I really can't speak highly enough of the transformative power of the program, its faculty, and its students on the life of a writer. I know that mine is but one story in the larger tale of Augsburg's Creative Writing MFA program, and that many students could and most likely will share similar experiences. It's my hope that you would take these into consideration and reconsider your decision to cut the program.
Her piece "A Message About Messages" offers a pointed and humorous rebuttal (of which only Le Guin was capable of) to those who insist on strangling messages out of the fiction they read
Evening and huzzah, goda människor, from a basement out here in central Minnesota. I hope this missive finds you all safe, sound, hearty, and hale. Nearly bedtime around these parts, but I wanted to hop and post something before hitting the rack.
It's been a week since Halloween, a week since the end of October, a week since the culmination of Short As Fictober, my self-imposed, month-long writing journey. I haven't written much of anything since then, but I have had a moment to reflect on the experience and make a plan of sorts.
Writing is a strange and giant beast, that I sometimes lose sight of the simple fact that it's supposed to be fun. I'm looking forward to what kinds of stories will happen over the next 31 days. Who's with me?
Because my car up and died shortly after moving to the Pacific Northwest, I'd ride my bike to and from work, which generally meant a commute home around one o'clock in the morning. On the ride, Berman's musical vehicle, The Silver Jews, would keep me company in my headphones.
In the preface to his essay collection, Zen in the Art of Writing, Ray Bradbury writes "And what, you ask, does writing teach us? First and foremost, it reminds us that we are alive and that it is a gift and a privilege, not a right. We must earn life once it has be awarded us. Life asks for rewards back because it has favored us with animation" (xii).
Barstow and Grand, the Chippewa Valley's premier literary journal, is currently accepting submissions for its third issue. What kind of stuff is B & G looking for? Poetry, creative non-fiction, fiction, and even hybrids of the genres.
How Long 'Til Black Future Month? is a solid collection of Jemisin's short fiction spanning her career. And in each selection she delivers on her world building, much in the same way she did in The Fifth Season: inserting information as it becomes relevant to the narrative, avoiding huge info dumps.
Currently the journal's taking submissions for its third issue (in fact, this weekend it'll be free to submit), and if you have a piece of fiction or nonfiction, a poem, or a hybrid text of some type, and a connection to Wisconsin's Chippewa Valley you should send it on in.
