Sydney Blair, an associate professor of creative writing at the University of Virginia who was a key figure in leading the Department of English’s Creative Writing Program to national prominence, died Monday in Charlottesville from complications due to a sudden illness. She was 67.

After graduating from the Creative Writing Program in 1986 with a Master of Fine Arts degree, she remained to teach in the program and stayed for 30 years. Blair twice served as its director, from 1991 to 1995 and from 2006 to 2009. Author of the novel, “Buffalo,” which won the Virginia Prize for Fiction in 1991, she published many short stories, reviews and articles, including the story “River Song” in American Scholar last year.

English professor Jane Alison, the program’s current director, said when Blair headed the program, “She was crucial during those years in welding together the writerly community and in expanding the program’s reputation.”

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