Careers, Critics, and Professors

Kristine Kathryn Rusch recently published a post titled "Careers, Critics, and Professors" in her The Business Rusch series. The article left me saying: Yes! Thank you, yes. Finally someone gets it and articulates it well without being crass, mean, or inflammatory.

I sent the article to a friend getting a graduate degree in music composition. His response was that Rusch was "right on during the half about conservatories ... it sounds like we (the music world) lost out on a great composer."

And where I didn't know anything about music conservatories, I know a lot about graduate and undergraduate writing programs, and Rusch manages to articulate everything (well, almost everything) that frustrated me about my own MFA experience. Frustration that lead me to looking into programs like Clarion and Odyssey and eventually attending the Odyssey Writing Workshop. Frustration that led me to taking the one course offered in three years on publishing and ending up spending more time (because I was more interested) on that coursework than on any other course in my entire graduate career. Frustration that lead me to speak out at the Professors and Graduate Students of Writing meeting that we should offer more publishing classes, offer them more regularly, require students to take them even, not just proceed with "the option to work on the program's associated literary journal."

Oh, and in that meeting, people nodded when I spoke -- one graduate student who had a chapbook published before she started the program also begged for publishing-related coursework because until her publisher sent her a proof of her chapbook, she'd never seen a copyediting mark.

Again, people in the room nodded, then said that students who wanted to learn about publishing should edit the literary journal. I pointed out that the one publishing class they were talking about not offering again had been wonderful because it had been about more than editing. It had been about explaining how a journal works as a business, how a small press works as a business, how a larger press operates, and the course had given a sense of history of publishing and printing.

They nodded again. Then reminded me that, well, the program is an art degree.

I sighed and let it go. I was done with my own degree by that point. I'd been teaching composition for 3+ years on minimal training and lots of hands-on experience. If there's one thing my experiences in academia have taught me, it's how to teach myself by researching and reasoning, improving old skill sets to apply them to new situations. So I'd already sought out other avenues of education on what it meant to have a career and how to go about making one.

Do not mistake my meaning: I learned a great deal in my MFA program. words and line level craft are important and something I needed to be taught. But it's not a holistic approach to the act of writing. And a career cannot be focused on minutia, it has to be holistic.

I'm a work in progress -- aren't all people's careers? -- but I'm fairly certain of what I want and that what I want isn't a PhD in creative writing to perpetuate the art of writing. No, what I want isn't to be an artist, it's to be a career storyteller, whatever form that may take.

How to find an MFA program

A big part of deciding whether or not to attend an MFA program (both traditional or low-residency) is figuring out where you would want to get the MFA. MFA programs are not like law schools -- graduating from Harvard Law might "guarantee" you a job, but there's absolutely no equivalent when talking about creative writing programs.*  Therefore the most important  consideration in choosing a creative writing program is will it work for you?


Of course, you have to find the darn things before you can determine if they have what you're looking for.

You can read the Poets & Writers fall issue on MFA programs, you can dally around the MFAblog -- but do both with caution. A lot of the "information" given out in both of those sources are opinions and generalizations. (Poets & Writers admits that many of their MFA articles are editorials rather than reporting, but it's easy to get swept away and forget that.) An MFA is a masters of fine arts; it is, by definition, a creative pursuit, and therefore what works for other people might not work for you.

All this is to say that you're really best off if you research programs individually and judge them by how the program's merits line up with your own desires and priorities.

There is a free database to help you out.  The AWP (Association of Writers and Writing Programs) has an official guide to writing programs where you can enter your search criteria and see the names of accredited programs worldwide.  Can't leave the state? You can search by that. Looking for a program that does genre fic? Or Screenwriting? Or children's lit? You can search for that. Looking for a BA or BFA program instead of a grad program? They list those too.

Once you've done a search, the AWP guide will show you the page they have with the program's info. Take this page as a preliminary, not the cold hard facts. These pages are slow to change -- for example, if a faculty member has left/arrived in the past couple of years, it probably won't be reflected in the AWP guide.** BUT these pages provide the web address for the school along with basic information -- and most importantly, they provide you with knowledge that such an MFA or MA program exists.

Another good way to get some info about programs, and to do so in person, is to attend the AWP Conference. In 2012, it'll be held in Chicago (February). Many schools will have table at the bookfair and you can go up to the table and ask faculty and current students questions (depending on who's sitting at the table at the time), and usually pick up materials and application tips. If a school's been cutting costs, they might not have a table just for them but they may have a table that's under the name of their affiliated literary magazine. If the school has a magazine associated with it, it's likely that at least some of the people running it are current graduate students at that program -- and they're most likely to be the ones sitting at the table! Go ahead and ask if they're grad students and if they wouldn't mind answering some questions about the program.


*(Caveat: getting an MFA from Iowa will definitely help you get a teaching job -- or at least an interview for a teaching job -- but you'll still have to work your butt off to publish and do all the other stuff. More on that tomorrow.)


**Note: Always use the school's website for application materials, deadlines, and direct contact info. Any source other than the school itself may be wrong and you won't be able to verify their info unless you go to the school's website anyway.

Low-residency MFAs

Judging from some of the comments I've gotten when I started blogging about good reasons to get an MFA and poor reasons to get an MFA, it sounds like a lot of low-residency MFA programs are being overlooked. Don't! These programs provide solid education and great flexibility for many individuals.


A definition: A "low-residency" MFA program is a program where much of the work is done remotely and interaction is primarily through correspondence and a minimum of 14 days of residential study each year. The MFA program will often break this up into two separate visits of 7-10 days. All other study is done from the student's home wherever that is in the country or world.

The AWP (Association of Writers and Writing Programs) says this by way of introduction to low-residency MFA programs in its Directors Handbook:

Since the first low-residency MFA program in creative writing was developed in the 1970s, higher education has established over thirty such programs.  With various combinations of residencies, workshops, lectures, online workshops and classes, study abroad, correspondence, and  one-on-one mentoring, low-residency programs vary; however, their chief attributes are individualized instruction and structural flexibility for students.  Low-residency programs require at least two years of study.  Students study literature and craft by writing original fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry, translations, screenplays, or plays; by analyzing contemporary and canonical works of literature; and by writing critical papers.  Programs also require culminating projects focused on the craft of writing—an extended craft essay, a lecture, or the teaching of a seminar.  The centerpiece of the course of study is a creative thesis, an original literary work in the student’s chosen genre(s). 

