2022 Creative Writing MFA Applicants Forum

[MDP]

18 minutes ago, koechophe said:

https://www.theparisreview.org/fiction/7851/this-then-is-a-song-we-are-singing-sterling-holywhitemountain

https://www.newyorker.com/books/flash-fiction/gravity

https://www.theparisreview.org/fiction/7803/mathematics-under-which-is-love-whose-bed-is-language-adania-shibli

https://www.theparisreview.org/fiction/7821/we-all-fall-down-mckenzie

Thanks for sharing these! I was bored at work. Third one is probably my least favorite...too self-conscious for my taste. Though it does remind me a bit of Flights by Olga Tokarczuk, which I do like. Love the ending of the first one, though I'm not really a fan of the hyper-colloquial, just-pulled-this-from-my-Notes-app voice. Seeing a lot of that in fiction lately and finding it kind of tiresome. 

[Rm714]

33 minutes ago, koechophe said:

https://www.newyorker.com/books/flash-fiction/gravity

I read Gravity a couple months ago and still think about it every now and then. What an incredible, poignant piece. 

Edited February 9, 2022 by Rm714

[MDP]

17 minutes ago, Rm714 said:

What an incredible, poignant piece. 

Agree -- that final paragraph! 

[koechophe]

47 minutes ago, MDP said:

Thanks for sharing these! I was bored at work. Third one is probably my least favorite...too self-conscious for my taste. Though it does remind me a bit of Flights by Olga Tokarczuk, which I do like. Love the ending of the first one, though I'm not really a fan of the hyper-colloquial, just-pulled-this-from-my-Notes-app voice. Seeing a lot of that in fiction lately and finding it kind of tiresome. 

I agree, not my favorite, but I like the.. I don't know, idea behind it? Like, this is railing against form, which I think is cool, but actually reading it isn't my favorite, so I guess mixed feelings.

33 minutes ago, Artel said:

If you search hard enough, you can find an unusual story in the New Yorker and The Paris Review that is not ideal for the New Yorker test and will always stand as an odd man out.

 

 

All four stories were on the front page of their respective literary magazines. I literally pulled the first ones I saw. I guess if you read literary magazines more frequently, you'd know that even the top ones aren't any sort of consistent on style and form. 

But that makes no difference, you're going to continue to move the goalposts on your argument because you're unwilling to admit that you're wrong. 

Also, aren't you tired of trying to play some game of "GOTCHA" with my writing--a piece which I legitimately wrote in high school and published back when I was a freshman in college? It was one of three that I submitted to the literary magazine, and they picked it out of a lineup--much to my annoyance, since I thought the others were better, but w/e. 

Please, feel free to assert your superiority with it. If that's what you need to make yourself feel better, who am I to stand in your way? 

 

Edited February 9, 2022 by koechophe

[MDP]

2 minutes ago, koechophe said:

I agree, not my favorite, but I like the.. I don't know, idea behind it? Like, this is railing against form, which I think is cool, but actually reading it isn't my favorite, so I guess mixed feelings.

True! I do respect that aspect of it. I actually read that piece earlier this year when my hard copy came in the mail and I have thought about it pretty regularly since, so it must be doing something right. I definitely have to work for it, which can be frustrating but rewarding when reading.

[koechophe]

6 minutes ago, MDP said:

I definitely have to work for it, which can be frustrating but rewarding when reading.

As a reader, I do feel like we lose some aspect of elegance. There's a certain beauty in really nice form, and I guess I find that missing in the overly stream-of-consciousness stories, but I also think that form has been an excuse to reject people, particularly marginalized ones, so I can see the value in really railing against it.

But I'm glad we're in a day and age where things are given more room to grow and flourish despite being unconventional. 

[Ydrl]

Hey, novel idea. How about we don't interact with the troll anymore? I realize I broke my own rule, but I think it's time to stop before we get investing in trashing them. No replies, no up or downvotes. Simple as that. It would save everyone a lot of heartbreak and upset.

[koechophe]

49 minutes ago, Ydrl said:

Hey, novel idea. How about we don't interact with the troll anymore? I realize I broke my own rule, but I think it's time to stop before we get investing in trashing them. No replies, no up or downvotes. Simple as that. It would save everyone a lot of heartbreak and upset.

I'm sure you're right. There's just a frustration when I see new users genuinely considering the troll's "test", but I should just respond to them instead of the troll. 

EDIT: Also, for anyone who is curious, here's how you ignore users on this forum: Click on your account name in the top right corner, then under settings you should see "Ignored Users." Click there, add the user, profit.

