Emilio Iasiello's Blog - Posts Tagged "mfa"

I’ve often been asked if I found my time in a MFA program beneficial and necessary. It’s a difficult question to answer as each individual has their own personal experiences and can only judge if the time and money was worth the investment or not. For the record, a writer does not need to attend such a program to achieve literary success. There are several contemporary writers who didn’t attend such schools and are well respected, well received purveyors of their craft. Even the literary canon we constantly read, revere, and refer to never went to such institutions. Simply, Shakespeare did not go to poetry school.

However, there are many positive factors that such programs provide. Unless a writer can create, foster, and develop a similar ongoing environment with a fellow community of writers (easier said than done – most of these groups don’t last six months), there is much value to be obtained in pursuing a MFA. Here are five truths that I personally found during my time in such a program:

1. Developing Peer Camaraderie is Paramount. My entrance class consisted of ten poets and fiction writers from different cultural, educational, and economic backgrounds. We were so fundamentally different that we immediately bonded. Even after three hour night classes we’d invariably go back to a classmate’s graduate dorm quarters and continue work-shopping our pieces, engage in literary debates, and talk about the process of writing. Fostering such a community helped build our immune systems to the inevitable criticism that all writers receive; while teachers can be generous with critique and stingy with praise, receiving similar feedback from your peers not only bolstered the validity of what teachers were saying, but helped you lose your sensitivity toward critiques of your work. And more importantly, it was done in a supportive environment with people you trusted and admired.

2. People Know More than You - Listen. No matter how much you think you know, no matter how much you think you’ve read, there are those that know more and have read more. And whether you want to or not, this experience is valuable to hear. This can come from experienced published professors or gifted students. You have to be willing to listen to everything with an open mind. This becomes very important when these people are reading and critiquing your work – you are gaining the benefit of their experience, and likely that of your future audience. Everyone is different and brings something different when they sit down to read a book or poem. You need to know this type of reaction; not be swayed by it per se, but know it and use it to your advantage.

3. Famous Professors May Not Be the Best Teachers. I was absolutely floored by the “named” professors that taught at my program. I had admired and collected their books for a while and couldn’t wait to take a class with them. One particular example comes to mind. At the start of my second year (I went part time so it took me longer to complete the program than fulltime students), I was able to take a poetry seminar with the biggest poetry name in the program. But when class came around, I was tremendously disappointed. While a fantastic poet, she was not a very good teacher of the craft. She told great stories, imparted guidance on writing, and was generally supportive of every poem that she work-shopped, there was very little information a student could use to better themselves. Conversely, the hardest, crankiest professor with a limited publication history proved to be the best professor I had in the program – he rigorously stressed fundamentals and technique, giving us tests and quizzes and in-class assignments, generally wanting students to understand the basics of craftwork before diving into writing poems. I disliked this man personally as he was unduly harsh with some of the students, but continue to give him props for actually teaching his class how to write.

4. MFAs Will Give You a Thick Skin. Continuing from the previous paragraph, the harsh professor was a plain dealer in the strictest sense – he would tell you that your work was horrible, he’d tear up pages in class, he’d ridicule everything from your choice of words, to repetitiveness, to poor rhyming, to overuse of simile, to ineffective use of metaphor….you get the point. He was a relentless critic. Was he ruthless? Definitely. Could he have done with a better bedside humor? Absolutely. Did he make young adults cry? I saw it more than once. But here’s the thing. At the end of the verbal and editorial onslaught, he made my work better. Each suggestion I took, every time I followed his guidance, I found that his input helped me elevate my writing. Sure, he embarrassed me on more than one occasion in class (see point 1 why a supportive peer network is important. They help dull the sting of truth.). In the end I realized that his devotion wasn’t to the student, but to the craft. He loved it that much. And by giving himself to its perfection, he helped the writer see the need to aspire for the same goal. And in knowing that, I could give him a pass for being a jackass, which is why I say, I hated him as a person, but respected him tremendously as a teacher.

The Thick Skin is essential, not only to writing, but to life in general. If you get torn down in a class of your peers by a maniac and are able to take it without crying or flinching, you realize that you can weather any storm. This will become valuable when talking with other editors and reviewers who don’t think of you as the genius you perceive yourself to be. A Thick Skin is a writer’s greatest defense.

5. Where to Go Now? The Business of Writing. You can finish your MFA with a thesis that’s ready to be sent to a publisher. Or your short stories and poems are ready to leave the safety of the program in search of a home in a journal or periodical. But how do you do it? Where do you send it? What’s the best way to determine where your writing will fit and where it won’t? How hard is it to get an agent? Are contests worth the time and expensive entry fees? (Believe me, at $20-50 a pop, contest “reading” and “entry” fees can be an expensive proposition if you don’t have a full time job.) It’s true. This leg work can be done on your own. The Internet hosts a wealth of information on these very topics. But here’s the difference. You spent three years at a respected program – you are part of that family. It’s in the program’s best interest for you to succeed. It makes you look good; it makes them look good – a mutually beneficially relationship. Plus, some of the professors may have specific suggestions or recommendations or may write recommendations on your behalf and make introductions that separate your work from thousands of other aspirant publishing writers. Use them. Use all that a program offers because in essence, you paid for it. Now it’s time to receive some help. And from my experience, they are generous with trying to help the very students they helped foster to grow.