orinincandenza

booksareneat, Mine still says 'sent to program' as well. It's infuriating, kind of.

I was about to do the same thing, being that I STILL haven't heard anything. Bracing myself for a rejection letter in today's mail.

You guys are so great. Thank you.

Awesome, thanks books. I just found out UMinnesota-Duluth does, too. Lookin' up!

Guys, I'm sorry, because I swear I started this thread like a month but now I can't find it. Anyway, it died pretty quickly so I thought I'd try one more time. I'm going to start a grad program this fall no matter what -- if I don't get an offer from my waitlist school, I'll start an MA program and then do my PhD two years from now (with another round of apps in between - sick!) So far I've applied to Northeastern (where I'd like to go) for an MA as well as Depaul (not so much, but I'm currently in Chicago, so it'd be convenient at least). I also applied to BU's MA program and haven't heard back yet. So I've got 3. My question is simply: do you know any neat, possibly under-the-radar MA programs that are still accepting apps? I know a lot are, I'm just having a bit of difficulty in my research. Like I guess everyone else, my thing is British and American modernism and/or other C 20 American lit. Many thanks, enjoy the weekend.

I'm also coming straight out of undergrad, though I graduated in Dec '07. I'm into 20th century lit. All of it. In my SoP I tried to stay away from the word 'postmodernism,' but the stuff I read for fun now and want one to day to do all my work on is mostly classified as that -- Wallace, DeLillo, Vollman, Powers, Barthes, Barthelme, etc. White American guys who are mostly still alive. I'm also into the dead ones too, and some Europeans I guess. The modernists. Joyce, Fitzgerald and Hemingway mostly (plus Woolf, who is not a man but is still white :| ), and I want to use their stuff to investigate narrative theory and 'the trajectory of the individual throughout 20th C lit.' To quote my SoP. I wrote my thesis about a DeLillo novel that asks if the concept of a single author/storyteller is obsolete, and explores the dichotomy between artists and terrorists (and this was 10 years before 9/11!). I'm real interested in the intersection of technology and 20th C novels, too, and I have a sincere but sorely undeveloped interest in film. I got my BA from the University of Illinois, and I've been rejected from Penn, UChicago, UIChicago, Northwestern, and waitlisted at Brandeis. I really, really want to go to Brandeis. And unrelated to my career aspirations, last night I re-watched the very first Nightmare on Elm Street and I think it's maybe one of the most brilliant things ever put on film. I want to write Wes Craven a letter.

My dad -- who came to this country in the 60s and has no experience whatsoever with higher ed, but who has been insanely supportive of me nonetheless -- repeatedly suggests that if things don't work out, I should apply to work for the CIA. Not sure why, really, but I can say that it's something I sometimes think about and wonder if I shouldn't be so dismissive. If I weren't intent on this whole Lit Professor thing, I'd probably want to be a detective. The only thing stopping me is the requisite however many years you have to be a regular cop first. I think that would suck. But to be a homicide dick -- and I'm thinking here of Morgan Freeman's Somerset in Seven, who solves grisly crimes with the help of Chaucer and Dante! -- sometimes I think I'd be real good at that.

Thanks gang. I know it's young. I just really dread the possibility of having to do something in between my undergrad and grad school years, because there's nothing I really want to do except continue my education and start my career. Right now I'm doing this year-long Americorps program which barely pays the bills but is perfectly timed since it ends in August of this year. If I have to apply again, I'll have to find somthing else to keep me busy during the wait, and that is not what I want, especially what with the economy and all. Plus you can only have so many 1-year stints on your resume before people start to wonder what's up. "But I was a prospective student all those years!" is probably what I'll end up saying. I'll live, though. Stay positive, fingers crossed, etc.

Has anyone heard anything from these guys? I'm just curious -- I've been expecting a rejection since mid-January, when a really rude and pretty transparent email response to one of my questions made it clear that they don't want me in the program. I'd just like to officially get it over with.

I'm inspired by the apparent confidence you've got in me, but I'll have to pass. Like I said, I chickened out yesterday. And the letter does say this not-knowing could last all the way up until 4/15. Though it feels like it's been a month already, I have to remind myself it's been only a week, and that I don't want to bother them while they're busy determining everything that's important to me. But god do I wish we knew more. I just wanna be IN. MY, I'm in the same position. I would have chosen Brandeis over the schools that have already rejected me anyway, but this waitlist is really the only thing I've got going -- I'm only waiting to hear back from schools I'm certain will be a no (and ones I would hypothetically turn down to go to Brandeis anyway). Who here prays? Wanna give that a try? At this point I'm willing to ask for help from anywhere.