 

Edited February 9, 2022 by koechophe

[xenawins]

34 minutes ago, koechophe said:

DIT: Also, for anyone who is curious, here's how you ignore users on this forum: Click on your account name in the top right corner, then under settings you should see "Ignored Users." Click there, add the user, profit.

 

Thanks for the tip! I had wondered if this was an option

[floralhell]

have any UMass Amherst decisions come out or have there just been interview requests?

[chuey]

12 minutes ago, floralhell said:

have any UMass Amherst decisions come out or have there just been interview requests?

I think only interview requests. I have mine next week -- in their email they said decisions might not come until early March. 

[floralhell]

1 minute ago, chuey said:

I think only interview requests. I have mine next week -- in their email they said decisions might not come until early March. 

good luck!! 

[chuey]

22 minutes ago, floralhell said:

good luck!! 

thanks!! either they're doing things a little different this year or are fully a month behind, who knows

[Rm714]

Looks like University of Alabama sent out at least one acceptance for poetry and one for fiction this evening! Both were posted in Draft.

[nosferatatouille]

This waiting period has been really hard for me and I'm genuinely starting to lose my mind here. I've been getting angry whenever I check my email because none of them are from any schools.

Based on the results page, none of the programs I applied to will start notifying anyone until March. Y'all I am SQUIRMING

[MDP]

10 hours ago, nosferatatouille said:

This waiting period has been really hard for me and I'm genuinely starting to lose my mind here. I've been getting angry whenever I check my email because none of them are from any schools.

Based on the results page, none of the programs I applied to will start notifying anyone until March. Y'all I am SQUIRMING

Meeee too. Fortunately (?) some of mine could be notifying any day now, but I honestly don't know how I'm gonna feel when they start rolling in. My friends/family/other writers keep telling me to just forget about the whole process (impossible) and keep writing, but I honestly don't even want to do that! I don't have the focus right now. Reading is the only thing that has helped.

[MDP]

From results page:

Rejected, Creative Writing Fiction, University Of Mississippi Website has been updated to say that everyone who made it to Phase II has been notified as of 02/07/2022.

[koechophe]

To save yourself unnecessary clicks, I'd recommend bookmarking this specific page:

https://www.thegradcafe.com/survey/?per_page=20&q=&institution=&program=creative+writing&degree=

This will show you all of the Creative Writing results from any schools. 

[koechophe]

12 hours ago, nosferatatouille said:

Based on the results page, none of the programs I applied to will start notifying anyone until March. Y'all I am SQUIRMING

Some days are better than others. Some days, I feel pretty good about the whole thing and have this attitude of "I'm not sure if I'll get in this year, but I know if I keep working, I'll get in eventually, and it'll be fine."

Other days, my attitude is more like, "AAAhhHHHH!" (Fun fact, "AAAAAHHHHHHH!" is what I named the spreadsheet where I kept all my grad school information when I applied last year. This year it was much more boring: "Graduate school information")

TBH, the worst happened for me last year, and I didn't get into any programs. Not even any waitlists, as far as I could tell. And you know what? Facing down all those rejections was still SO much better than just waiting. So be nice to yourself, and know that this period will come to an end. Waiting really is harder than anything else. 

1 hour ago, MDP said:

My friends/family/other writers keep telling me to just forget about the whole process (impossible) and keep writing, but I honestly don't even want to do that! I don't have the focus right now. Reading is the only thing that has helped.

Hey, same! I've really struggled with writing. In order to motivate me, I've recently given myself the goal of writing a new literary piece and trying to get it published before I hear back from every school (Not, like have it actually get in a journal by then, but have written, polished, and submitted.) I stopped getting things published a few years ago when I realized that it wasn't going to help me get into a grad program, but it seems like a good, concrete goal to work towards. 

Honestly, I know this doesn't work for everyone, but with me, sometimes I just need to square my shoulders and grind out new writing when I'm feeling uninspired. 

Edited February 10, 2022 by koechophe

[MDP]

12 minutes ago, koechophe said:

In order to motivate me, I've recently given myself the goal of writing a new literary piece and trying to get it published before I hear back from every school (Not, like have it actually get in a journal by then, but have written, polished, and submitted.)

What a good idea!! I could definitely use the distraction...maybe I'll have to give this a go. I feel like I can't even touch the novel excerpt I submitted as my writing sample yet. Too anxiety-inducing...

[koechophe]

11 minutes ago, MDP said:

I feel like I can't even touch the novel excerpt I submitted as my writing sample yet. Too anxiety-inducing...

