Men and Women of Letters 

“I’m not sure I was ready to fully absorb that in my days as an undergrad,” Lombardo says. “But it’s certainly a part of my daily life as a teacher, writer, editor, and human.” 

William Peter Blatty was a student at Georgetown University when he heard about the demonic possession and exorcism of a 14-year-old Maryland boy. Decades later, he used that story as inspiration for his novel The Exorcist, which was released in 1971 and soon made into a blockbuster movie. 

While Blatty encountered that anecdote as an undergraduate in the late 1940s, Jesuit institutions continue to produce many of today’s preeminent writers in many genres. Loyola University Chicago has Phil Caputo, author of the memoir A Rumor of War; short story writer and poet Stuart Dybek; and fiction writer Billy Lombardo. 

To sum up what he learned at Loyola, Lombardo quotes another Jesuit-educated author, Don DeLillo (Fordham University), whose narrator in the novel Underworld proclaims: “The Jesuits taught me to examine things for second meanings and deeper connections.” 

“I’m not sure I was ready to fully absorb that in my days as an undergrad,” Lombardo says. “But it’s certainly a part of my daily life as a teacher, writer, editor, and human.” 

Annie Sullivan took her first creative writing class at Brebeuf Jesuit Preparatory School in Indianapolis, and since then she’s authored three young adult fantasy novels. 

“Brebeuf promoted thinking outside the box,” says Sullivan, who works full time as a copywriter for John Wiley & Sons publishing. “It was okay to challenge ideas and ask why things were the way they were. I think that spark of curiosity they encouraged helped me become a better writer and plotter since it encouraged creativity and being intellectually competent.” 

Jesuits have a long history with writing and publishing. After having committed the Jesuit order to educating lay people in formal European schools, St. Ignatius of Loyola purchased a printing press in 1556 to make textbooks more affordable. Jesuit scholarly text has thrived for centuries, but the work of contemporary Jesuit-educated writers runs the gamut. 

Delphine Red Shirt, a graduate of Holy Rosary High School (now Red Cloud Indian School) on South Dakota’s Pine Ridge Indian Reservation and Regis University in Denver, writes nonfiction books about the Lakota experience and traditions. The late Tom Clancy, mega-bestselling author of military espionage novels—many featuring fictional Boston College alumnus Jack Ryan—is an alumnus of both Loyola Blakefield and Loyola University Maryland. Former U.S. Poet Laureate Billy Collins graduated from the College of the Holy Cross. 

John “Cal” Freeman worked in the writing center and edited the student literary magazine during his time at the University of Detroit Mercy. He says that experience and the writing workshops he attended were crucial to his development as a poet and creative nonfiction writer. His new poetry collection, Poolside at the Dearborn Inn, will be released next year. 

“I think the emphasis on liberal arts within the Jesuit tradition, as well as the emphasis on social justice, instilled in me a diverse and interdisciplinary reading practice that has been foundational for my writing life,” he says. 

Now a creative writing professor, Freeman recalls the impact UDM’s Fr. Justin Kelly, SJ, had on him. He cites him as the best teacher he ever had. 

“I took his Poets, Mystics, and God class as a junior, and it cemented my feeling that reading and writing poems was a spiritual act,” Freeman says. 

One story Fr. Kelly told about the poet Theodore Roethke was especially impactful. Roethke, having finished a poem, felt as if the spirit of William Butler Yeats was in the room with him. 

“Maybe I’ve never experienced anything quite that ecstatically mystical while drafting a poem, but there are voices that show up whose presence in the poems seem to come from somewhere I don’t understand in any intellectual way,” Freeman says. 

For Mark Wisniewski, the unexpected acceptance of a short story in the highly competitive student literary magazine at Milwaukee’s Marquette University High School might have been what inspired him to study journalism and communications at Creighton University. 

“That was maybe the first time the Polish- American kid from the poor side of town felt a little something known as prestige,” he says. “I felt the thrill of seeing my fiction in print. Once you embody that feeling, you want to feel more of it, again and again.” 

In addition to graduating from Georgetown University Law Center, Wisniewski has since written three novels, a collection each of short stories and poems, and a writing craft book. He and his wife also founded the short story anthology CASA (coolestamericanstories.com), which features the work of established and emerging writers. He encourages readers of this magazine to submit. 

“When I was at Jesuit schools, I’d say the bulk of the student body was chasing down prestigious, well-paying jobs,” Wisniewski says. “But various Jesuits were rather accepting of anyone wanting to risk a less affluent lifestyle for the sake of something as idealistic and difficult as becoming a successful novelist.” 

The Ignatian way of teaching and learning gave these writers, and certainly many others, the knowledge and courage to pursue their goals—and to live as complete people. They also learned to craft compelling narratives, which many of us rely on not only for entertainment, but to inform our lives as a whole.