oh no oh fuck no. Your comment about learning what Borgesian craft manuals can't teach you was painfully on point. I was literally just working through a Borges "total library"
I appreciate the perspective as someone who has only recently found myself voicing some of my kinda-unformed literally aspirations.
The first two panels would standalone because they had to, if I remember right—a lot of papers would cut them for space. It was a big part of Watterson’s endless disputes with Universal.
This might be too cynical, but how much of the value of an MFA do you think is just having the time and space to focus on writing? In other words, would an MFA be less valuable if we had a French workweek, or if you could quit your job without losing your health insurance?
I got through my entire MFA program without reading Middlemarch but it is on my list of Books to Read Someday. Great piece about your MFA program at UM. I sometimes left my fiction workshops at Colorado State pissed off at everyone in the group, wondering why I ever left a lucrative yet numbing corporate career to have people pick over my work like a flock of buzzards. Other nights, I left quite pleased with my work. I always left with something to work on and did because I had the time and inclination to do so. That's the thing, to be in a community of writers, working on my stuff, discussing reading and writing. That's what I thought about every time I was tempted to quit. I still think about that and the critiques, good and bad, that I received from my fellow students and faculty. They still help my writing 30 years later. One regret: not knowing about the Shower Curtain Solution. I spent perfectly good grad school stipend money on those plastic clips at Target. I could have used it to buy burgers and fries for the family. Who knew?
oh no oh fuck no. Your comment about learning what Borgesian craft manuals can't teach you was painfully on point. I was literally just working through a Borges "total library"
I appreciate the perspective as someone who has only recently found myself voicing some of my kinda-unformed literally aspirations.
The first two panels would standalone because they had to, if I remember right—a lot of papers would cut them for space. It was a big part of Watterson’s endless disputes with Universal.
This might be too cynical, but how much of the value of an MFA do you think is just having the time and space to focus on writing? In other words, would an MFA be less valuable if we had a French workweek, or if you could quit your job without losing your health insurance?
I got through my entire MFA program without reading Middlemarch but it is on my list of Books to Read Someday. Great piece about your MFA program at UM. I sometimes left my fiction workshops at Colorado State pissed off at everyone in the group, wondering why I ever left a lucrative yet numbing corporate career to have people pick over my work like a flock of buzzards. Other nights, I left quite pleased with my work. I always left with something to work on and did because I had the time and inclination to do so. That's the thing, to be in a community of writers, working on my stuff, discussing reading and writing. That's what I thought about every time I was tempted to quit. I still think about that and the critiques, good and bad, that I received from my fellow students and faculty. They still help my writing 30 years later. One regret: not knowing about the Shower Curtain Solution. I spent perfectly good grad school stipend money on those plastic clips at Target. I could have used it to buy burgers and fries for the family. Who knew?