JessicaLange

I know that this isn't what you want to hear, but we can't tell you. You might get in and you might not. The program might not be accepting as many people the year you apply. They might think that your Statement of Purpose doesn't really fall in line with their research specialties. Your writing sample, if you have to have one, might not be well received. There are way too many factors and nobody on here can give you a guarantee. But! I don't see anything in what you've said here that completely puts you out of the running. I absolutely think that you should go for it and c'est la vie, you know?
One word of caution: I was consistently getting 162s on my GRE practice tests and then the day of the test I tensed up and got a 157, which is fine, but it was so far below what I wanted. I retook the test and was able to do even better than my practice scores, but I was only able to do that because I had enough time to. I don't know when your applications are due, but I'm assuming March? Maybe? I would take the test sooner and give yourself cushion time in case you need to retake it. Of course, if it's already too late, then just really make sure you don't psych yourself out during the test. Deep breaths and calming thoughts and all of that. Good Luck!

Is it possible to call her? 
For the apps due on the 15th, being a bit later than the 15th should be fine, but then the one that says the 15th is the latest, I would take that at face value and let her know that's the most urgent one - if she's in the office and you can physically drop bye, that would work too, I think - I feel like she spaced out thinking that she sent in one and she was done. One of the professors in my department actually blanked on this one student's application cycle completely and sent ZERO letters out - needless to say he didn't get in anywhere.. so... assuming the worst may be necessary.... 
 

Anyone else experience the sudden certainty that their materials are simply mediocre and there's absolutely nothing you can think of to do about it?
I am the left guinea pig: 
 

So, I didn't really go out of my way to read too much of their work, because I agree with other folks that the SOP is about me, and I'm not going to devote more than 5 sentences to POIs. However, there were a few schools where I had already read their faculty's works and one professor who is currently on my reading list for my thesis. I just mentioned this and said under what circumstances I had read them and how I admired their work and so forth. There are a few schools that I know nothing about their professors, so I went to JSTOR  and similar sites to look up the ones that had interests in my fields. If I found nothing in their work, I left out POIs altogether and just talked about the program specifically. Is it going to work? No idea! But this whole application process is sort of trial and error for all of us.

So, I didn't really go out of my way to read too much of their work, because I agree with other folks that the SOP is about me, and I'm not going to devote more than 5 sentences to POIs. However, there were a few schools where I had already read their faculty's works and one professor who is currently on my reading list for my thesis. I just mentioned this and said under what circumstances I had read them and how I admired their work and so forth. There are a few schools that I know nothing about their professors, so I went to JSTOR  and similar sites to look up the ones that had interests in my fields. If I found nothing in their work, I left out POIs altogether and just talked about the program specifically. Is it going to work? No idea! But this whole application process is sort of trial and error for all of us.

Reading the books of multiple POIs is admirable from an academic perspective...but completely unnecessary for application purposes. You need to know what your POIs' current research interests are (as specifically as possible), their methodologies (i.e. marxist, structuralist, historicist), their general stature (no sense in wanting to work with a visiting assistant professor), and yes, some of what they've written.

Remember that research interests evolve over time. Reading a POI's book from 2002 might have little or no bearing on what that POI is interested in now. There is zero expectation on the part of admissions committees that all applicants have a deep, thorough, sophisticated knowledge of their faculty. In fact, some successful SOPs don't mention a single faculty member at all.

Again, if you are highly interested in the work of your POIs, reading their books will help you as a scholar, and might help you a little bit as an applicant, but as Yanaka says, your application will require very little direct reference to those professors, unless it is relevant and emerges organically in your SOP.

So, I'm an undergrad here, but I know some of the admission committee members pretty well. Be interesting in your SOP. I know that's pretty general advice, but they are definitely looking for interesting people that will enrich their program, so show your personality. Also, I don't know this for a fact, but I'm pretty sure they have some cutoffs for your GPA and GRE. So, check on that. But overall, it's a really great school and they are interested in a wide breadth of knowledge. I would contact Judith Brown. She's very cool, and I bet she'll reply to your questions.

I'm freaking out. Now I'm thinking I have no back-up schools and should apply to fully-funded MA's, but that means bothering my profs for their reference letters again. What should I do!! 
Also, the application process has had its toll on me already, and although I've only submitted Berkeley and UCLA applications and have 5 more to go, I don't feel like continuing. Reading publications, tailoring the SoPs... I'm tired! And I have exams coming up for my actual school. That I have ignored for the past two weeks. 
How do you guys deal with the "I'm not gonna get into one of those schools/I hope this is not all going to be fruitless" feeling? 

