Dave M

I began my MFA application process late last summer. My very first instruction (from the MFA Writers Podcast) was to “research, research, research.” Frankly, I didn’t even know what to research. Now at the end of this long process, where this week I will decide between two full residency programs I’m equally honored to attend, I have grown reasonably comfortable evaluating a program’s fit for me. But only in the last few days have I worked through what proved to be the most stressful and confusing issue of the process – My status as a senior citizen. As a sixty-something applicant who’s earliest days date back to Year 1 B.D.E. (Bob Dylan Era) I offer here my perspective to children of all ages. After all, we all woke up this morning the oldest we have ever been. The earliest application guidance I came across can be stated as “At sixty-six, your road to admission to a well-regarded program will be a very, if not impossibly steep, climb.” This barrier to entry was explained to me as “Top programs are only interested in writers with long writing careers ahead of them. And your clock is ticking.” I accepted this as fact from day one. I have friends who came up against this in Ivy League business and medical school admissions. But I struggled with its dialectic. Because we are told over and over again that the only thing that really matters is your writing sample. Trying to bridge these two opposing truths has been a dispiriting task. To resolve this I hired an MFA consultant. Finding one I could click with took a surprisingly long time. But in the end, after being moved by a particular consultant’s excellent memoir, I made my choice. They reviewed my writing sample, SOP and resume and offered these conclusions: · If anything, I had underestimated the age-related barriers to my entry. The age discrimination suit filed against Iowa was sobering. Their own data showed that none of their 105 MFA applicants over the age of 51 was admitted. · The underlying reason is that MFA programs focus very strongly on the potential of their student’s long and productive writing careers. · My writing sample was just barely adequate to the task (And I heard polite restraint in their voice). But “... at least it has a clear beginning, middle and end.” I did not disagree. · I should tear up my draft Statement of Purpose and start over. I completely agreed. · Age was not my only hurdle. That as a retiring yacht broker, “... your entire being will suggest to first stage MFA reviewers readers a life of enormous privilege.” And that I had to understand the POV of these front line readers, that I must put myself in the shoes of, to write to the audience of reviewers who are “...extremely progressive, twenty-something gay women.” I fully accepted the consultant’s first statement. And of the second, I felt insulted on behalf of the qualitative integrity, professionalism and editorial abilities of MFA staff everywhere. That said, I do have to say that the consultant did a superb job of providing me the bullet points for a new Statement of Purpose. The theme was that beyond the value of a lifetime of accumulated experience and wisdom, I should demonstrate that I am an atypical aging applicant. From working in the jail systems of Rikers Island as a social worker, to becoming a yacht broker with long stretches of work in Turkey, China and Scandinavia, I have a wealth of good material. And as for the prospective length of my writing career, beyond finishing my first novel about the life and death of a talented clinical psychologist, my outline of a subsequent novel is complete - A four-hundred year ghost story set on Rikers Island. I’ve got at least ten years of hard writing work ahead of me. I applied to eleven programs. I have been accepted by Columbia, Sarah Lawrence, The New School, Stony Brook, and Stone Coast. I am waitlisted at NYU, and have been rejected by Brooklyn. I await word from Hunter, Queens, Bennington and Warren Wilson. To my needs, I have resolved the dialectic - there are not two facts in opposition. It’s all about the writing. I’m not saying that ageism is not a factor. But that as in so many dimension of life in our time, much can be influenced by [honest, creative] marketing and self-promotion. I am not and never will be a great writer. I fail every day. I go through almost endless stretches of not failing better. Edward P. Jones puts more truth and beauty into a single paragraph than I will put into my entire career: “The moon shone silver through all the trees, which the wife first noted to herself, then pointed to places on the ground for her husband to see – a shimmering silver all the more precious because it could by enjoyed but not contained. The moon was most generous with the silver where it fell, and even the places where it had not shone had a grayness pleasant and almost anticipatory, as if the moon were saying, I’ll be over to you as soon as I can.” Wow. The term I use to characterize my work on good days comes from the yachting industry. When a used boat is in OK shape, when its core components and functions work reasonably well and those that don’t can be made to perform without too much time or money, the boat is referred to in official reports as “Serviceable.” Here and there I see my writing as serviceable. The rest of the time I’m on the rocks,taking to the liferaft, or looking up from the bottom of the deep blue. Thanks for listening. Best of luck in all things. Fail better. dave

