Robyn Creswell

Robyn Creswell is an Associate Professor of Comparative Literature and Director of Graduate Admissions at Yale University. He specializes in Modern Arabic Literature, Translation Studies, and Modernist Poetry, with a focus on the intersection of literature and politics in the Middle East. Creswell holds a Ph.D. from New York University (2011) and a B.A. from Brown University (1999). His research explores Cold War intellectual movements, pan-Arabism, and the role of translation in preserving literary heritage.

Education:

• Ph.D., Comparative Literature, New York University, 2011
• B.A., Comparative Literature, Brown University, 1999 (Magna cum laude)

Research Interests:

Creswell’s work spans Modernist Poetry, Arabic literature, translation theory, and the politics of Middle Eastern cultural production. He has written extensively on 20th-century Arab poets like Nazik al-Mala’ika and Adonis, analyzing how literary forms reflect broader sociopolitical shifts. His current project, The Ruins: Arabic Poetry in an Age of Extremes, examines post-WWII Arab intellectual history through poetic analysis.

Publications:

His book City of Beginnings: Poetic Modernism in Beirut (2019) won the Gaddis Smith International Book Prize. He has translated works by Iman Mersal, Sonallah Ibrahim, and Abdelfattah Kilito, including the National Translation Award-winning The Threshold (2022). His essays appear in The New York Review of Books, Daedalus, and Critical Inquiry.

Awards and Fellowships:

• Guggenheim Fellowship (2021)
• National Translation Award (2023)
• Berlin Prize (American Academy in Berlin, 2015–16)
• Cullman Center Fellowship (2011–12)

Teaching and Service:

Creswell has taught courses on Arabic poetry, literary translation, and the global history of sports writing. He directed Yale’s Comparative Literature Department (2021–23) and served as poetry editor for The Paris Review (2011–18). He has organized academic symposia such as Translation/Tarjama (2018), exploring Arabic literary translation’s political dimensions.