Mise

Still waiting to hear from BU...

I emailed the graduate office about a question I had, and they said they had sent out the initial offers, but I know not when. It is tantalizing to see only rejections and waitlists on the result board...

Guess they're from the future since March 05 is past for them

They can't even say it "will be posted" haha. Truly mysterious.

Mysterious email from NYU that my result was "posted" March "05"

I'm on GWU's waitlist! A non-rejection in a month.

I think most UC Davis rejections are out, but I didn't get anything... Anyone waiting for news from UC Davis?

I'm interested in Alex Woloch's theory of characterization, as formulated in The One vs. the Many. In his book, he explains how characterizations of major and minor characters happen differently in 19th century Realist novels (Austen, Dickens, Balzac), and makes the connection between novelistic form and historical context. His keywords are "character-space" and "character-system," and they kind of speak for themselves. He makes a much more specific and compelling argument about the "connection," but I can't explain it here because I don't want to open my copy of his book now, and I sort of have the fear of speaking in public... I was really interested by his argument and observations because it combined a formalist approach with a historicist approach... which means that he explained why there are so many characters in 19th century novels and how they are structured one against the other (actually, the "many") through close-reading and historical backup. I think I liked his argument because his book answered one of my questions about novels (why so many characters? why do minor characters always seem so "flat"?) and also provided me with a basis for starting my studies in novels.

I ran out of reactions, so here's my manual "like" and "upvote"!

Absolutely! It is time to motivate myself by getting back to work. Happily(?) a new semester is starting in a week and talking with my colleagues and my adviser will certainly help, though it won't foster any new acquaintances, as an external seminar or conference may help to... which reminds me to fish through CFPs!

Thank you for your encouragement! I am trying to get over that wave of doubt by taking some distance

Wow... like... I know what a rejection means, and thank you for spelling it out on my heart! I'm also mildly suffering from being rejected twice on the same manuscript on a pretty condescending note. I don't expect the editors angels, but I am having doubts about continuing in academics. I get your point. I must've mistaken my tone when I said "we do have to..." because that was more to tell myself to brace myself against my own UC Davis rejection

I was shaken to read that too... not competitive enough? yeah duh, this is a rejection letter! But I guess we do have to get used to these things, especially when we start trying to publish.

Thank you for calling and sharing the information!

none at all! I've looked through the results page but I couldn't find any pattern.