I got a free ride to an MFA program that included a teaching stipend, and I wanted an excuse to quit my job...so I took it.
I'm between semesters now. If my mood about the novel & publishing world were dim before, I'm pretty much in despair now—especially after an instructor brought a literary agent to speak with the class. The literary fiction market exists solely for the urban book club & brunch & "I heard on NPR..." crowd now. That's who's encouraged to write. That's who decides what gets published. That's who's reading. Everyone else has been pushed out.
The program I'm in recently changed directors. The outgoing head was an older Gen X author who was pretty much completely checked out and ready to leave during the final semester, but showed glimmers of enthusiasm while reminiscing about his acquaintance with David Foster Wallace and other writers in that milieu. A friend of mine put it brilliantly: the man's entire civilization has been destroyed. The literary edifice of his generation was bulldozed during the Cluster B Cultural Revolution and replaced by a relentlessly unchallenging and agreeable hugbox—and the extinction spiral of fiction's cultural capital effectively prevents any eventual reverse swing of the pendulum. The MFA industrial complex is permanently locked in.
The Empire has fallen. The Odovacer of YA and monster smut rules the land now. Even "uplifting voices" lit is dying now that the Democrats blame arabs, black men, and latinos for Trump. Every literary agent I've spoken to casually says the most "literary" product they're looking for is "upmarket fiction," which is just airport paperbacks masquerading as capital-L Literature. We are citizens of the ruins.
Holy based. I went to Concordia for the same fucking program and I agree with everything here. I fucking hate minimalist workshop core shit man, I fucking hate it with every fibre of my being.
An excellent blogger about the Freelance life (I forget who at the moment) did an experiment where she asked MFA programs how many professional writers they had created. Typically the answer was none, or unknown. When she asked one about this, they replied that MFA programs were not for creating professional writers, but for creating writing professors. In other words, the program exists solely to propagate itself. I found this incredibly helpful. Not that everyone in or out of the program fits this mold, but that the real purpose is made clear, and the outliers also made clear.
I dunno. People who manage to recoup some amount of their inner child or whatever on the heels of finishing an MFA don't go around rocking “I Survived MFA” tshirts, you just (eventually) go out and do your thing. It takes years to quell the anger and self-loathing and self-pity and careerism to manageable levels; I'm not tryna broadcast that I hung out at the gift shop afterwards.
the parallel between the emergence of realism & impressionism as a reaction against academicism highlights a conflict at the heart of the matter: it is a surer road to success to learn the rules before you try to break them. many of those painters came up through the academy, learned technique, and innovated because they were in touch with emergent modern culture. i think this also accounts for why minimalism is popular with young writers and in academic settings---fewer aesthetic variables lets you concentrate on whatever effect you're trying to concoct.
I call it Iowacore. Sure, some is good - I think Marilyn Robinson is amazing for example, and she's Iowa through-and-through, but most of it gets remaindered and forgotten.
wow - made me think back to my experience at the BA level trying to squeeze my way into the graces of the poetry clique and probably harming myself in the process
And yet the desire to comment betrays something less than impassivity or boredom. This IS the "morbid interregnum" of culture we are sitting in. You can "yawn" all you like, but I can hear you screaming.
I support you raging against indifference. It's considered "bad form" for writers to hit back against TL;DR and vocal DNF-ers. (To be clear, no one is owed readership and people have every right to DNF, but people who are proud of it suck balls.) I, for one, am glad to see someone doing it. But this is not to say it is wise. If you want to be well-liked, take the opposite of my advice at every turn.
I am inspired by this post to make my own modest proposal, but I am personally not in favor of "bulldozing." I much prefer a wrecking ball, to be applied to political science departments far and wide, starting with Harvard (where I would welcome a bulldozer as well). Our minds have been lobotomized by the Orwellian lie that John ("Mr. Slavepower") Locke was the inspiration for the ideas in the Declaration of Independence. In graduate school I discovered smoking-gun proof otherwise: The 1776 congressional definition of "happiness" is the opposite of Locke. My paradigm-shattering research has been suppressed, to protect the delicate egos of ageing ivory-tower dinosaurs afflicted with Academic Superiority Syndrome (note the handy acronym) while our culture gets lobotomized: Happiness is actually the byproduct of being habitually good to others.
I got a free ride to an MFA program that included a teaching stipend, and I wanted an excuse to quit my job...so I took it.