With its mentoring relationships involving one teacher and one student, or with small online workshops and seminars, the low-residency program excels in expediting the development of a writer.  Students in low-residency programs tend to be older than traditional graduate students.  Many students enter these programs intending to continue in their already established careers; these students find that their professional work is often improved by the skills they acquire in their artistic avocations.  Low-residency programs have a strong record of preparing graduates for careers in teaching, editing, publishing, public affairs, advertising, and administration. 

Lifestyle favorable: Low-residency MFAs are good choices if you aren't within driving distance of the school you want to go to and have a life you can't easily move. Great for people with kids in school, or a spouse that needs to stay put for work or family reasons, if you have a house you can't sell, or if you have a job. Yep, you don't have to quit your job to get an MFA if that's what you want to do. It'll be tough to juggle it all -- going to night school always is -- but it can be done.

Another perk is that low-residency MFAs do not (usually) come with teaching obligations to round out your funding. Although, if your post-MFA goal is to teach then this may be more of a con than a pro as the during-grad-school teaching obligations are also a form of getting experience. But if you know you don't want to teach -- ever -- then hey, bonus!

But remember that even though you get to keep your current normal life/job/living situation,  it is a form of "going back to school." Even though you meet in person only once or twice a year, you still have weekly homework, workshop deadlines, and scheduled internet chats/emails/etc. with faculty.

I've been told that to be a successful low-res MFA instructor you need to be good at expressing yourself in email -- that is, expressing yourself thoroughly and without confusion. So I'd assume that the flip side of that is that if you're a low-res student, you shouldn't be afraid of extremely long emails from your faculty; you should be willing and able to plow through those and learn whatever you can; you should be able to then express yourself succinctly through reply emails. Regardless of how well you can write a story, some people just can't email worth a damn -- odd, but true -- find out if this is you before you apply so that you can have a strategy for success or choose another route.

Niche and genre-favorable programs: If the classics aren't your thing and say, mystery writing is your thing, then odds are that there's a low-residency MFA program with a niche program for mystery writers. Same goes for screen writers, YA writers, science fiction, fantasy, romance, crime, and other forms of "commercial fiction," "popular fiction," or "genre fiction" (all three terms refer to the same thing and are used interchangeably). It's my experience that it's much harder to find programs that specialize in any of those things among traditional (high residency) MFAs, but there are quite a few now in the low-res world. The University of Southern Main, Seton Hill University, and Western Colorado are just a few I know off the top of my head. It's my opinion that more programs should be more open to training writers of popular fiction.

Non-MFA granting training programs: There are also non-MFA programs which are great.  Some of them, like the Odyssey Fantasy Writing Workshop, are potentially better than MFA programs in terms of how much you grow as a writer. If you're a sci-fi/fantasy/horror writer, consider Odyssey Fantasy Writing Workshop, Clarion, Clarion West, and others. For romance writers, join the RWA -- I don't know how much of an education the local chapters will give you, but I know that they often run bootcamps for members nationwide which you can attend (which anyone can attend but by joining the RWA you actually get notified of the upcoming event). I have little doubt that there are similar workshops and bootcamps for mystery writers and others interested in commercial genres check them out. They may be the alternative to a high residency MFA which is perfect for you.

Resources: While a google serach for "Low-residency MFA" will bring back oodles of results, there's also a handbook you can get in paper or Kindle format. It appears to be made by the same people who made the Creative Writing MFA handbook, which presumably didn't have an in-depth enough section on low-residency programs and thus the low-res volume. I've not taken a look at either -- they were either not in print yet or had gone out of print when I was applying to programs.

What I recommend is checking out the Portable MFA in Creative Writing (a $10-17 book) before you begin. If the book puzzles you, presents items you never thought of, makes you feel in over your head (ever so slightly) or tantilizes you to learn more, then getting an MFA may be just the thing to do. I remember looking at A Portable MFA before starting my program, and everything that I read sounded vaguely familiar. At the time, my vocabulary wasn't up to snuff (particularly the vocabulary I use to talk about writing) so it presented a challenge when the authors were talking about writing. But mostly I remember reading that book and agreeing with them on the lessons and the theory ... and then putting down the book and having no idea how to apply that to my own work.

And that is precisely what a good teacher/mentor can do for you: teach you how to take what works theoretically and make it work for you.

Forthcoming MFA posts: 

• How to find a program
• Why you should pay no attention to "rankings" for any school or program

Reasons to get an MFA in creative writing

Here's my big question -- before we even get into the "are you ready for an MFA?" and "where should you apply/go?" -- why do you want to get an MFA, and are your reasons strong enough to hold you through 2-3 years of graduate study?

Good reasons to get an MFA:

• You want to work on improving your craft.
• You are encouraged by having deadlines for your writing.
• You want funded time to write (assuming you get funding).
• You'd like to teach writing at the college level including composition.
• You learn well in a school-setting.
• You have a high threshold for pain when it comes to people critiquing your writing.
• You enjoy classic and contemporary "literature."
• You want to push yourself.

Poor reasons to get an MFA:

• You got a BA in English and don't know what to do next.
• You hate the thought of teaching freshmen to write essays and only want to be an artist.
• You want to be an artiste.
• Your writing doesn't need any work, you just need to network.
• You believe that once you're in an MFA program, you need only stay long enough to network your way to an agent/editor/publication.
• It will look good on your submission cover letters. 
• You think a masters degree in creative writing will make you employable.

An MFA, in theory, is the terminal degree for a creative (or artistic) form.  There are creative writing PhD programs out there, but for the moment both a PhD and an MFA are considered "terminal."  As a creative discipline, the Fine Arts part of your Master of Fine Arts degree makes you not terribly employable.  There are no ready jobs for MFA holders they way there are ready jobs for holders of JDs.  (Although lately there's no ready jobs for them either.)

