Angelo State Professor Honored Among Texas’ Top Writers

SAN ANGELO, TX - Dr. Laurence Musgrove of the Angelo State University English faculty has been inducted into the Texas Institute of Letters (TIL), a distinguished honor society that celebrates Texas literature and recognizes distinctive literary achievement.

The TIL's elected membership consists of the state's most recognized and serious writers of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, journalism, music and scholarship. Musgrove is a member of the 2025 induction class that also includes such other notables as Grammy Award-winning songwriters Rodney Crowell and Lyle Lovett, Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning playwright Robert Schenkkan, and New York Times best-selling author Jenny Lawson, who was ASU's 2014 Distinguished Alumna.

"We are overjoyed and honored to welcome such a varied and stellar group of literary talents," said TIL President David Bowles. "These folks are some of the very best in their respective fields, and we congratulate not only their nomination and induction, but also the years they have each dedicated to Texas letters."

"I'm very proud to have received this prestigious honor of membership in the Texas Institute of Letters," Musgrove said. "I'm grateful for the support I've received from my department and colleagues at ASU, especially Chris Ellery and Terry Dalrymple, who have mentored my writing and introduced me to other Texas writers and editors. I'm also very grateful to Katherine Hoerth, editor-in-chief at Lamar University Literary Press, who has always welcomed my book proposals, whether they be my collections of verse or edited anthologies of work by others. I plan to represent Angelo State and West Texas proudly as I begin my service to this fine organization."

A professor of English in the Natalie Zan Ryan Department of English and Modern Languages, Musgrove joined the ASU faculty in 2009. He served as department chair from 2009-19 and has been the faculty advisor for ASU's Oasis Magazine arts and literary journal since 2016. An accomplished poet, he has published four books of poetry, including "A Stranger's Heart" and "Bluebonnet Sutras," and has had more than 130 poems published in a wide variety of literary journals dating back to 2004. He has also published multiple book chapters, short stories and cartoons, and he is editor of the Texas Poetry Assignment online poetry journal.

In 2023, Musgrove was selected for a Fulbright-Hays Seminars Abroad Program in Taiwan, during which he engaged in lectures and immersive experiences as he was introduced to the richness of Taiwan's democracy and national identity, while also gaining insight into the country's history, society, religion, culture, environment and language. His chapbook of poems based on his experience, titled "The Dogs of Alishan & Other Poems from Taiwan," will be published later this year.

Also a member of the Texas Association of Creative Writing Teachers and the National Council of Teachers of English Assembly for Expanded Perspectives in Learning, Musgrove earned his Ph.D. in English at the University of Oregon.