Prolific children’s author offers some halloween-season chills
The latest book from Heather Alexander ’89 is Haunted USA, which compiles spooky tales from all 50 states.
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Welcome! Literatures in English as a department teaches students how to read and write about literary cultures. Supported by excellent libraries and in connection with a number of interdisciplinary programs at Cornell, Literatures in English invites students and scholars to engage in conversations about global cultures as they develop skills for the future.
Throughout history, poets find inspiration at Cornell
Cornell’s influence on the art and academic discipline of poetry has been deep throughout the university’s history and continues on campus today, where scholars and poets discuss and refine this art form in graduate seminars, gather for open mic nights and study the craft of creating beautiful and meaningful work in undergraduate classrooms.
Discover Cornell poets and the experiences that have shaped them.
Upcoming Events
Oct
16
Thursday
05:00 PM
Reading by Garth Greenwell
Klarman Hall
Rhodes-Rawling Auditorium, Klarman Hall KG70
Oct
23
Thursday
04:45 PM
Sandhya Shukla, “Cross-Cultural Harlem: Relations of Race, In Place”
Goldwin Smith Hall
G64
Oct
24
Friday
05:00 PM
MFA First-Year Reading Series
Off-Site Location
Buffalo Street Books
Nov
06
Thursday
05:00 PM
Gottschalk Memorial Lecture: “Crawling Between Heaven and Earth," Shakespeare's Environmental Theory of Humankind
Goldwin Smith Hall
132, Hollis E. Cornell Auditorium
Nov
07
Friday
05:00 PM
MFA First-Year Reading Series
Off-Site Location
Buffalo Street Books
Nov
13
Thursday
05:00 PM
Reading by Katie Kitamura
Klarman Hall
Rhodes-Rawling Auditorium, Klarman Hall KG70
Nov
17
Monday
12:15 PM
Nov
18
Tuesday
04:30 PM
Coffee & Chat with Profs: Anna Shechtman
Goldwin Smith Hall 258 Literatures in English Lounge
Recent Highlights from the Department
NoViolet Bulawayo wins the Best of Caine award
Zimbabwean writer NoViolet Bulawayo has won the Best of Caine award, an honorary prize celebrating a story from past winners of the Caine Prize for African Writing, to mark its 25th anniversary. The prize was given for a short story praised by judges for its “powerful language, distinctive tone of v...
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Teens’ portraits celebrate Toni Morrison as community-builder 
High schoolers from Ithaca and Brooklyn produced the artworks depicting Morrison and a local student, a collaboration that promises to introduce Morrison's work to new generations of New Yorkers.
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Culler receives 2026 Wayne C. Booth Lifetime Achievement Award
A specialist in literary and cultural theory and French literature of the 19th century, Culler will receive the award in June 2026 during the International Society for the Study of Narrative conference in Denmark.
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Animals are dashing, stampeding, gliding into contemporary fiction: Book explores how
Elisha Cohn's second book, “Milieu: A Creaturely Theory of the Contemporary Novel,” also explores the methods authors are using to give animals a voice.
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Jean Blackall, first woman tenured in English at Cornell, dies at 97
Jean Frantz Blackall, a Cornell faculty member from 1958-94 who in 1971 became the first woman to receive tenure in what was then the Department of English, in the College of Arts and Sciences, died July 15 in Williamsburg, Virginia. She was 97.
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Four-day event celebrates 70 years of Toni Morrison’s Cornell legacy
A four-day event featuring films, panels, workshops, the unveiling of a mural and other activities will celebrate the 70th anniversary of her degree, life and work. “Toni Morrison: Literature and Public Life” will take place Sept. 18-21.
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Dual-campus visit highlights A.D. White Professors-at-Large lineup
Best-selling writer and technology blogger Cory Doctorow will make the A.D. White Professor-at-Large program’s second dual-campus visit, ending his week at Cornell Tech in New York City. Four other professors will visit Cornell this fall.
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Literatures in English Destinations
Recent Books by Department of Literatures in English Faculty
Department faculty continually publish important works of criticism, fiction, poetry, and essays. Visit Literatures in English Faculty: Recent Books to learn more.
Land Acknowledgment
Cornell University is located on the traditional homelands of the Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫ' (the Cayuga Nation). The Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫ' are members of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, an alliance of six sovereign Nations with a historic and contemporary presence on this land. The Confederacy precedes the establishment of Cornell University, New York state, and the United States of America. We acknowledge the painful history of Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫ' dispossession, and honor the ongoing connection of Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫ' people, past and present, to these lands and waters.
This land acknowledgment has been reviewed and approved by the traditional Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫ' leadership.
Statement from the Department of Literatures in English
We, the faculty and staff of the Cornell Literatures in English department, pledge to support and do our utmost to protect members of our community who are discriminated against, unjustly treated, or otherwise targeted because of race, religion, gender identification, sexuality, immigration status, ability, and other forms of difference.
Recognizing that words and symbols can be manipulated into violence, we renew our commitment to direct the force of language toward large and small acts of learning, alliance, imagination, and justice.