Nothing here. Mentalyoga, where you at?

Yeah, where you waitlisted at, OP? I'm also curious about this -- I almost emailed the school that listed me today, only to back down at the last second. A letter from them assures me I am "placed high" on the list, but I also know that at least two other folks here received that same letter, so it's hard to figure out. Maybe we're better off not knowing? Oh and I'm waitlisted at Brandeis. I figured people knew that by now, what with all the whining, but it's also not fair to ask it of you and be all secretive over here.

For sure, Yaggles. I just keep reminding myself that I AM IN HERE, and not just an organism whose sustenance depends on PhD acceptances. Commoner, keep your chin up -- five schools is a lot; anything can still happen. Hang onto any and all good news you get, like that offer from the prof. I'm also looking into the possibility of 2010, and stretching my application campaign to a 3(!)year run. Over the weekend I had a friend who's in his second year at a very good med school try to tell me that 'rejection and disappointment are Romantic,' that once I'm a successful prof at a big ten university, this whole process will seem an integral part of the journey. Despite being 4 beers in, I had a really, really hard time believing that. Still do. In an increasingly last-ditch effort for any semblance of piece of mind, though, I'm certainly trying!

Way past absurd. I demand answers, and find it more and more difficult to get through the week without hearing anything. With a waitlist position the best thing I've got going right now, I'm afraid it's gonna be this way until April. Ughhhhh.

Word up. My 'safety school' rejected me first out of the ten programs I applied to.

I think I've heard of one UMinnesota acceptance, but what about anyone else? Anybody totally in the dark like me? Last year their rejection notice came pretty early, I want to say early February. What ya'll know about it?

Thanks, lyoness. I think that's what's going on too.

I'm real confused right now. This is the message I get when I log into my application: Feb 20 Update for Admissions 2009-2010 Please be aware that admission decisions will be sent by post beginning the first week of March. We will be unable to give out information about admission decisions via email or over the phone. If your mailing address is in the U.S. and you have not received a mailing from the Office of the Dean of Students in the Humanities by March 16, please let us know by emailing Sarah Tuohey, Assistant Dean of Students for Admissions, at stuohey@uchicago.edu. If your mailing address is international, please let us know if you have received nothing by March 23. Haven't people already gotten in though, via calls from the DGS? It seems like they've just set up a message explaining that we won't get our rejection notices until March. Also, weren't people already denied via the website? I thought I read that at least one person logged in and had a Deny status, but maybe I'm confusing it with another school.

Such clarity and wisdom from this one. Srsly, I might take you up on this and literally join one of the free yoga classes offered at my gym. Thanks for the encouragement, it's good to hear. And you're absolutely right -- this process sort of breeds self-doubt more effectively than anything else. It's important to remember this is only a matter of finding where we best fit. Ahem. [i'm really sorry. I couldn't help myself]: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRjb8sMjYu8

Mentalyoga, I think no news is good news re your other schools. This does seem like a big waitlist, if we're three on it and I'm assuming more candidates who don't hang on the grad cafe. I'm trying hard not to get my hopes up for that reason, but I'm crossing my fingers that three accepted Brandeis candidates will get into WashU or Brown or something, and we'll all be so in. Joey: you think that was a fake results post? How come? I know in the carefully-worded letter of ours they talk about how they fully fund all PhD students...is 35k way too much or something? I just don't know my way around the whole financing part very well yet.

Thanks Yellow, I'm hanging onto whatever I've got. I'm hoping for many acceptances for everyone, so that they'll choose somewhere other than where I'm waitlisted! Me: 10 schools applied to. 3 rejections so far (Northwestern, WUSTL, UPenn), 1 waitlist. Not the most heartening stats, but at this point I'm just hoping to hear good news from at least one school.

Touche. And thanks. I'm sure if I do you'll hear about it.

This thread, that is. Not the grad cafe.

Ha ha, yellow. Please don't! Does posting on here as often as I do qualify as creepy and desperate? Maybe, I guess.

Aaaaand I'm waitlisted. At what's my #1 choice. I'm super excited but nervous and scared. This is the first non-rejection I've received, but I'll also be really bummed if I don't get in. Now how to let them know that I REALLY want to go there without seeming desperate or creepy (they have asked me to let them know)? The purgatory continues. Phase two, in which Orin gets his oats.