With an MFA in creative writing you can teach college level writing classes -- most of these openings will be college level composition classes not college level creative writing classes. With an MFA in creative writing a couple publications, you can also teach community ed. classes in creative writing. You must have substantial publications in your creative field and substantial previous teaching experience to land a decent job teaching creative writing full time.  Know this ahead of time if it's what you want.

The time spent getting the MFA is a time to learn, but it's also a time to write.  That is the most valuable part of the MFA for any funded student: funding to write.  The most valuable part for the unfunded student: a chance to learn craft from people who (usually) are good teachers.

MFAs are horrible places to network your way to publication. Unless you make it into Iowa.  If you make it into Iowa and convince them to give you a degree, it will be easier (eventually) to get a teaching position and/or your first book contract. But every other MFA in the country is not Iowa.  Only Iowa is the Iowa of writing programs. No other MFA holds that clout -- no matter its "ranking."  More on that ranking nonsense tomorrow.

The MFA community can sniff out those who are there to network not learn. And it takes them about as long to find the fakes as it does the new family on the block to figure out if their neighbor is bringing them a casserole to welcome them in and save them from ordering pizza while unpacking, or it the goo and noodles in the corning wear is really just an excuse to get in the house and snoop. And those who are identified as using the program to network, don't ever integrate fully into the community. Although I will say that most of my faculty are the biggest name droppers I've ever met ... but that doesn't mean they'll introduce you, the student, just because you're there.  If you're looking to network, then go to local readings. Find out about readings, get on email listserves.  The university, library, or community group in your area likely brings writers and editors to town to talk and you don't even know it. Ask to be included on those email list serves and then, you know, attend readings -- it's one of the best ways to meet writers. And it'll generally cost you the price of their book (to get it signed) and not the few grand it would cost per semester of MFA.

It's MFA application season

Application season for would-be MFA students lines up roughly with that of American collegiate football:

The anticipation, the planning and preparation, starts right around Labor Day weekend -- often a little before. The actual games/activity begin in September and stretches though most of the fall months, culminating in the final sendings-off of applications in the end of December and first part of January. Then there are bowl games and, for collegiate football, things are done. We wait a few weeks and then everyone goes to a Superbowl party even if they're not big on pro football because, hey, it's the only football there is for a long time, and everyone's making a big hype over it so why not?

Once the Superbowl is over, however, MFA applicants are still waiting, waiting, growing more nervous and neurotic by the day. They spend their time on the MFAblog or the Poets & Writers forums checking to see if anyone is reporting a rejection or acceptance to the schools they applied to. It is a dark few months.

Then, late-February through mid-April, the response letters and emails slowly trickle in. Rejection. Acceptance. Rejection. Rejection. Acceptance without funding. Rejection. Waitlist. Acceptance.

You jump for joy. You pout. You call your mother, wife, girlfriend, college roommate. You make plans. You worry your lip. You talk to other people. You worry some more. You get frustrated. Your buddy buys you a celebratory beer. You develop a sore from worrying your lip so damn much every day. Then you get to take a deep breath and watch the Stanley Cup finals because this application season has extended beyond the confines of a single sports season (or a single metaphor), but at least it's over ... unless you're reapplying.

In which case, you plan all summer for the start of next season.

Thankfully, for most people, this cycle does not happen more than once or twice in their life.

This week on Speak Coffee to Me, we'll get back into the MFA talk and particularly the application talk because it's that time of year and hey, I really have nothing to say about football that you can't hear on Sports Center.

Workshop = you - your voice

Agent Kristin Norton has a short and sweet little post up on Pub Rants about voice being workshopped out of students. To which I wholeheartedly agree. When I left college I had a super-quirky but non-functional writer voice. Which the MFA has since beat out of me.

(I should of course admit that the voice I was left with was highly functional -- something I did not have before -- if not terribly interesting.)

I've also since realized that the MFA made me get super distant from my characters (and I used to love love love to be right up in their heads) because I had an instructor or two right at the beginning of my study who loved to dissect the character's neuroses and therefore the author's.  And yeah, okay, so she was normally right on the money with which neuroses my characters held were made up and which were my own.  But that sort of detective work -- and namely, announcing that detective work to my peers -- made me not write characters like me.

I got super-distant from my characters. And then I got despondent. I tried, flailed. Thought about focusing solely on nonfiction without the veil of fiction to obscure what I was saying, then hit on the notion of folklore as the lens to focus my fiction writing through. Thus my big break.

While folklore in the MFA workshop was its own sort of uphill battle, no one stopped to suggest that it was a poignant narrative and if you made it up then all the more poignant.

So I dropped the closeness of my narrative voice in favor of the fairy tale voice. I dropped the quirky wondrous sarcastic voice that had been my signature as an undergrad. A voice that would give me my first fiction publication. And after a 2-3 year hiatus, only now am I slowly attempting to regain that voice.  But certainly not in all  of my works.

Voice is something I struggle dearly with. My writing teachers and peers like to tell me that "I think you've found your voice" whenever they see the writing come together for me.

I've been told, so far, that I have "found my voice" on three vastly different projects. Possibly four -- my memory is faulty.

I've also been told that my voice often waffles within a single piece. Little wonder, all things considered.

I've been told my quirky voice was "it"; that my fairy tale voice was "it"; that my contemporary folklore voice waffled too much but my high fantasy voice was spot on, (read: "it").

Is this a matter of an author having a "soft ear" and therefore being able to pick up many voices? Is it a matter of my own fear closing off avenues? Or is it simply workshop workshopping the voice out of individuals in favor of craft? (which if you read the linked post above,  you'll see is no bad thing so long as craft is learned and voice is regained).  I don't know. I really don't know. But I'll keep trying on new voices for as long as I can. Writing voices fascinate me, much like speaking with accents/dialects fascinate me. Please, don't ask those who knew me in middle school about the Irish accent I adopted after watching The Secret of Roan Inish; the accent came easily to me, and I used it to annoy the crap out of everyone around me.

MFA Survivalist

In one of the more anticlimactic moments of my master's program, I have received the email informing me that my MFA in creative writing has been granted.  The diploma to follow shortly by mail.

