Kealey polished his prize-winning style in the creative writing MFA program at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. After studying with professional writers, he began publishing in short story journals like Story Quarterly and Glimmer Train. Along the way, Kealey picked up some crucial wisdom about the creative writing market and MFA programs. He now guides fledgling writers with his innovative resource, The Creative Writing MFA Handbook.
While exploring Kealey's bustling web community at his MFA-studying website, I knew he had to participate in my deceptively simple feature: Five Easy Questions. In the spirit of Jack Nicholson’s mad piano player, I run a weekly set of quality interviews with writing pioneers—delivering some practical, unexpected advice about web publishing.
Jason Boog:
What are the right reasons to go to a creative writing MFA program? What are the wrong reasons to go to a creative writing MFA program?
Tom Kealey:
The best reason to go for an MFA in creative writing is: You’ve always wanted to be a writer. You need time. You need instruction. You need to be part of a writing community. You’re basically drawing a line in the sand and saying: “I’m going to take these two or three years and work intensely on my writing, and I’m going to see what comes of that.”
Any reason beyond that might actually be a very good reason, but I think that’s the number one reason. A lot of people talk about being a writer. When you go for an MFA, you’re doing something about it.
One caveat: No one, obviously, needs an MFA to be a writer. If you want to write: Write. And read. A lot. And at certain points, get feedback on your writing from people you trust. Then read and write a lot more. An MFA is simply one way to make these things happen. It provides structure for those who would benefit from structure.
Wrong reasons? An MFA is not a direct pipeline to publication or making your living as a writer. It can get you in that pipeline, but then you need hard work, revision, revision, revision, some contacts, some luck etc..
My point is: Don’t worry too much about publication etc. when you’re in your MFA. (I don’t mean that you shouldn’t put things in the mail. You should). Your primary concern should be working on your craft. Stretching as a writer and learning new techniques, voices, and ways of seeing the world.
The MFA is an artistic degree, much like an MFA in painting or the like, and not a professional degree. Students should keep this in mind and approach it accordingly.
Jason Boog:
I love how your website keeps your book's discussion going beyond the pages you already wrote--most writers would kill for this kind of feedback/relationship with readers. How has this web-based Q&A and reader interaction influenced the handbook? How has it influenced your writing in general?
Tom Kealey:
The blog has influenced my thinking about the next edition of the MFA Handbook, which I’ll work on in two years. I’d like to include much more information about Low-Residency programs, which are the fastest growing programs in the country. I did include a number of interviews with professors and students from Low-Residency programs, but I’d like to include more, and I’d like to be better informed about them as well.
Right now, I’ve profiled 50 creative writing programs, and I’d like to get that number to about 70 or so for the next edition. In some ways, the MFA Blog is an edition of the book. It allows me, and the readers, to have a discussion about the elements that are in the book, as well as elements that I’ve overlooked. I learn a lot from the comments that readers leave on the blog, and I try to pass on this information in future posts.
I consider myself ‘the bus driver’ of MFA programs. I offer a tour, lots of inside information, and a good deal of advice. When I don’t know something, I say that I don’t know something: I’m not the ‘MFA Guru.’ We have a running joke on the Blog about Male Answer Syndrome.
I feel like I get prospective students off to a good start and then send them out into the MFA city to see what they can find. The nice part of the blog is that students come back to the bus (I know: I’m. beginning. to. stretch. the. metaphor. here.) and give me information that I can pass on to the next group of students. In some ways, it’s a type of ‘open source,’ except that instead of open source technology that uses information, it’s open source information that uses technology.
I don’t know that it’s influenced my writing, but it’s influenced my thinking about the power of the Internet as a writer. In two or three years, the MFA Handbook might be the book most MFAers have commonly read outside of To Kill a Mockingbird, The Bluest Eye, The Catcher in the Rye, and all those type classics.
I’m not saying my book is a classic. I’m saying that a lot of prospective MFA students will read it, and that writers are readers. It will get my name out there, though more for my information and organization, rather than my writing ability. It’s a nice plus for the project and for my career, but it’s not the reason I wrote the book.
I wrote it because I had the information, I was interested in learning more, and I remembered that I didn’t know squat when I ventured into the MFA world. I tried to write the book that I would want to have, if I were to do things over.
» Five Easy Questions, Tom Kealey, Part Two from ThePublishingSpot
Over the last few days, I've corresponded with Tom Kealey, the award-winning short story writer and and Stanford University creative writing professor who literally wrote the book about creative writing MFA programs. It's been a great conversatio... [Read More]
Tracked on: April 4, 2006 3:09 PM | Permalink to Trackback