Mippipopolous

Thanks, @imogenshakes! Definitely two great schools it's down to then! When are the visiting days for them? One of my best friends was just at SB and absolutely loved it, though she's a bit worried about how to make it work financially if she gets an offer. Seems like an amazing place and school!

Guys, after that Oscars flub I'm pretty sure I'm gonna have nightmares that I didn't actually get into a PhD program. "I'm sorry, but there's been a mistake—we've actually admitted Moonlight to the English PhD program at Notre Dame!"

Please have her binge watch all of Parks and Recreation, that'll definitely turn her around on Indiana Many P&R jokes were made during recruitment weekend haha. Li'l Sebastian does have an honorary degree from Notre Dame after all!

Very true, my sister just took the bar and it almost broke her. She's one of the smartest and most dedicated people I know, but it really pushed her to the limit. And she already has a job lined up, so if she didn't it would've been even more stressful. The debt is crazy too, when I told her I was turning down an offer from U of Chicago's MAPH offer because I could never justify taking on 50k in debt she thought nothing of that amount. She absolutely loves the working environment at the firms she's been involved with though and the work itself, so definitely worth it to her! @eadwacer, I'm sorry you had such a negative experience in law school, it's definitely not the right path for everyone. I think you are perhaps discounting a lot of the wonderful work the profession as a whole can do though. For a recent high-profile example, the ACLU's work to strike down the Muslim ban and all the lawyers who showed up at airports to work pro bono for those stranded by it. And of course lawyers are responsible for landmark legal cases that have expanded our rights significantly; Obergefell v. Hodges being one of the most recent examples where the law was the path forward for fighting discrimination. It does sound generally like a hyper-competitive environment, which is one reason I never really considered pursuing law school—that and my deep passion for literature of course! It sounds like the environment at whichever institution you attended was very toxic, so hopefully you end up at a wonderful PhD program to remedy that! Keeping my fingers crossed for you about Minnesota! They seem like such a lovely department, I'm sure you'd do amazingly there And of course spending time at the insanely beautiful UBC campus is an awesome option too!

I've been lucky I guess, everyone I have talked with has been incredibly encouraging. During the application process I definitely ran into people not really understanding how difficult the process is and how low the odds of success are, which can be frustrating to an extent. "Oh, you're smart! You'll get in, don't even worry." And I'm like, no. It doesn't work like that at this stage, said while stifling panic attacks. I do have a few friends applying in different areas though, so we've commiserated over the stress. But everyone's been really supportive otherwise, especially once I received my acceptances. Once I told friends they were all very excited, promising to take me out for drinks to celebrate—all my close friends know its been my dream for ages. I'm lucky that my immediate family have always placed a huge value on education and reading especially, so they're a huge part of the reason I have the passion that I do for literature in the first place. My mom said she cried for like thirty minutes when I told her I had gotten into Notre Dame haha, she knew how much it meant to me, she might've been even more nervous than I was. I definitely am very grateful to have the support system I do, they all mean a lot to me. I'm so sorry to hear about some of the negative or frustrating responses others have received! That's part of what makes a forum like this so nice, isn't it? It's great to have a place where people understand and are there to support each other and celebrate all the hard work everyone has put into following their passion! And the fact you've stayed dedicated to pursuing your passions in the face of doubt and outright opposition is really inspiring! That kind of internal-motivation and confidence is amazing. I'm definitely proud of you guys anyways!

This is a fascinating topic! So interesting to hear more about everyone's work. I used my undergrad thesis on the Villa Diodati ghost-story competition. The first chapter, which I did not include, examined the various narratives of the event which often differed wildly and were frequently attached as paratexts to the works conceive at the Diodati. I also surveyed the critical scholarship surrounding the event and argued against their attempts to establish a definitive historical chronology and the failures and limitations of using that approach to discuss the Diodati. The second and third chapters were my actual sample. I wanted to free myself from attempting to just determine the "true" version of events, and instead examine what the Diodati myth came to mean as a symbol within these narratives and what Romantic tropes these self-representational accounts drew upon. So, I wrote about the scandal surrounding the original misattributed publication of The Vampyre and how it tainted the Diodati as an origin for Polidori's work due to associations with scandal and celebrity gossip. Then in the next chapter I analyzed Mary Shelley's 1831 introduction to Frankenstein and how she crafted a compelling narrative where the Villa Diodati becomes a foundation for an origin-myth for her work—she's able to draw upon and subvert numerous Romantic tropes (dreams as inspiring force, fragility and transience of poetic inspiration, Percy's ideas of the poet as creator, and so on) and creates something uniquely her own through her self-mythologization and legacy-building.