That's it. I'm done. Really done. I've survived.

And now for others that have "survived": a great humorous vid that I've been forwarded (thanks MonkeyLOLogist).  This will likely be funnier for those who watch Mythbusters, but should provide a special type of glee for all geeks.


I decided not to walk during the summer commencement ceremony.  And maybe it would have been more momentous if I had.  Instead, on that day, I chose to do something more meaningful: I had coffee with my advisor and brunch with other fiction program students.  I walked at my undergrad commencement and that was momentous -- then again it was a more meaningful ceremony for me.  There were less than 700 students in my graduating class.  We had our names called individually, we walked across the stage, shook the university president's hand, and got our diplomas.  Here, at a large, state university, lumped in among thousands of undergrads and sundry grad students getting their degrees, I didn't feel like the pomp was worth the circumstances.

Yes, I made a pun.  Forgive me.

Instead, I received word of my degree completion while sitting at my computer, wearing gymshorts and a t-shirt, fighting off yet another heat wave.

But isn't this just exemplary of the writer's life?  Here, solitary, at the desk, at the computer, doing the writing until the writing can be done no more.  The friends, the cheers, the drinks and the toasts will come later.  For now, it's back to work.

You're basically finished with your MFA -- how do you feel?

Shell-shocked.

That's pretty much sums it up.

It's been a crazy dash to the deadline -- a self-imposed deadline nonetheless -- and it doesn't seem like it's over. Perhaps because I finished the project, lined up a cat-sitter, and madly dashed out of town for a family graduation party four hours north. There was no great sigh of relief, no celebratory beverage (unless you count the coffee with my cat-sitter), and no happy dance in the end zone.

Although there was some bouncing on the balls of my feet but that's more nervous excitement, and the giddy feeling of turning in something that you think really should have gotten one more proof reading.

All and all, it just seems unreal.

My project committee has the next three weeks to peruse my collection of stories, send back their comments and decide if they're going to sign off on the project and therefore my degree. I've listened to my advisor, so I'm not terribly worried that they won't sign off on the project -- maybe if I was worried there would be more finality to the actual finishing.

As it is, I'm off to do some errands today and on to the next project.

Anyone else feel this way at the end of their degree?

Searching, Receiving ... now if the universe could just deliver me a story before deadline

I've been searching for the Robert Heinlein article/letter titled "On the writing of speculative fiction," ever since Elizabeth Twist referenced it in her post earlier this week.  It's better known as "Heinlein's rules of writing."  All I can find of it on the internet are the rules themselves and that it's supposedly from a 1947 private letter to Heinlein's agent Blassingame.  I've contacted my father to see if it's in Grumbles from the Grave, which I remember skimming for a report in high school and recall having Heinlein's letters in it.  Hopefully I'll find it soon because I want to see the whole of the essay.

I also sent for and received The Monsters and the Critics, a book of Tolkien essays on Ursala Le Guin's recommendation.  no, Le Guin and I are not chummy -- but oh how I wish we'd discussed it over coffee! -- I have a long list of "seminal work to read" courtesy of Le Guin's essay in Secret History of Fantasy edited by Peter S. Beagle (and still available in book stores).  And the copy of Monsters and the Critics I bought arrived by Royal Air Mail -- apropos, I think.  In there is "On Faerie-Stories," his famous what is fantasy essay.

And ... I'll be up half the night finishing a short story for deadline.

I love having these weekly MFA thesis deadlines, but they also set a tough pace.  Yep.  Still lovehate deadlines. And I'm on another one.  Right now.  Okay, universe, time to deliver.

To collect or to novel?

When fiction writers get to the end of their MFA they're expected to produce a project that is "book length," but they face the decision: do I make a collection of short stories or do I write a novel?

The short story collection tends to be the favorite in practice while the novel is what everyone says they'd like to do until they face having to do it.

There's points in favor of each.

Short Story Collection
The reason I say the short story collection tends to be what most people do is because it's what MFA workshops have set you up to do. In workshop you write and submit short stories, you get feedback, you find things to change and you make them better. Now, all you need to do is edit those stories on your own and you're halfway to a collection.

For people whom revision is easier than drafting, this is a the option of choice.

For people who can't get their minds around the length or structure of a novel, then the collection is, without question, the way to go. Often MFA programs don't have coursework on writing novels, or it's not as in depth as the course work on writing the short story.

Often, the collection seems like the ready-made option. Particularly when you have that moment of realization where you realize that the path of least resistance to your degree is to brush off a group of desperate stories whose only connective tissue is that you wrote them and call them "collected." It seems like a cop out to me, but a reasonable cop out. Particularly if your style/subject matter hasn't changed much while you've been in the MFA program. Then your stories are probably much more cohesive than mine as I tried a bunch of different styles and then switched gears from realism to fantasy.

Also, the "MFA project" asks you to present the fruits of your education. It is not specifically designed to ask you to produce something that anyone would ever want to publish as a book.

Which brings me to: short story collections are hard to sell.

There are three main ways to get a short story collection sold. (1) You win one of the short story collection contests that have publication attached to them like the Flannery O'Connor Award, the Iowa Short Fiction Award, or the AWP Award Series (there are a couple others but they don't come to mind). (2) You get a contract for a novel in which your agent convinces them to buy your collection as a "bonus"--mostly this is a "bonus" for the writer and a grudgingly accepted ultimatum for the publisher, and another reason why agents are so cool. (3) You get 3-12 stories published by The New Yorker and some publisher wants to collect and reprint them. There are other ways, but those are the three big ones. All other ways are extremely hard sells.*

Now consider how many MFA thesis collections are out there in the world and you're suddenly wondering why you'd want to put energy into a collection when you could be putting it into a novel -- or at least that's what I'm wondering.

The Novel
The big thing the novel has going for it is that it can be sold. That is, it's likely that (all prose being considered equal) someone will want to publish it. All that time, effort, and editing will result in a bound, typeset version of something with your name on it. Even if the cover sucks it's still your book.

