Begin Writing With a Feeling

A friend of mine recently had an essay she had written critiqued by a creative writing professor.

“This is a fine piece,” said the professor, “but I don’t know where you would sell it.” His objection to the piece was not so much that there was anything wrong with it, but that it would be difficult to market. I’m sure teaching to write to the market is his job as a writing professor, and thankfully he offered suggestions as to how the piece could be modified to make it, in his view, more suita...