Clay Reynolds

Now retired from academic life, Clay Reynolds holds three academic degrees, not creative writing degrees. He is the author of roughly 1100 publications, mostly literary criticism and essay, although he also has a substantial list of published short fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction. He also is the author of eighteen published volumes, editor of two additional volumes, ten of the authored volumes are of original prose fiction. He is a former journal editor, former faculty advisor for another journal, and is a paid consultant for several presses; has directed professional stage productions, written and produced radio drama, dabbled unsuccessfully in screenwriting, is a free-lance journalist and feature writer, and has taught in college and university classrooms since 1974. He was Director of Creative Writing at the University of Texas at Dallas’ School of Arts and Humanities, and he built that program from a fledgling start to the most active and productive degree program in the school. He also taught courses in literature and general humanities and over a ten-year period directed more dissertations than any other faculty member in the school; he is a former associate dean of undergraduate studies, has previously been novelist-in-residence on three university campuses. His first novel, The Vigil, was given an “Oppie Award” in 1986; his third novel, Franklin's Crossing was entered into the Pulitzer Prize competition for 1992; it also received the Violet Crown Award for fiction as well as other awards and honors; Monuments also won the Violet Crown Award for 2000. In 2012, Reynolds was awarded the prestigious Spur Award for Short Fiction for his story, “The Deacon’s Horse”; he was a finalist for another Spur Award for creative nonfiction for his published essay, “Railroad Man”; “Railroad Man” was awarded the Texas Institute of Letters Bud Shrake Award for Creative Nonfiction in 2019; his short story, “Autumn Moon,” was awarded the Texas Institute of Letters’ Kay Cattarula Award for Short Fiction in 2019. He has previously been a finalist for Spur Awards and also for other Texas Institute of Letters’ Awards on six occasions, and he has been a finalist for the Best Western Novel Spur Award on two previous occasions. He has also been runner-up for both essay and fiction prizes from PEN Texas, among other literary awards. He has received grants from the Texas Commission for the Arts and was also a National Endowment for the Arts Fellow in 1993.