AustLit

'A few months ago an article by the distinguished American author and academic Louis Menand appeared in the New Yorker, asking whether creative writing can or should be taught. Now I've nothing against the substance of Menand's question - about the methods and value of teaching - but I'm weary of it almost always being asked only of writing programs. Can music, for example, be taught? Should painting or literature or history be taught? Or, even more unlikely, engineering? These questions are never asked, and as a result writing academics spend a lot of time feeling defensive. Why are people always putting the question, and why do we even both to answer it?' (Introduction)