Making the World a Better Place, One Writer at a Time

A TFP conversation with Christopher Merrill—poet, journalist, director of the world-renowned International Writing Program, and author, most recently, of 'Flares,' the dazzling remnants of his travels

Christopher Merrill welcomes the 2018 IWP writers in residence (credit: IWP staff).

By Michael Judge

The first time I met Christopher Merrill, the award-winning author, translator and poet whom W.S. Merwin rightly praised as “one of the most gifted, audacious, and accomplished poets of an extraordinarily rich generation,” he was doing, perhaps, what he does best—welcoming writers from around the globe to a small Midwestern college town and a shared experience that will change them forever.

It was a late summer day in 2005. Merrill was standing in the sun in his unadorned Iowa backyard surrounded by writers from Saudi Arabia, Tanzania, Burma, China, Slovenia, Libya, Kuwait and Kosovo, among other nations, when I introduced myself. I’ll never forget the gleam in his eye when he offered his hand and said warmly, “Michael, welcome, welcome. I’m so happy you could make it.”

Merrill has been the tireless director of the International Writing Program (IWP) at the University of Iowa since 2000, …