Hunter’s Colum McCann Is Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters

Colum McCann, bestselling author and distinguished member of the MFA faculty, has been inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Founded in 1898, the Academy is an honor society of the nation’s leading writers, architects, artists and composers.
 
McCann’s novels and story collections are published in more than 35 languages. He has won the National Book Award and the International Dublin IMPAC Prize, and has been named a Chevalier des Arts et Lettres by the French government. He is also a member of the Irish Arts Academy. In the American Academy’s literature department, he joins such influential figures as Toni Morrison, Joyce Carol Oates and Peter Carey, his Hunter colleague and director of the Creative Writing MFA program.
 
While at Hunter, McCann, along with Carey, has advanced the Creative Writing MFA program, making it one of the most competitive and sought-out programs of its kind in the nation.
 
On campus this April 6, joined by Hunter MFA graduates and acclaimed young authors Kaitlyn Greenidge and Bill Cheng, McCann celebrated the launch of his first work of non-fiction, Letters to a Young Writer.