Not much fazes me in the World of Creative Writing—a terrifying realm, to be sure—and though occasionally bummed, I don’t get too shaken up by phrasing such as “Dear Writer,” “we regret to inform you,” and “over x hundred/thousand/million/billion applicants.” So it goes. There are six words, however, that cause me to recoil involuntarily when…
If you’re interested in poetry and/or literary fiction and have been reading the Internet at any point over the last decade, you’re probably at least vaguely aware that there’s some controversy over the MFA degree: the number of people pursuing it, the effect it has on American writing, and its overall usefulness in our capitalist…
So! A quick caveat. By night, I’m a poet: I write, I submit, I sometimes get an acceptance, I get a bunch of rejections, and I submit again. Lather, rinse, repeat. There’s notoriously little money in poetry, however, so by day I work in the digital group of a publishing company. The caveat I mention…
It took me awhile to understand that when a journal rejects your poem or short story, it isn’t an indictment of your character or a judgment of your ability as a writer; all they’re saying, really, is: “not this piece at this time.” I’ve never been one to take rejection personally, and I never thought…
Do I dare Disturb the universe? In a minute there is time For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse. — “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” I didn’t do a lot of revision before beginning my MFA. This isn’t because I didn’t see the value of the process; it simply didn’t…
When you’re drinking Rolling Rock with a bunch of poets after a sparsely attended reading in a far-flung corner of Brooklyn, it’s hard to keep in mind that writing isn’t just an art—it’s a business. Especially in poetry, it’s easy to become enamored of the bohemian aspect of the writing life, to cultivate a contempt…
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