I'm between semesters now. If my mood about the novel & publishing world were dim before, I'm pretty much in despair now—especially after an instructor brought a literary agent to speak with the class. The literary fiction market exists solely for the urban book club & brunch & "I heard on NPR..." crowd now. That's who's encouraged to write. That's who decides what gets published. That's who's reading. Everyone else has been pushed out.
The program I'm in recently changed directors. The outgoing head was an older Gen X author who was pretty much completely checked out and ready to leave during the final semester, but showed glimmers of enthusiasm while reminiscing about his acquaintance with David Foster Wallace and other writers in that milieu. A friend of mine put it brilliantly: the man's entire civilization has been destroyed. The literary edifice of his generation was bulldozed during the Cluster B Cultural Revolution and replaced by a relentlessly unchallenging and agreeable hugbox—and the extinction spiral of fiction's cultural capital effectively prevents any eventual reverse swing of the pendulum. The MFA industrial complex is permanently locked in.
The Empire has fallen. The Odovacer of YA and monster smut rules the land now. Even "uplifting voices" lit is dying now that the Democrats blame arabs, black men, and latinos for Trump. Every literary agent I've spoken to casually says the most "literary" product they're looking for is "upmarket fiction," which is just airport paperbacks masquerading as capital-L Literature. We are citizens of the ruins.
Well-put
Thanks for the kind words
Great piece!
Holy based. I went to Concordia for the same fucking program and I agree with everything here. I fucking hate minimalist workshop core shit man, I fucking hate it with every fibre of my being.
An excellent blogger about the Freelance life (I forget who at the moment) did an experiment where she asked MFA programs how many professional writers they had created. Typically the answer was none, or unknown. When she asked one about this, they replied that MFA programs were not for creating professional writers, but for creating writing professors. In other words, the program exists solely to propagate itself. I found this incredibly helpful. Not that everyone in or out of the program fits this mold, but that the real purpose is made clear, and the outliers also made clear.
I dunno. People who manage to recoup some amount of their inner child or whatever on the heels of finishing an MFA don't go around rocking “I Survived MFA” tshirts, you just (eventually) go out and do your thing. It takes years to quell the anger and self-loathing and self-pity and careerism to manageable levels; I'm not tryna broadcast that I hung out at the gift shop afterwards.
the parallel between the emergence of realism & impressionism as a reaction against academicism highlights a conflict at the heart of the matter: it is a surer road to success to learn the rules before you try to break them. many of those painters came up through the academy, learned technique, and innovated because they were in touch with emergent modern culture. i think this also accounts for why minimalism is popular with young writers and in academic settings---fewer aesthetic variables lets you concentrate on whatever effect you're trying to concoct.
I call it Iowacore. Sure, some is good - I think Marilyn Robinson is amazing for example, and she's Iowa through-and-through, but most of it gets remaindered and forgotten.
wow - made me think back to my experience at the BA level trying to squeeze my way into the graces of the poetry clique and probably harming myself in the process
*yawn*
And yet the desire to comment betrays something less than impassivity or boredom. This IS the "morbid interregnum" of culture we are sitting in. You can "yawn" all you like, but I can hear you screaming.
I support you raging against indifference. It's considered "bad form" for writers to hit back against TL;DR and vocal DNF-ers. (To be clear, no one is owed readership and people have every right to DNF, but people who are proud of it suck balls.) I, for one, am glad to see someone doing it. But this is not to say it is wise. If you want to be well-liked, take the opposite of my advice at every turn.
You can hear your own hysteria
It's called MANIA you OAF
I am inspired by this post to make my own modest proposal, but I am personally not in favor of "bulldozing." I much prefer a wrecking ball, to be applied to political science departments far and wide, starting with Harvard (where I would welcome a bulldozer as well). Our minds have been lobotomized by the Orwellian lie that John ("Mr. Slavepower") Locke was the inspiration for the ideas in the Declaration of Independence. In graduate school I discovered smoking-gun proof otherwise: The 1776 congressional definition of "happiness" is the opposite of Locke. My paradigm-shattering research has been suppressed, to protect the delicate egos of ageing ivory-tower dinosaurs afflicted with Academic Superiority Syndrome (note the handy acronym) while our culture gets lobotomized: Happiness is actually the byproduct of being habitually good to others.
https://youtu.be/vWbFFUlCnlc?si=JTbLDwg05rsaLrCb