Student News

Year End Honors: 2026 Howard Canaan Thesis Award for Innovation, Thesis of the Year, and Program Honoree

We’ve reached the end of another academic year, which in addition to meaning it’s time for all of us in the program to celebrate means it’s time for the MA English Literature program to award its three annual distinctions: the Howard Canaan Thesis Award for Innovation, the Thesis of the Year award, and the Graduate English Christie Bowl (i.e., program honoree).

The Howard Canaan Thesis Award for Innovation honors the late Dr. Canaan, an esteemed Shakespeare scholar at Mercy who was also a lifelong advocate of the value and power of speculative fiction, graphic novels, and other genre fiction sometimes looked down-upon by the academic establishment. This award recognizes a thesis that does one or some of the following: approaches literary analysis in a unique, unexpected, or unusual way; reconsiders and otherwise treats with dignity genre fiction; involves interdisciplinary studies; or merges creative pursuits with the thesis project.

  • The winner of the 2026 Howard Canaan Thesis Award for Innovation is Lily Fox for “Gently Used: A Novel.”

The overall 2026 Thesis of the Year award goes to one standout thesis written during the summer or fall of 2025, or spring of 2026. Singling out one study for this award was not easy, as every thesis submitted during the past year was a work of outstanding quality and originality, and every work in its own way proved laudable. The following study was selected for this distinction by faculty with no students’ papers in the running:

  • The winner of the 2026 Thesis of the Year award is David Benjamin for “The Anatomy of an Error: Free Will, Predestination, and Aristotelian Hamartia in Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus.” 

The third distinction that the MA program awards each year is the Graduate English Christie Bowl, named for the late Joannes Christie who established and long chaired Mercy College’s English Program. The award, determined by the collective graduate faculty, recognizes one graduating student for their consistent academic excellence and classroom performance throughout their time in the graduate program, for their other contributions to the program’s learning community, and for their relevant accomplishments beyond the program (e.g. publications, presentations at conferences, and other such achievements).

  • The winner of the 2026 Graduate English Christie Bowl is Fatuma Mohamed.

It is always a strange thing to announce such distinctions as when doing so one can’t help but think of the marvelous students and studies that are not the ones named. It is extraordinarily difficult to locate any single person to honor for any of these awards out of the many exceptional students graduating each school year from our program. So as we recognize these honorees let us please also recognize all members of the graduating MA class of 2025-26 for their hard work and dedication that has gotten them to this moment of completing their MA degree in English Literature. Congratulations, everyone! Here’s to the summer ahead, and to all of our continuing adventures and explorations in literary and creative studies.

Useful Program Info & Tips

Program-Info Session for Prospective MA Students – Monday 5/11, 5pm Eastern

This blog is primarily where we communicate program info to current students and alumni, but it’s also where prospective students come to get a look at what sort of program we are. This post is for those prospective students. On Monday evening, 5/11, at 5pm eastern the program will be holding a drop-in zoom session for prospective students to ask any questions and talk about the MA English Lit program. If you’re curious about the grad program, about if it might be a good fit for your needs and interests, just come by the zoom session and let’s talk! The zoom link, passcode, and meeting ID are below:

  • Meeting ID: 929 2732 2303
  • Passcode: MA2026

Any questions write to cloots@mercy.edu

Annual Grad Student Symposium

Writing Image Text (WIT) 2026 Graduate English Symposium, Saturday April 25, Noon Eastern, on Zoom

On Saturday April 25 the MA program will host its annual “Writing Image Text” or “W.I.T.” Graduate English Symposium. The event will be held live on Zoom starting noon, eastern. The length of the event will depend on how many of our grad students present, but usually it runs for a few hours.

This call for papers (CFP) is open to both current grad students in the program and alumni. Anyone in the graduate English community who wants to attend but not present is welcome and encouraged to do so as audience members. The deadline for responding to this CFP and declaring as a presenter is the end of Saturday, April 11.

The symposium is a casual mini-conference at which students present scholarly or creative work of any sort, medium, or genre. A paper or project that you’ve created for any of your MA courses would do just fine.