The big downside to writing the novel as MFA thesis is that the MFA is not geared toward getting you to produce a novel. As mentioned above, it's the short story that's the perfect size and shape for weekly workshops, not the baggy monsters. Therefore, you'll likely be generating new material and editing it in a shorter span of time.

Then there's the whole has anybody taught you how to write a novel? question which seems to trip people up. I've heard quiet a few people say that they won't try to write a novel (including well published short storyists) because they just don't know how to put one together. Although if you look outside your MFA you can almost always find someone to teach you or materials to use to teach yourself. (Screenplay structure, as I understand it, is where to start looking.)

Then there's the not to be overlooked notion of having an idea big enough to fill a novel.

Where I'm at
See, I thought I had a plan (a novel). Then I had another plan (a story collection)--a plan I put in writing this time! And now I don't know if that plan is as good as the new-new plan (a novel, different from the first novel which I now know I couldn't sustain).

The new-new plan is, albeit, new and shiny. But I might be in the throws of saying hey, if my short story collection idea is going to be as much work as my novel idea then why don't I write the novel, have more fun, and end up with a more viable product at the end?

My advisor recently asked me to crunch numbers and find out where I'm at so that we can think about how best to spend my time. She didn't commit to one side of the debate or the other, but the mere suggestion of number crunching had me thinking all weekend.

The question is not as easy to answer as one would think. I've known a lot of people who said they were going to write a novel for their thesis project. It was only logical, and when it came down to it, logic changed and the logical thing to do was a collection. And now I don't know where I'm going to land with four months until it's due.


*This, of course, makes me laugh. Like any of those three are particularly easy.

(Not) Writing to the trend

Advice to genre writers is always "don't write to the trend."  Teenage wizard goes to wizarding school is hot? Don't write it. Teenage vampire romance is hot? Don't write it. At least, don't write it if your heart's not in it 100%. Don't write it just to hop on the bandwagon because (a) your book will suck if you're not in love with it and (b) the bandwagon might be gone by the time your book comes to market.

This advice is readily available to writers seeking instruction in commercial fiction, so why is no one saying it to MFA students?

I've become aware lately that many of the "rules of good writing" spouted off with great authority by students in writing programs are, in fact, trends. Faculty tend not to spout as definitively or level as broad, sweeping statements about the art and artifice of writing. Faculty tend to encourage experimentation. Students, however, encourage sameness in their peers: Trendiness.

In their written critiques of my work, I've had fellow students deliver "reminders" to not experiment. Remember: followed by some supposed rule of narrative. To which my faculty member asked, Why? Why does that have to be? and could not get a satisfactory answer from the students.

Certain pieces of craft like grammar and clarity (sentence level and story level) are tools not trends. But just about everything else -- prose styling, subject matter, and point of view included -- is a trend.

Particularly smacking of trendiness is the desire of today's American MFA student to write like Hemingway -- the idealized version of Hemingway, not the actual one. Trend.

Fiction goes through trends. "Highbrow" fiction goes through trends more slowly -- perhaps because fewer people write or read it, and therefore the impetus to change and innovate isn't as strong because the field isn't as deep -- but it's still changing. Look at fiction from 50 years ago, compared to today, or 100 years ago or 200 years ago: the high minded fiction of any given time period is different. It changes based on trends.  It changes based on what today's readers expect and what they're willing to accept.

I refuse to believe the New Critical notion that there is such a thing as "imperatively "good" writing that is "good" without taking into consideration the context in which it was written. If that was the case then no one would still be studying Shakespeare (his language is wordy and obtuse and the plots are unoriginal [even back then] and melodramatic) or Hawthorn (his novels crawl along like a dull snail in order to get to a few poignant and beautiful passages). Their work is not inherently "good art" yet there are myriad other reasons why we study those writers and why their prose endures, most of which can be appreciated contextually.

Don't believe me?  Try taking a piece that shifts between free verse and rhyming pentameter to your MFA workshop.

Perhaps the slowness of trends in supposedly high minded fiction has as much to do with the depth of the field as it does with the training of writers moving into academia.

Precisely when writing attached itself to the academy is debatable. It depends which self-important entity you choose to believe. Was the first writer's program at Bread Loaf? Harvard? Or was there no creative writing in the academy until Iowa? (all of them claim the distinction) Where it started doesn't really matter. What is certain is that after WWII, writing programs began appearing more and more regularly at colleges until there was a boom of them in the 80s -- a boom which has not yet slacked off. In fact, it might be in a second boom with the 21st century improvements in communication that allow for long distance and low residency MFA programs.

The MFA allows for a single style to be perpetuated and touted over all others. For a trend to be codified into the rules of fiction. For the production of the McPoem, as Donald Hall called it, ten billion served.

It's true that there was no way the peer who wrote to encourage me to Remember the "rule" could have known that I had already considered said "rule" and discarded it in order to serve my purposes. But that doesn't change the fact that it's a prime example of the rules of the trend being touted as the rules of all fiction.

And there have been other examples -- okay one example -- from my experience where my peers said fuck the rule, you should really run with it. 

You could probably show up to an MFA program and learn all the trends, be praised for your ability to recreate fiction that fits the trendy comprehension of the genre, graduate, and never challenge yourself to experiment. And, given the glacial pace of literary fiction, you work wouldn't date itself until the tail end of your life. However, the data shows that it's much more likely that you'll leave your MFA and never write again.

National Book Award Winner

So this is cool. My professor just won the National Book Award in fiction. Majorly cool. And therefore totally acceptable that she had to cancel class this week to go accept her award for Lord of Misrule.

NPR article on the awards ceremony.

State of the MFA: Year 2.5

After writing the State of the MFA: Year One, Year Two and Year Three, I realized that I'd left out a great deal. I'd left out all the revelatory information that came between the end of one and the beginning of another.

It was in this nebulous 2.5 time frame that I started asking the question (and answering it) Who am I as a writer and what is it that I care about?

