurt that one of my favorite poets, Anne Winters, was on UIC’s creative writing faculty at the time!
Advice for new students at UIC?
UIC has so many resources, and there are many opportunities to pursue your interests both on campus and in the city of Chicago. Yes, the school is large — but seek out your professors during their office hours, sign up for departmental newsletters, and so on, in order to connect with people who share your interests. Get the very most you can out of coursework, and also be proactive about exploring opportunities beyond coursework.