The Words Chats With Matt
by Sarah Tachau ’27
This fall, the English Department welcomed Professor Matt Burgess into his new role as chair. Returning from his semester-long sabbatical, Matt dove back into the classroom, teaching ENGL 150: Intro to Creative Writing, while carving out time for his newly acquired administrative duties. We stopped by his office hours to chat about his creative work and sabbatical-side-tasks, improv included, as well as his first few weeks as chair.
What were your sabbatical plans?
I wanted to finish 100 pages of a manuscript, but actually ended up finishing the whole thing. It’s a middle grade mystery, called Mystery School 1: The Curse of the Missing Moonstone. It’s been super fun to work on.
Also, I felt that some of my nonfiction readings for Intro to Creative Writing had gotten kind of stale for students. So I asked Jizelle Villegas to work as a research assistant for me; she went through a huge anthology to find readings that might be more exciting and useful for students.
I also went to Mexico City and did some bopping around there, exploring material for a potential international folklore course. In our department, the faculty like Professor Geng and Professor Lumbley do such an amazing job of guiding students through old stories and helping them see their own world differently through the lens of these stories. Inspired by them, I would love to be doing something similar to that on the creative writing side.
Were there any highlights from your sabbatical or moments you cherished?
I took these two improv classes in hopes that it would make me a more present teacher and a better listener. We’ll see if it did. It certainly made my writing faster. I was able to churn out a lot more of these pages and get out of my own way. When you’re writing, you’ve got that critic, and I was able to just turn that voice off and see what came up. It was a great sabbatical, lots of writing, lots of great reading and travel, some new classes. I took a Loft Literary Center class on writing literature for children, and there was actually a former student in that class, which was really neat. So it was a busy but restful time, and I’m very pumped to be back on campus.
Was there anything you missed about being on campus?
I definitely missed the energy of students and my colleagues. I remember that Peter [Bognanni] and I were the opening acts for a reading that Emma [Törzs] did, and that was the only time I was back on campus. It was just so nice, the community that Jan [Beebe] has built here and the amazing things that the other faculty members are doing both inside and outside of the classroom and just the energy that students bring, it’s in the air, and it’s a fun place to be.
How are you feeling about being chair so far?
It’s been great. I love working here, and I love my colleagues. And I’m just excited to be around students. I think the job is mostly, so far, a communication job. Specifically finding out what’s working for students and what can be helpful for faculty. And facilitating a lot of those conversations between all those different subgroups. I mean, it sounds corny, but I just genuinely enjoy everybody here. So it’s been very exciting. What’s really exciting too is you get more information. I just hear more about what people are doing, like what Dr. Elkins is doing in terms of her scholarship– to know more about that as chair is such a treat. And as people are coming in and declaring their majors or telling me about their ideas for honors projects. I’m just like, “wow.” These people are amazing, it’s been a thrill.
How have you felt about the transition from the professor role into a slightly more administrative role?
I’m just learning more and confirming my suspicions that everyone is just amazing around here. The people who were chair before me have done such a great job of setting a collaborative tone and mentoring me. And getting the opportunity to work closer with Jan, who does such a great job of building community for all of us—it’s just made it much easier for me to slide into the role.
Is there anything that you’re especially looking forward to in your first year as chair?
I’m looking forward to meeting all the students and ideally continuing to support this community between students and faculty. And also just setting up an environment where people are comfortable talking about what they need and what they want to see.
We’d like to thank Matt for taking the time to talk with us, and we wish him the best of luck in his first year as chair.