Some of you will have decisions in hand within the next two weeks. That's got to be a pretty good feeling, right? That all this planning/waiting is about to pay off.

I'm not sure if it's that clear-cut. Columbia's endowment is large, but spending at the university has been/is somewhat controversial. They've come under fire for throwing money at massive building projects, while tenure-track positions in the Humanities haven't been filled, or have been replaced by sessionals. Likewise, there's a lot of money going towards the business and law schools, while the Core Curriculum is being comparatively underfunded. I guess it suffices to say that there's really a stranger political landscape beneath the overall wealth of the school. 

I think it's also worth pointing out that Columbia is one of the few schools of its calibre to offer standalone, unfunded MA programs in a number of Humanities disciplines, like English and Art History. Ironically, the other school that comes to mind here is Chicago, whose MAPH program is probably the best comparison. In both cases—and I've heard this from students in the PhD programs—the MA students are seen as subsidizing PhD candidate funding. Moreover, rejected PhD applicants are often funnelled into the MA programs. As cynical as it seems I don't think it's out of line to believe that Columbia and Chicago are fairly intent on maximizing the number of applicants to their PhD programs, so as to likewise maximize the $$$ coming in from their masters programs. 

@Wyatt's Terps - You don't have to stress too much.  I called the OSU English Grad office last week and they said they don't really expect all the letters to come through until the 15th or so.  You still have time
 

That's a really funny story about which you'll be able to laugh once you're not stressed anymore  
I think some schools accept LORs after the deadline, but you need to either do some digging on their website or ask the Grad office.

Soooooooooo the deadline for Stanford is 6 Dec and one of my recommenders has just been hospitalized. He did not upload the stanford recommendation. Faaaaaaaaaack. He says he'll try to upload it tomorrow. Do you think that we'll be aight? Apparently, he tripped over his cat and broke his ankle. 

Well, I think that you should definitely try to rework a new writing sample. You don't want them to remember you and think that you're a one trick pony. However, if you revamp the new sample and you don't think it isn't strong enough, just go with the original one.

Ah, kdilks, it never even occurred to me that the SoP might not be the end-all-be all.. Personally, I'm English, so the SoP needs to be a work of art. I get the impression this is true for most humanities folks.

I'll hand you tubes of paint.
 
Now go on, tell me how you know ALL ABOUT Picasso and Monet and Manet.
 
C'mon, from the tubes of paint. Or better yet, an account of seeing their paintings in a museum from several centuries ago that tries to explain the experience to you. C'mon, tell me how you're an expert.

The Kings Men wrote/published the first folio. Otherwise all there was were the foul papers which were used to produce the cue scripting.
 
What you read today as "Shakespeare" in literature is a complete fabrication. No such written thing existed when the plays were performed.. and they were created to be performed. Acting as if the literary analysis divorced from the performance has any validity is just academic masturbation.

Ugh.. Just stop talking until you take a theater history class or at least google it.

I'm going to hastily generalize that whatever involvement you thought you had in theatre was trivial, laughable, and at best superficial.
 
And in contrast if you'd like to go check out the books I've written from your school's library I can PM you the ISBN's.

Actually in English you talk about Shakespeare in the present tense because you're discussing an active analysis of the text and the relationship between the reader and the attempt to convey meaning. Which really is a bit silly because Shakespeare wrote plays.. or rather, his plays weren't even written down at first. They were simply performed. Later they were scribbled down.. so the manner of conveyance (which dictates the meaning) is often entirely left out of literary analysis of his work. Bad lit major, bad bad lit majors! *newspaper across nose* Stop trying to make theater into literature!
 
And it was said by a character in a play.. it's not Shakespeare's voice, his opinion, etc.. Just so we're clear.
 
But why bring this trivial difference of opinion up? Because it illustrates that different fields, departments, etc.. have different ways of seeing things. A lit department would probably be fine with such statements, but anyone who has studied Shakespeare as theater academically is not going to let that slide. The stripping down of scripts into mere words on a page is a sore point for most theater practitioners. It's generally seen as the murder of an artform and a contributing factor in the decline of public performance.
 
So be careful of even your most innocuous statements.. though the OP would likely not be happy in a theater program who believed such things. Thus a rejection would be a favor, despite the desire for acceptance.