Joanna Scott

Roswell Smith Burrows Professor of English

MA  Brown University
Modern and contemporary fiction, the art of imaginative writing

Research/Writing interests

Character and the motion of thought; the effects of varied narrative form; contradictory perceptions of time and place; the idiosyncracies of voice; mystery and the impact of disclosure; beauty and ugliness; comedy, temptation, collapse, and recovery; the elusive potential of imagination—these are some of the subjects that Joanna Scott explores in her novels and stories. Modern and contemporary authors she has written about include Samuel Beckett, Virginia Woolf, W.G. Sebald, Maureen Howard, William Gass, and J.M. Coetzee.

Selected publications

• Everybody Loves Somebody, a collection of stories, Back Bay Books 2006
  
• Liberation, a novel, Little, Brown and Company 2005
  
• Tourmaline, a novel, Back Bay Books 2003
  
• Make Believe, a novel, Little, Brown, and Company 2000
  
• Various Antidotes, a collection of stories, Picador USA, reprint, 2005
  
• Arrogance, a novel, Picador USA, reprint, 2004
  
• Fading, My Parmacheene Belle, Picador USA, reprint, 2003
  
• The Closest Possible Union, a novel, Picador USA, reprint, 2003
  
• The Manikin, a novel, Picador USA, reprint, 2002

Teaching

Courses in fiction writing, modern and contemporary literature

Recent undergraduate courses

• Modern Fiction: Construction of the Self
  
• Introductory Fiction Workshop (fall 2006)
  
• Advanced Fiction Workshop (spring 2006)

• Seminar in Fiction Writing (spring 2007)
  
• The Representation of the Imagination in 20th-century Fiction (spring 2007)

• MacArthur Fellowship
  
• Lannan Award
  
• Guggenheim Fellowship
  
• Ambassador Book Award from the English-Speaking Union
  
• Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, Pen-Faulkner, and Los Angeles Book Award
  
• The Rosenthal Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters
• Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, PEN

jsct@mail.rochester.edu
(585) 275-2784
516 Morey Hall