I legitimately haven't opened that piece(s) (I have a collection of short stories, and I picked 1-3 of them for each submission, depending on how much they asked for. It was crazy how one school wanted 10 pages and another school wanted 40 lol) since I submitted it. I feel like that's been a good decision.

[MDP]

2 minutes ago, koechophe said:

I legitimately haven't opened that piece(s) (I have a collection of short stories, and I picked 1-3 of them for each submission, depending on how much they asked for. It was crazy how one school wanted 10 pages and another school wanted 40 lol) since I submitted it. I feel like that's been a good decision.

Haha. Wish I could say the same. I've re-read it about a thousand times now, but not touched it editing-wise. That's nuts that your schools had such a big range! Most of mine capped at 7500 words or said to send between 20-40 pages. I sent the first 30 of my novel.

First time I applied, I sent several excerpts from random points in a different novel I was working on at the time, which no doubt worked against me. That and the fact that nothing of note happened in that entire sample, lol. Hoping that this year's sample reads more cohesively.

[Rm714]

1 hour ago, koechophe said:

I legitimately haven't opened that piece(s) (I have a collection of short stories, and I picked 1-3 of them for each submission, depending on how much they asked for. It was crazy how one school wanted 10 pages and another school wanted 40 lol) since I submitted it. I feel like that's been a good decision.

My schools also had a huge range! Lowest page count request was 15, highest was 40!

[oatcrust]

2 hours ago, koechophe said:

In order to motivate me, I've recently given myself the goal of writing a new literary piece and trying to get it published before I hear back from every school

I know I should try and do my own research on where to publish, but so far it feels pretty intimidating. Does anyone have any suggestions on where to start looking for literary sites to publish?

I ended up submitting to a contest in Vocal+ but got rejected and it made me second guess everything even when I told myself rejection will be big deal. Plus I'm not even sure if Vocal+ is a reputable publishing platform anyway...

As others have said, reading is the only thing I feel capable of doing as I wait to hear back in March. 

[koechophe]

17 minutes ago, oatcrust said:

I know I should try and do my own research on where to publish, but so far it feels pretty intimidating. Does anyone have any suggestions on where to start looking for literary sites to publish?

I mean, it depends on your goals. So there's four tiers in publishing literary fiction (There's actually way more, but I like to divide it this way mentally:

Tier 1: Places you can't publish in unless you're already known/represented. Like, these places theoretically take blind submissions, but in practice, really don't. This is the big, BIG name places, like the New Yorker. There's not a lot of these.

Tier 2: Big-name places that actually publish unknown authors. 

This is places like Granta, The Sun Magazine, etc. They are HARD to publish in, but it's much more of a resume item if you actually pull it off.

Tier 3: Middling literary magazines.

Boy, there's a lot of these. Literary magazines a lot of people haven't heard of, but they actually have some amount of readers, some amount of notoriety. These are great to publish in: It means something if you do get published here, but it's not an extremely tall barrier like some of the ones in tier 2.

Tier 4: Local / University magazines.

I say university lightly, because some university magazines are in tier 3, and some even in tier 2 if they're super prestigious. But a lot of the more undergraduate ones that have public submission are here. These ones aren't super hard to publish in, but they don't accept garbage. They are also usually listed as "good places to start with" on websites.

 

My advice if you've never published anything is to start in tier 4. Then, if you have success (and keep in mind, a "good" success rate for getting things published is like 10% of them say yes) then move up to tier 3. Again, if you're doing good there, move up to tier 2. 

And... then maybe try tier 1? Idk, it's probably more like "maybe try to get a book published" and then tier 1 will give you the time of day lol.

This is just my personal system, i'm sure people who are more experienced here could tell you everything that's wrong with it, but it was good for me when I was trying to get things published. 

If you'd like, I can tell you some of the magazines I found success with, or other ones I've seen recommended, but it'd be helpful to know what you're going for. If you just want to get your feet wet, then I can list off some tier 4 ones, but if you're looking for something more serious, tier 2-3 ones are also an option. 

 

Important note: Do not take rejection from any publication as any sort of sign. Like I said earlier, a GOOD acceptance rate for a story is that 10% of people would agree to publish it (Unless you're established, which is a different ballpark.) It's honestly just going to depend on what the magazine is looking for.

A lot of magazines like to make each issue feel cohesive around a particular theme. Just be mindful that if you dive in to this field, you can expect a lot of rejection. Try not to let it get you down. If there's something to learn, learn from it, but don't dwell on it. 

 

Edited February 10, 2022 by koechophe