I began my MFA application process late last summer. My very first instruction (from the MFA Writers Podcast) was to “research, research, research.” Frankly, I didn’t even know what to research. Now at the end of this long process, where this week I will decide between two full residency programs I’m equally honored to attend, I have grown reasonably comfortable evaluating a program’s fit for me. But only in the last few days have I worked through what proved to be the most stressful and confusing issue of the process – My status as a senior citizen. As a sixty-something applicant who’s earliest days date back to Year 1 B.D.E. (Bob Dylan Era) I offer here my perspective to children of all ages. After all, we all woke up this morning the oldest we have ever been. The earliest application guidance I came across can be stated as “At sixty-six, your road to admission to a well-regarded program will be a very, if not impossibly steep, climb.” This barrier to entry was explained to me as “Top programs are only interested in writers with long writing careers ahead of them. And your clock is ticking.” I accepted this as fact from day one. I have friends who came up against this in Ivy League business and medical school admissions. But I struggled with its dialectic. Because we are told over and over again that the only thing that really matters is your writing sample. Trying to bridge these two opposing truths has been a dispiriting task. To resolve this I hired an MFA consultant. Finding one I could click with took a surprisingly long time. But in the end, after being moved by a particular consultant’s excellent memoir, I made my choice. They reviewed my writing sample, SOP and resume and offered these conclusions: · If anything, I had underestimated the age-related barriers to my entry. The age discrimination suit filed against Iowa was sobering. Their own data showed that none of their 105 MFA applicants over the age of 51 was admitted. · My writing sample was just barely adequate to the task (And I heard polite restraint in their voice). But “... at least it has a clear beginning, middle and end.” I did not disagree. · I should tear up my draft Statement of Purpose and start over. I completely agreed. · Age was not my only hurdle. That as a retiring yacht broker, “... your entire being will suggest to first stage MFA reviewers readers a life of enormous privilege.” And that I had to understand the POV of these front line readers, that I must put myself in the shoes of, to write to the audience of reviewers who are “...extremely progressive, twenty-something gay women.” I fully accepted the consultant’s first statement. And of the second, I felt insulted on behalf of the qualitative integrity, professionalism and editorial abilities of MFA staff everywhere. That said, I do have to say that the consultant did a superb job of providing me the bullet points for a new Statement of Purpose. The theme was that beyond the value of a lifetime of accumulated experience and wisdom, I should demonstrate that I am an atypical aging applicant. From working in the jail systems of Rikers Island as a social worker, to becoming a yacht broker with long stretches of work in Turkey, China and Scandinavia, I have a wealth of good material. And as for the prospective length of my writing career, beyond finishing my first novel about the life and death of a talented clinical psychologist, my outline of a subsequent novel is complete - A four-hundred year ghost story set on Rikers Island. I’ve got at least ten years of hard writing work ahead of me. I applied to eleven programs. I have been accepted by Columbia, Sarah Lawrence, The New School, Stony Brook, and Stone Coast. I am waitlisted at NYU, and have been rejected by Brooklyn. I await word from Hunter, Queens, Bennington and Warren Wilson. To my needs, I have resolved the dialectic - there are not two facts in opposition. It’s all about the writing. I’m not saying that ageism is not a factor. But that as in so many dimension of life in our time, much can be influenced by [honest, creative] marketing and self-promotion. I am not and never will be a great writer. I fail every day. I go through almost endless stretches of not failing better. Edward P. Jones puts more truth and beauty into a single paragraph than I will put into my entire career: “The moon shone silver through all the trees, which the wife first noted to herself, then pointed to places on the ground for her husband to see – a shimmering silver all the more precious because it could by enjoyed but not contained. The moon was most generous with the silver where it fell, and even the places where it had not shone had a grayness pleasant and almost anticipatory, as if the moon were saying, I’ll be over to you as soon as I can.” The term I use to characterize my work on good days comes from the yachting industry. When a used boat is in OK shape, when its core components and functions work reasonably well and those that don’t can be made to perform without too much time or money, the boat is referred to in official reports as “Serviceable.” Here and there I see my writing as serviceable. The rest of the time I’m on the rocks, taking to the liferaft, or looking up from the bottom of the deep blue. Thanks for listening.

Accepted Stone Coast and Stony Brook. Two down, nine to go.

Happy to be here. Sixty-six years young and applying to NY Tri-state full residency programs (literary fiction) for fall 2025. Can anyone direct me to a list of MFA application coaches/consultants? Grazie!