Category Archives: Graduate Writing Programs
New Fiction Workshop
In my last post I explained how I started this blog with material from my diary called Surviving a Graduate Writing Program. The saga continues…. This workshop was comprised of seasoned students. Five of them I knew, three from previous … Continue reading
Going Back to Graduate School
If you’ve read my earlier posts, you know that I received my MA in fiction from Johns Hopkins University in 2007. Having some distance has given me some perspective as well as helped me understand that writing programs have a hard … Continue reading
Workshopping In Florence
Jean and Alice alternated their sessions. Each teacher held a workshop on one of our submissions and both talked about craft issues. Jean started each session with a craft discussion and Alice integrated craft issues into our discussions about each … Continue reading
Posted in Graduate Writing Programs, Johns Hopkins University, workshops, writing
Tagged Italy
2 Comments
Poets and Writers Mag – MFA Nation
If you’re looking at writing schools, you won’t want to miss the September/October issue of PW. The magazine’s theme this month is MFA Nation and they rank the schools in this issue. This year, they also discuss not enrolling in an MFA and note writers who have been successful … Continue reading
Second Workshop
My first workshop wasn’t what I’d hoped for. Maybe I misinterpreted my teacher’s actions. I would like to think so. My desire to write was still intact; three decades had given me a stronger ego. I knew that I didn’t … Continue reading
Posted in Graduate Writing Programs, workshops
Leave a comment
Guess I’ll Never Know
The setting for my first mystery was an imaginary place called Bridgeton, Maryland that included my memories of the Catholic Church in Prescott,Wisconsin, with some variations of course; the steep streets of Missouri Valley, Iowa; and a street in downtown … Continue reading
Posted in Graduate Writing Programs, workshops
Leave a comment
The Light Turned Red
I had lots of ideas about how the story could be expanded into a book. I ended up with something that I would describe as more a vignette than a full-blown story because anything else would have made the story … 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
Posted in Graduate Writing Programs, workshops
Leave a comment
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
Posted in Graduate Writing Programs, Uncategorized, writing
Tagged publishing for literary novels
Leave a comment
Chapter 5-2 Getting the Words Right
My teacher was patient and helpful and the comments weren’t all that bad from my peers either but I kept making stupid mistakes. I would spend hours and hours on a single paragraph for our assignments that demonstrated sentence forms and … Continue reading
Posted in Graduate Writing Programs, writing
Leave a comment
writingsurvivor 