Graduate students and professional scholars often attend and read at local, regional, national, and international conferences, so this symposium provides a friendly small-scale introduction to the conference experience. And for anyone who reads a paper, it becomes a line-item that you can list under the scholarship section on your CV (click here to read more about the CV).

Anyone planning to attend this year’s WIT symposium, as presenter or audience member, please indicate as much by sending an email to cloots@mercy.edu no later than the end of Saturday, April 11. And please use the subject line “WIT Symposium 2026” for your email. Zoom info will be sent out after April 11 to everyone who RSVPs.

On behalf of the MA faculty: we hope to see you all there! Please contact cloots@mercy.edu if you have any questions about any of this.

Annual Grad Student Symposium, Course Schedules

Fall (and Summer) Offerings, Shakespeare Performance on campus, Grad Symposium on Zoom

Hi all, below you can find info on upcoming course offerings, as well as a few events taking place this spring. For the fall graduate schedule we’re starting with three courses. If demand warrants we’ll add more but we anticipate that three courses will suffice.

FALL 2026 COURSE OFFERINGS

  • ENGL 507 – Narrative Strategies in the Novel (Dr. Fritz)

This course studies the novel and various narrative methods used in the novel over the centuries and across the British and American traditions. 3 credits. Fulfills either the Writing & Literary Forms field requirement or an elective.

  • ENGL 524 Reason & Imagination (Dr. Sax)

This course studies a range of literature emerging first during the Enlightenment, and then during the subsequent Romantic era, with attention to Neoclassicism, among other things. Students will explore and consider some of the tensions between and informing these different eras and literary movements, will consider ways that these eras and movements relate to one another, including how the Romantic era and its emphasis on imagination emerged to some degree as a response to the Enlightenment and its emphasis on reason. As such, particular attention will be paid to the historical contexts from which the literature of these eras emerged, and to the role of reason and imagination in literature, history, and life. Fulfills a Literature Group 1 requirement or works as an elective.

  • ENGL 541 Search for Identity in American Lit (Dr. Loots)

This course will study the search for identity, individually and collectively, as it manifests in American (United States) literature from Colonial times through the early twentieth century. Attention will be paid to the rapidly changing historical/cultural contexts from which such literature emerged, as well as to different literary movements emerging in America over the eras studied (e.g. Colonial, Revolutionary, Romantic, Realist, Modern). Part of the goal of the course is to provide students with an understanding of the foundations of literature in America. Another goal is for students to recognize just how vast and diverse the literature of America is, as well as how vast and diverse are the definitions of what it has meant, and means, to be “American.” Readings in previous instances of the course have included works by Anne Bradstreet, Edward Taylor, Olaudah Equiano, Jonathan Edwards, Thomas Paine, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, Phillis Wheatley, Philip Freneau, Poe, Emerson, Margaret Fuller, Walt Whitman, Kate Chopin, Fanny Fern, Sojourner Truth, Frederick Douglass, Henry James, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Charles Chestnutt, W.E.B. Du Bois, Paul Lawrence Dunbar, and Zora Neale Hurston. Likely we’ll encounter many or all of these authors and their works again this fall, and still others too might find their way into the course readings. Students might further elect to pursue readings of works from other nations, works emerging in time with the assigned American literature, to gain a more comprehensive and comparative understanding of the literature emerging globally during these centuries. Fulfills a Literature Group 2 requirement or works as an elective.

SUMMER 2026 COURSE OFFERING

For the summer we’re planning just one course, but if student demand warrants it we’ll add another. The summer course offering is:

  • ENGL 515: Creative Writing – Telling Your Story (Dr. Sax)

Students in this course will work on crafting their memoirs, in various ways and forms. Unlike autobiography, which chronologically details the events and facts of a person’s life up over time, memoir involves personal reflections and life-stories centered around a theme: for example discovering one’s heritage, or overcoming fears or trauma, or coming of age, or the quest for belonging, etc. Students will consider existing published memoirs, explore themes for their own memoirs, craft and draft memoirs, and share and discuss them as a learning community of creative writers. No prior experience with creative writing is necessary to enroll in this course. Fulfills an elective but can work for any other area requirement, if needed.