For years, I tried quite desperately to write to please other people. As an undergrad I wrote stories like the ones I was assigned to read (all realism). And when someone in workshop said, hey, this sorta reminds me of that Pam Houston story we were assigned I knew I had struck gold. Yes, my writing was quirky and snarky, but it was as much that way because that's how my brain functioned as it was because that's how I knew I could get a laugh from people. Next I wrote to get into the MFA program. They needed to like me and my work to accept me, right? I arrived and the first night of workshop my instructor swiped a hand across the desk and said none of that genre stuff. I wasn't surprised, but I complied. He talked about his great interest in slice of life stories so I, like much of the class, tried to write plotless slice of life stories.

Things kept on like this for a while. I wrote what I wanted in my own free time and wrote what they wanted when I had to show it to them. I was happy (or so I thought) in my knowledge that
what I wrote on my own was important to me and considered worthwhile by other people even if those people were not the ones sitting in class or issuing grades. I thought I would just play the man's game long enough to learn what I needed to. At an AWP panel this past spring I heard a panelist say My goal was always to smuggle out the pretty sentences and take them to Tolkien.

Then it came to a head. I no longer cared to write for other people. I had my This matters TO ME moment.

Someone recently described when she had that same moment some fifteen years ago. Her instructor told her that the story was well written but in the end it was still a story about [dismissive fluff]. She had to work around to it, but she eventually put metaphorical fists on her hips and said, hey, this particular breed of dismissive fluff matters to me.

In my mind, this is the great thing about Year 2.5 of the MFA: you learn to separate out content from style and you realize that you no longer give a damn whether your content is on the approved list of sufficiently weighty topics we can write about.

And once you've had that moment it's hard to go back. Right now I'm working on a story and I'm really sad that it's not as ME as others because it'll be better received if it's less ME and that pisses me off.

Year 2.5 was when I came out of the genre-writer closet, so to speak. In my short profile on the side-bar, you'll see that I love paranormal and urban fantasy novels and I no longer care who knows it. I do love them and I don't care. I used to think that I had to engage only in discussion of aforementioned sufficiently weighty subject matter. Now I honestly admit that I've never given a rat's ass about the boring stuff.

I'm not saying that all MFA students will become genre writers or that we all think the same things are boring. But I do think that it takes a couple of years trying and failing before you realize what's important enough to you that you want to keep trying. To find what it is you'll fight for. If you wouldn't fight whole heartedly in defense of what it is you're doing right now, then why are you doing it? Reasons of learning or pleasing people will only last you so long, and when those reasons expire, you have nothing left except to be yourself.

State of the MFA: Year Three

It's completely crazy around here. And I'm sleep deprived.

I've been referring to this week as The Eight Day Slog Through Hell and that was accurate ... until the slog got extended to ten days.

After The Ten Day Slog Through Hell is over, I will take a deep breath, a long nap, and then attempt to put together my first job application dossier.

I've talked with people who think my third year is my thesis year. There are programs that work that way. You do two years of coursework and then draft your thesis project on your own time away from the school. For me, yes, year three is thesis year, but I'm still doing course work. Lots and lots of coursework.

For me, year three is the year where I take all the extra hours over the "normal" amount because they wouldn't let me take them when I arrived -- back when I was bored because I had so much time on my hands. Now, when I am an editor and going on the job market, now I have to take extra classes. Yes. Brilliant people. Thanks for talking me into this wonderful set up. Not. Really. So. Much.

I'm sort of working on my thesis. Sort of. Mostly I'm just doing what I need to to get by. And I'm trying to write new stories for workshop that will fit in my thesis.

Official guidelines for writing your thesis project: completion of a book length work of publishable quality. That's all the guidelines say. ALL. Nine words to describe the project without which you cannot get your degree. Thx.

Popular student opinion on how you write a thesis project: take everything you've turned in for workshop, dust, polish, write a table of contents. Which I think is kind of lame. There were a lot of stories I wrote back in the beginning of this workshop that I have no intention of touching again, let alone polishing. Actually, Allison wrote a recent post on something like this.

For one, I'm a much better writer than I was back then. I can't do cosmetic surgery on those stories and expect them to be part of a publishable collection. They'd require surgery on the Dr. Frankenstein level.

For two, I have different interests now. I've written a bunch of disparate stuff over the past couple of years -- realism, fabalism, non-fiction, fantasy -- stuff that's only common thread is that I'm its author.

So I'm writing a bunch of new stuff. I've got two pieces that are done, edited, boom, ready to go. And another four short stories and one would-be-novella that are drafted and need major overhauls. So that's what I'm doing. I'm leaving out stories because they don't fit the collection.

And I want direction -- I plan on demanding direction -- from my advisors about how putting together a collection (and publishing it) works. That info is the kind of thing I've found you have to demand. Part of the art of paddling up river (to invoke the metaphor I started with the earlier State of the MFA posts).

I'm taking control now. I'm paddling. I'm threatening people with the paddle and I'll whack them with it if need be. I'm not waiting for the river to spit me out somewhere. In fact, I'm not entirely certain that I don't want to make my way to an entirely different river. That is, of course, if I don't pass out in my boat from exhaustion first.

State of the MFA: Year Zero

State of the MFA: this week's retrospective on the grad school process and plans for the future.
 
I begin before the beginning.  I begin with year zero.

I've posted in the past about how I finally came to the decision to apply to MFA programs. It was something that I'd greatly resisted when leaving college even though I majored in English writing -- my institution's degree that was half English lit, half writing classes.  I thought that writers had to be starving artists because they earned so little.

I rather liked food, so I applied to law school.

In short, law school sucked.  The parts of it that were cool, they told me I would not do as a practicing lawyer.  The parts of it that were a akin to waterboarding while watching paint dry, were the ones they told me I would do daily for the first ten years I practiced until I could afford to pay someone else to do them for me.  So I left.

Panic and whimsy hit me all at once.  I was in love with Chicago and I hated it.  I walked the South Loop and ground my teeth and hunched my shoulders against the wind and the drizzle.  I walked the lake shore and wanted nothing more than to sit next to a young tree and watch the waves.  I remember getting a copy of Poets & Writers mailed to me by my mother -- because for some reason you can't buy a newsstand copy of it in Chicago -- and going out to the marina during the last days of October.  I sat on the cold cement and dangled my legs over the edge.  Behind me, an occasional jogger or cyclist went by.  There were no boats tethered except one; the rest were already in winter storage.  One lone goose paddled up to me; he hung out with me the whole time I was there just in case I might feed him.  The chill seeped through my jeans, and my butt and thighs went numb, I gave the finger to the law school homework I'd been assigned and read every MFA related article in Poets & Writers until I could not feel my fingers for the cold.