Just started the thread! Hopefully it'll be a good space for people to share their exciting choices and help each other mull over their options too! You've definitely got a tough choice ahead of you! Some awesome programs as options for sure. You said you were leaning to the California options before, yeah? Definitely awesome programs! And can't beat the location of somewhere like UCSB. My best friend's there for her visit now and making me insanely jealous with a bunch of snapchats of the ocean and mountains haha. And of course, anytime! Happy to help if I can! It just was changed from ISIS last year if I remember right, maybe last summer. We were all a little bummed out honestly, we'd gotten so used to the name! They changed the interface too and most of us preferred the old one, so that just added to the joke haha

A few people suggested in the acceptances thread that it might be a good time to get the ball rolling on a separate decisions thread! So, if you feel comfortable share which school you've decided on here! What were the biggest factors in your decision? How incredibly excited are you to have made it through to the finish line? If you're having trouble making a final choice feel free to mull it over here too! It can be a nice way to network with future classmates as well. And of course it's a space to celebrate each other and all the hard work everyone put into this process! To start us off, I'll be heading to Notre Dame next fall! They were always one of my top choices, so I'm incredibly excited to have gotten an offer. There are numerous faculty who are great fits for my research interests, their funding is very generous, service free years one and five, and all kinds of great resources. My other offer was unfunded, and although I was waitlisted for two great programs they wouldn't really have been able to beat Notre Dame's offer or fit for me. I also fell in love with the school and department while visiting for recruitment! So ultimately wasn't too tough a choice for me. It's also closest to my family which is a nice perk. All in all I am very excited with my decision! Looking forward to hearing where everyone ends up!

Thank you, I'm really excited to start there! It's definitely an awesome program, I'm still a little dazed it all worked out! A few of us from the weekend have stayed in touch through GC too which is nice. I'll probably start a decisions thread soon! I was pretty lucky to hear back from all my schools early in the season though, so not sure if too many others will have made up their minds quite yet! But will be good to have it ready to go for everyone. Hopefully I can be helpful about Iowa info; I've worked with a few of the professors from the book studies area, so hopefully can be a bit there! And then know IC pretty well obviously, though from an undergrad perspective. Great town! This is totally off-topic, but funny story about MyUIowa—for almost the entirety of my time there it was known as... ISIS. As you can imagine, a name-change became rather necessary after awhile!

Congratulations, I'm so excited for you! If you're thinking about them and have questions happy to answer any like I said Their book studies stuff is definitely great—Hooks is super awesome, the Center for the Book is crazy, lot of great resources. I also already decided—off to Notre Dame! My other offer wasn't funded, and even if I got off the waitlists for my other schools I felt the faculty at ND were best for my interests, their funding was most generous, and they just have a lot of great resources. Really excited!

I'm with @Hartley on this one—I think you'll be fine on that front! The Catholic influence is more noticeable in general than the Irish one around campus—our guide cracked a bunch of jokes about the number of chapels we passed by during our tour haha. And the campus is stupidly pretty, we were all wowed on that front. Totally agree with @Sunsy (Congrats on all the acceptances by the way! Sounds like you've got some tough choices to make) that it was just so good to be back in that academic environment and be able to kind of nerd out about our research interests together and share that passion for what we're studying, both with the faculty and fellow interviewees. Notre Dame really did things right. Also happy to chat if you have any questions, @Caien! It'll be a really good cohort whoever ends up accepting offers. It's nice a lot of us are on GC too, cool to be able to stay in touch a bit and compare notes. Also, funny story from today! I was walking to the bookstore back here at home and ran into one of the other interviewees from the weekend! Such a small world, right?

Thank you! I should've also noted that I'm a Romanticist for anyone else waiting for those, so dunno how helpful that is for anyone on here depending on how they work their waitlists. But that's definitely encouraging one of your POIs told you that! I'll be keeping my fingers crossed for you Minnesota seems like a lovely program.

Haha yeah, was nice to be able to make a decision early since I've heard from everyone now. Their full-court press at recruitment weekend won me over pretty quickly, it's just such a good offer and a great fit for my interests. Hopefully you'll be joining in August! Excited to see who from the group is going to be coming, sure it'll be a great cohort!

Congrats, that's so amazing! Really rooting for you to pull-off the clean sweep! Hell of an accomplishment no matter what though. That campus is really something for sure. One of my good friends is heading out there next week for interviews for art history, sounds like its an awesome school.

The other day I turned down my offer from Nebraska and removed myself from Ohio State and Minnesota's waitlists. So, hopefully some of those help out some people on here!