UPCOMING SPRING EVENTS

For those local to the New York City area: Mercy English will be hosting our annual “Christie Day” Shakespeare festival on Wednesday, April 8, on the Dobbs Ferry campus, in the Main Hall Lecture Hall. The NYC-based Red Bull Theatre/Apocalyptic Artists acting company will be putting on a version of MacBeth, followed by Q&A between audience and actors. Admission is free and everyone in the graduate English community is welcome to attend, whether current grad student, alumni, or family/friend. Curtain is 4pm and the performance will end around 5:30pm. “Christie Day” is named for the late Joannes Christie, founder and former Chair of Mercy’s English Department.

The 2026 “Writing/Image/Text” or “WIT” Graduate English Symposium will take place on Saturday, April 25, at noon eastern, on Zoom. All students in the program are encouraged to attend and hopefully to participate by sharing a selection of your work. You could share a scholarly paper, or your creative writing, or a digital or multi-media project, or something musical or audio-visual, or practically anything else that’s of your scholarly or creative efforts. A distinct call for presentations will go out later, but anyone interested in presenting or simply attending as an audience member should clear your calendar now to be sure Saturday 4/25 is free. Although we limit presentations to our active grad students, all of our alumni and anyone else associated with the MA English Lit program’s learning community are welcome to attend.

For questions about any of this, please contact cloots@mercy.edu.

Course Information

Spring Semester Begins Wednesday 1/21

The winter holidays are past and the new year has begun, which means it’s time to get back to our graduate English studies, to our adventures and explorations in literature and media. We begin again this Wednesday, January 21st!

Your Blackboard courses will already be populating with materials as we approach the start of the semester, but note that until 1/21 anything you might see in any of your Blackboard courses should be considered a draft-in-progress and subject to change, other than whatever book orders your professors have posted. By this point any book orders will be locked-in and the information available at Mercy’s Barnes and Noble site. Note that some books might be mark as required, others as recommended, so look closely as you look over the site. You don’t actually have to purchase anything from the university bookstore, unless you have book vouchers to spend. You might find any of the required materials for less cost elsewhere.

Here’s to the new year, and to the new semester. If anyone has any questions about your spring courses, be sure to reach out to your professors. If anyone has any questions about the program or such, be sure to reach out to me/the director at cloots@mercy.edu.

Course Information, Course Schedules

Spring 2026 Registration and Course Information

General registration for spring opens on November 6, typically at 9am eastern (when the Registrar’s office manually activates the system on that morning, it’s not automated, so it might not open at 9:00 sharp). If you need assistance with registration note that the current PACT advisor for the MA program is Chris Hernandez at chernandez85@mercy.edu. We’re planning to run three graduate courses in the spring and will expand the schedule beyond this if needs demand. For the spring you will find these course options available for registration starting on 11/6:

  • ENGL 505 Transformations of the Epic (Dr. Sax)

This course is based on the conception of the epic as an encyclopedic narrative of substantial length featuring a central figure who reflects the values of a particular culture. It will proceed chronologically, studying the taxonomy and transformations of the epic, from its earliest Classical manifestations, through its emergence in Medieval and Renaissance texts, to its incorporation after the Renaissance into modern writing. Fulfills the Writing & Literary Forms requirement or an elective by default, but can fulfill a Literature Group 1 or Literature Group 2 requirement upon request.

  • ENGL 515: Reel Stories: Literature & Film (Dr. Loots)

This course explores story as presented through writings and film from around the world and back across time, with an eye to considering questions such as: What is the point, value, or power of story overall, culturally speaking or otherwise, whether written or filmed? Why do some of us create stories, whether written or filmed? And why do so many of us like to experience stories, whether written or filmed? What advantages are there to storytelling through each of these different mediums? What technical aspects and considerations go into the creation of stories in these two different mediums? Why do people create or experience tragic works if they depict such heavy material that it might make us sad? And what value is there to studying story, whether written or filmed, at all, in the university? We will talk about all of this and more throughout the semester. Basically, if you like thinking, and conversing, and stories, and movies, and exploring your ideas about such in a supportive environment, this is the class for you. Fulfills an elective by default but can fulfill a Literature Group 1 or Literature Group 2 requirement upon request.