Deciding to apply to MFA programs on or around November 1, is a difficult proposition.  I don't recommend it as a strategy.  But I was desperate, unemployed, not in school, and had just moved back into my parent's house.  It was a prove yourself by doing this situation.  So I did.

I applied to six schools.  Three were reach schools (fully funding all students), two were considered sleeper programs, and one was a safety school.  I don't necessarily recommend "safety schools" when applying to MFAs.  Wherever you apply to should be someplace you would actually move to and live there if you got in.  However, I was in a bit of a strange situation, what with the whole dashing of one plan -- I had done nothing but plan to be a lawyer for the 24 months prior -- and the unemployment, and the when are you going to move out of my house questions ... I was willing to go someplace I didn't really want to go to just to be moving forward.  I didn't get into the three schools that fully funded all students -- I later found out that they'd each had 2000-3000 applicants -- but I got into all of the other three, and went to one of the sleeper programs.

But in that dark period between Jan.1, when the last application was due and mid-March when they started letting people know, I did the smartest thing I could have done: I dedicated myself to writing the shitty first draft of a novel.  I finished it and proved to myself that I was a finisher not a quitter (quitting law school had put me in danger of thinking that way).  And I kept my mind off checking the MFAblog hourly.

At the time, the MFAblog was THE ONLY place to go.  Since then it's gone downhill and the Poets&Writers online forums for this sort of thing have improved drastically.  But don't post on either, or spend January and February checking either: it will only drive you crazy.  And then, two or three years later, you'll realize that you sounded just as naive, pretentious, impatient and whiny when you posted as those people who are posting today.

I think, in an ideal world, I would have asked more questions.  I would have taken my time applying.  I would have considered low-res programs that fitted my creative needs, instead of looking only for schools that would provide me with an excuse not to take my bizarre skill set into the job market during what was not-yet-called-a-recession.  Back then, my mindset was that if I showed up and applied myself, whatever teacher in whatever program could teach me to write well, and I could take that and use it as a foundation for whatever it was I wanted to do.  Back then, I also didn't know what I wanted to "do" in terms of my own writing.

I waffle between saying I would have been more successful if I'd waited until I'd known myself better, and saying that I learned more about my writing because I was in the MFA.  I think that if you're leaving nothing (like I was) to find yourself, then go and go boldly.  If you're leaving a job or moving a spouse ... maybe you want to find yourself first.

MFA progress update

I recently got this lovely question from HeathcliffsGirl in the comment section:

Heathcliffs Girl said...Hey! i Read a couple of posts,mfa related! i guess a few years back?
i cant find what happened next? did you happen to get through?

Nope.  Didn't get through it.  Still going.

I'm somewhere in the soggy middle of it all.  But approaching the bitter end.  So at this point, things are both soggy and bitter.  And kinda chewy to be honest.  Actually, a lot of it is like a badly cooked roast, the kind where the meat tastes like the potatoes and the potatoes taste like the meat, and then your mother-in-law asks you a question and you can't for the life of you answer because you can't seem to chew enough to swallow anything you just put in your mouth no matter how small a piece you took.

I'm embarking on my third of three years in the program.  That is, I'm taking a year-and-a-half's worth of classes in one year because they wouldn't let me front load classes.  Nooooooo.  You gotta overload yourself when you're on your way out.  When you're reading for your thesis and trying to compose the thesis and attempting to get yourself ready to go on the job market, that's when no one curtly suggests that you only take 6 credit hours a semester.

A large chunk of the population is trying to figure out if they're going to apply to MFA programs right now.  And if so, where and when.  I'm trying to figure out what wisdom I've gained from this (opposed to knowledge) and how to succinctly put it.

This week, inspired by HeathcliffsGirl's comment, I'll be posting a "State of the MFA" series of posts, one covering each year.  Posting will begin tomorrow morning.

This is why I'm going to grad school

This notion of lyricism is part of the reason I'm paying money to get a degree in writing: a few years ago I thought that was artful.

(Please, read the post linked above -- it's short -- but resist the impulse to read the comments, they're inane, asinine and repetitive in not only syntax but in sentiment, which means that none of the first dozen commenters realized they were committing the error both intentionally and unintentionally therefore destroying any achievement of wit on their parts.)

There have to be well regarded novels out there that pull of that kind of shit in the extreme -- otherwise we wouldn't all think that it was how we should write when we want to be poetic. And there's the fact that that sort of repetition works in oratory, particularly when you're attempting to hype up a crowd. So talk about mixed messages -- we're allowed to take it in but not allowed to produce it ... kinda like when I wandered into the bathroom when I was four while my father had his head under the sink trying to fix the drain and walked back out saying well shit, shit, shit.

There's a lot of reasons I'm in a writing program that fit under the umbrella of "I want to learn to write well." And one of them is nuance and subtlety in phrasing and prose styling. (Trust me, I'm still a student, but I'm trying.)

"Prose styling" -- now there's a phrase I never would have used two years ago.

I looked at Nathan Bransford's post and thought this is atrocious, but I know ways that I could rework this to keep the same feeling and lose the pretentious, seasick feeling that comes with reading it. Then again, it would have to be earned, and you can't earn anything in 250 words. I'm in grad school to learn how to think these fixing sort of thoughts.

I'm also in grad school because, as I mentioned above, reading widely isn't enough for me to learn what to do, when to do it and why it's sometimes better not to do it -- just like listening to what everyone around me said wasn't enough when I was four. I need someone to plod through the murky details of things with me. To have a discussion. To inform me. To lay down some boundaries and some conditions which I can apply to situations so that I can determine for myself when it's best to wander around muttering shit shit shit.

If you applied to MFAs ...

If you applied to MFA programs this cycle, really the last thing you should be doing is trolling the internet for anything remotely MFA related in the months of January/February. It's a surefire way of making yourself loco and/or paranoid.

