"The best that can be hoped for is a kind ofgradual incrementalism," he says.

The program is part of the English departmentand despite the high student demand, it is notalways the department's highest budget priority.

Buell, who is also an English professor, saysit is up to the department to invest moreresources in creative writing.

Such reallocation would be like "robbing Peterto pay Paul," he says, because the departmentwould have to take money away from its literaryofferings.

Resources for Concentrators

The department would rather use its resourcesto satisfy concentrators, rather than the manystudents outside the department who take thecreative classes.

"We've made a commitment to have all sophomoretutorials faculty-led," Buell says, "and we have alot of trouble making good on that."

English department chair Leo Damrosch sayscreative writing is just "one of many things inthe mix and not an immediate priority."

"We also have desperate needs," he says.

Damrosch also places some responsibility forthe status of creative writing with centralFaculty administrators.

There is only one tenured position for acreative writing teacher, the BoylstonProfessorship held by Heaney.

Most of the teachers, no matter how popularwith students, must leave Harvard after theirfive-year lectureships expire.

The department has "kicked around the idea thatit would be nice to have a [tenured] novelist,"Damrosch says. But the department would need thesupport of Dean of the Faculty Jeremy R. Knowlesto establish a new professorship, he says.

Another possible option to improve the statusof the creative writing program would beestablishing a separate department for creativewriting classes. But according to Buell, this isalso unlikely to happen.

The dean says a separate department "wouldstill have to be in a symbiotic relationship withthe critical study of literature," and keepingcreative writing in the English department "doesmore [to] guarantee the symbiosis."