  • ENGL 525 Victorian Age in Literature (Dr. Dugan)

If one were asked to define the timeline of Victorian literature, one might be hard-pressed to do so. As literary genres are fluid, it is hard to determine when the Romantic Period ends and the Victorian Period begins; and when the Victorian Period ends and Modernism begins. Whatever the dates, a defining characteristic of Victorian England would be change, change matched with a belief in progress: societal, religious, economic, and artistic. While some benefited from these changes, others did not. The semester we will look closely, through Victorian literature, at issues that challenge the notions of change and progress, notably the role of women, industrialism, gender roles, and poverty as shown in fiction, poetry, and drama of the Victorian age. Fulfills a Literature Group 1 requirement or an elective by default, but can fulfill a Literature Group 2 requirement or the Writing & Literary Forms requirement upon request.

Faculty News, Student News

Faculty Speaking Event: Dr. Sax Discusses his forthcoming book

Good news for grad students able to reach the Dobbs Ferry campus: Our own Dr. Boria Sax will be discussing his forthcoming book The Butterfly Who Dreamt He Was a Man this Thursday, October 30, at 10:30am in the Maher Hall Conference Room. This is part of the School of Liberal Arts’ 2025-26 thematic series of events on Bodies. The MA English Lit program strongly encourages anyone in the area to come over to campus on Thursday morning. For directions to Maher Hall or more info, write to cloots@mercy.edu.

Student News

Seeking Students for a School of Liberal Arts Themed Event: “Psyche & Soma in the Age of Cyberculture”

Hi all! Each year the MercyU School of Liberal Arts (SLA) launches a theme and then encourages faculty and students to create events based on the theme. The SLA theme this year is “bodies.” Faculty in the grad program are hoping to gather students together for a themed-event called “Psyche and Soma in the Age of Cyberculture.” Just what would the event actually involve? And when would it happen? We don’t yet know! But it would somehow have something to do with the question and mystery of the mind, the self, one’s psychical quidditas (psyche) in relation to one’s physical body (soma) in this age of cyberculture, meaning the age of the internet, phones, computers, AI, virtual reality, augmented reality, MMORPGS and other co-op shared gaming and virtual environments, social media, etc.

We’re first just looking to see who from our grad program would be interested in joining together to do something on the theme. Then, from there we’d confer and determine just what that something might be. The most standard thing would be some sort of a panel event, where a series of presenters would share something (perhaps a scholarly paper, perhaps a creative-writing piece, perhaps something of the studio-arts or digital arts, perhaps something musical, perhaps something cinematic, perhaps something like dance, etc.) each somehow related to the question, issue, mystery of “Psyche and Soma in the Age of Cyberculture.” But perhaps there’s some other sort of event that we might imagine.

If any student in the grad program is curious about or interested in this, please write to cloots@mercy.edu by October 25. Reaching out does not bespeak a commitment, so if you’re at all intrigued, just reach out. Let’s just get in view who all might be interested in banding together for this event. Once we have that in view, we’ll take it from there and figure out what we each might do, and when, and in what modality.

Red Hyacinth Journal

Calling All Creative Writers!

Mercy University’s nationally-recognized literary+arts journal Red Hyacinth is now accepting submissions of creative writing, photography, and images of other original studio arts for it’s 2026 edition. For full submission guidelines and instructions, please click here. The deadline to submit is November 30. This is a great opportunity for students in our grad program to get your creative work considered for publication, and potentially to see it in print, in a perfect-bound hard-copy award-winning journal.

This is the director's blog for the Mercy University MA in English Literature Program. This is not the official University site.