That said, every where I go I find bloggers and the like chatting about MFA applicants and the value of such an education. And, for some reason that escapes me, I read every article I come across that debates the MFA education/experience. It's not like I'm going to change my mind about my degree halfway through it, and yet, I read.

[it could be said that I'm reading b/c I'm still entertaining myriad PhD notions and non-notions, but that's probably more logical than truthful]

If you are an applicant and read any of the following links then read this one. The blogger on Ward Six is probably the most grounded, least fear- and apprehension-mongering of all of those discussing the subject (after my humble self, of course).

Then you get Alexander Chee writing about When to get your MFA. Or not. In parts one, and two, and three (which you might want to keep this link handy, because Chee forgot to link it himself) we mill around thoughtfully and take away that a degree program if nothing else is perhaps a chance to "Spend two years finding out whether or not your writing is any good rather than 20 years wondering.” Chee's posts are of his personal story and include his reasons, his thoughts, his circumstances and -- surprisingly -- the morals of the story. Perhaps I was reading this too late at night, but I really liked that he just straight up told us the "morals" of his story. It's after 1 AM, my grad student brain has switched off for the evening as it prefers to save power for more noble pursuits like figuring out how I can graduate without having to read (any more) Faulkner.

In other thoughts: go because you just love school, and not because you think there might be some sort of mystic publishing industry edge.

To get around to the absolute worst thoughts on MFA programs in print or on the web you have Poets & Writer's December 2009 MFA program rankings. Seth Abramson is attempting to make money by doing for writing programs what the LSAC did for law school: make everyone neurotic and obsessed with "prestige." (Abramson even has a "consulting" business that will, for a steep fee, give editing advice on your MFA application to those who refuse Chee's sage advice and jump to apply too soon.)

The rankings -- which I refuse even to link to -- are based on surveys of applicants to MFA programs. By definition this means that the people ranking the programs are no more educated about the realities of the programs than anyone else beginning graduate studies. They do not have writing degrees, or writing careers; they do not teach; they most likely have not published; they have no experience to draw from only research, reputation and rumor. The AWP has a letter of response posted here. Writing is a subjective art and you should be more concerned with who your subjective teachers will be and whether or not you can afford to relocate out of state than with a rumor-mill driven numeric ranking.

Whoa

Glad I posted that I'd be MIA for a bit because, baby, am I MIA.

I find myself in the position of having two classes where I have to propose my final project up front. One major project for each class.

Some people might enjoy this; I do not.

Mostly, I dislike making proposals for creative work I've not yet spent time thinking on. I'm not good at bullshitting on my feet (probably another good reason to quit law school when I did), and I get even more anxious and embarrassed about it when it's creative work. Why? Why? Why? I have no problem saying 'here, read this story,' but the moment I have to talk about that story in summary I can't think of a single thing to say that doesn't sound either pretentious or calculatingly cold and boring. Really good thing I didn't become a lawyer ... although everyone expects lawyers to be pretentious, calculating and boring so ... No, best not to finish that thought.

What I prefer to do when starting a project is to think, write, think, write, edit, think some more, frantically change things at the last minute, then show it to people.

I also running up against the issue that I expected to work on several smaller, non sequential pieces throughout the semester and I'm having trouble adjusting from expectations to reality.

Aside: Why is it that when expectations go awry they "disappoint you" but when assumptions go awry they "make an ass out of you"? Neither is founded on anything other than the individual's experience and perspective. Is it because expectations are thoughts, and assumptions are thoughts that are acted on?

Even more of an aside: my cat smells like perfume. She's a very clean animal and normally doesn't smell like much of anything. Why and how she's attained this new floral scent ... well, we're going to have to add those to the ever growing list of questions I can't answer at the moment.

End of Term

People keep asking if I'm out of paper-grading-hell yet. When they ask they are certain I will say "Yes!" and we'll both engage in this moment of shared bliss -- a strange social construct of ours since the person asking has absolutely nothing to do with my bliss but feels the need to participate in it anyway. Alas, that bliss-shit ain't happening.

I sat (technically, I still am sitting) and waited for finals to be handed in to me this morning. I graded papers as I waited and watched the maintenance staff clean out Miller Fountain with a pool cleaner on a 40' pole. This was particularly amusing when they cleaned out the edge of the fountain and the pole was sticking 40' up in the air.

With the arrival of the finals I have moved into a different sort of paper-grading-hell. Are there layers? Has Dante categorized this? Whatever it is it simply means that there is more work to do; that the hell hath not ended.

Last night I attended the last workshop of the semester. We held it in the instructor's living room complete with wine and food. It was a nice change of pace from the oddly sanitary classrooms I've been sitting in all year. Scratch that thought. The stark and occasionally unsanitary classrooms (mystery sticky substance appeared on the floor a few weeks ago and garnered much discussion).

It feels odd to know I won't have a workshop for four months now. And when I do it will be in non-fiction not fiction. Although that's not entirely true: I'll be at the Kenyon Review Writer's Workshop in about two months. Just two months! Those workshops are always amazing, and this year I'm working with the ruthless Nancy Zafris, an experience I'm looking forward to.

The folklore and fairy tales class ended on Monday with my mad-dash term paper writing, but I won't have to wait for months for another lit class. I start another one of those at the beginning of May. Yea! for American Linguistics! (Pep rallies are good for the soul.)

But once I emerge from paper-grading-hell, these won't be the things I'm thinking of.

I'll be thinking of CLEANING MY APARTMENT. It's gone to pot these past ten days. My clean laundry is teetering precariously on top of a drying rack that was never meant to hold so much weight. The counter is half-covered with dishes. It was completely covered yesterday morning, but I ran out of coffee mugs and decided that unloading, loading and running the dishwasher was, indeed, a necessary use of time. The carpet needs vacuumed. (Do you like my southern Indiana dialect there?) The bathroom sink also needs cleaned. (Okay, I'll stop with the dialect.) And my bedroom/office is generally in shambles. It is a situations, and that is probably the nicest term I can use to describe it. I'll post before and after pictures tomorrow.