Monthly Archives: July 2011
Back to My First Workshop
I knew I was really in trouble halfway through the semester when he started skipping over me as he made his way around the room asking everyone for their comments. Knowing that part of our grade was based on classroom participation, … Continue reading
Ph.D Program at Utah
A new friend on Twitter – welcome Michael! – is going to this program in Utah. I really like the description of a creative writing degree with literature at the PhD level. I’ve actually been thinking about more school to … Continue reading
First Full Day at Sewanee
They had a little tour of the campus this morning which I forego in favor of getting some writing work done but I greatly enjoyed the readings this morning by staff and fellows – John Casey had an extremely interesting … Continue reading
Sewanee Writers Conference
The drive from Maryland is a long one. You have to drive down Interstate 81 for something like 391 miles and there are miles to drive to get out of Maryland and over through northern Virginia and at least 200 … Continue reading
Sorting Out the Comments
I found it easy to toss comments like “Why did the story take place in Iowa?” and “You had too much description.” I should have known to throw out the comment, “How can you have the point of view character … Continue reading
Chapter 6-3 A Little Water on the Fire
This was the first full workshop of the semester (someone had read a story the first week and we’d responded orally to what we heard), the only good thing that I heard was from myself. They were all looking at … Continue reading
Books About Writing
Lots of folks put down books about writing and say that they aren’t helpful to anybody. I collected a lot of them before I took writing classes. They didn’t help me as much as I would have liked but what … Continue reading
Slash and Burn Workshop
The perfect time to begin the story would be when my character was interrupted the first time she was going to kill herself. The idea sounds pretty melodramatic now but this turned out to be a very popular story and was the … Continue reading
Graduate Writing Programs and Getting Published
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/feb/25/literary-fiction-twelve-best-new-novelists This is an interesting post from the Brits. About one-third of the newly published authors had attended a graduate writing program. Mary