Hitting up the LJ Hivemind

[leahbobet]

Does anyone have any data/experiences on the value, drawbacks, whatever of doing an MFA?

Management thanks you in advance. *g*

Comments

[maradydd.livejournal.com]

jdeguzman and writerpo are both good people to ask.

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

Awesome -- thank you!

[gryphynshadow.livejournal.com]

I know anecdotally that the folks who have tried for, or gotten a MFA have suffered from a massive drop in creative output.

A poet friend of mine stopped going to school, and stopped writing, because his MFA process was killing him. He said that poet was a verb, that poet is something you do... and then he didn't write any poetry for three years. They recruited him because of his poetry; told him he was awesome and amazing (very true), then, once he was taking classes, all they could say was how bad he was. It demoralized him, broke him...

He's been away from school now for around a year, and has finally started to write again. He's working up to getting on stage to slam.

I'd say, if you were going into marketing, or advertising, or business, a MFA would be a cool set of letters to tack onto your name. If you want to be creative, think outside the box, push the boundaries of conventional storytelling... don't get an MFA.

MFA = creativity killer.

but, this is all anecdotal. so...

[gryphynshadow.livejournal.com]

and that was SO not the icon I meant to choose.

O.O

sorry...

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

...I thought it was supposed to be like, awesomely thematic.

"Do an MFA and get spanked by academia!"

[upstart-crow.livejournal.com]

Man, my BA writing classes were dreadful and demoralizing enough. The few I took completely broke me and contributed to the severe depression I was already battling throughout my early 20s. I can't even imagine how an MFA would be. :/

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

Do you think it would be different if you were in a place where you were, well, surer of your craft?

[rezendi.livejournal.com]

My impression is that its main tangible value is that it qualifies you to teach at a post-secondary level.

[themachinestops.livejournal.com]

I only have a writing MA, not an MFA, but to use those other three little letters IMO... don't do it. Unless you plan to teach. I think that the aura of "professionalism" around the whole deal had a lot to do with killing the fun of writing for me. It also depends on the type of program you are in, but I've heard the "don't do it" sentiment from enough people writing enough kinds of fiction and poetry to believe it's universal.

[coraa.livejournal.com]

My understanding is that if you want to teach, it makes a huge difference, but if you don't, there's not much benefit to you. So it depends what you want to do with it.

(Mileage obviously varies.)

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

I think it very much depends on why you want to do it.

If you want to teach creative writing at the college/university level, then yes. That's your way in.

If there's some other thing you want that requires an MFA to get (as in, specifically, that accreditation), then yes.

If you want to improve your ability to do a particular kind of writing, then possibly--although you will want to research very very carefully, and you might still do just as well (much less expensively) by applying your own critical reading skills (which I know are formidable) to authors who do that kind of writing.

Other than that--you already have more publication credentials than most applicants to MFA programs, so I'm not entirely sure how it would benefit you. Plus, of course, you'll have to negotiate that whole genre-fiction issue very carefully. I know not all MFA programs are genre-hostile, but the majority of them are--and even if not actively hostile, if you wanted to work on writing with genre elements in it, you'd want to (again) research very carefully to find a program that had people who would be able to understand what you were doing.* Benevolent ignorance is not what one wishes in a teacher when one is paying one's hard-earned money for their expertise.

. . . This is all from the prose side. I know nothing about poetry MFAs.

---
ETA: E.g., the University of Southern Maine's Stonecoast MFA program has people like David Anthony Durham and Kelly Link on its faculty. They're probably okay. :)

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

It's partly that I want to improve my ability to do a certain kind of writing (the more CanLit side of things, where some of my stuff appears to be heading hello Miss No Speculative Element who can't market her own work anymore) but almost more that I want to locate the market sense, professional relationships, creative context, and cred for the CanLit scene. I pulled that down as a side benefit of the years and years at the 'shop (http://sff.onlinewritingworkshop.com) when it came to SFF stuff; I sort of want that on-ice awareness for the literary market.

Also, I am bored. I have a good life that people would want and envy and I am bored and vaguely discontent with it. Something needs to shake up around here.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Since I know nothing about either Canadian MFA programs or the CanLit scene, my usefulness to you, such as it was, is at an end. *g* I will say that, if you choose to go ahead with this plan, since you are in the luxurious position of doing this entirely by conscious choice and since you have specific goals, exploit that to the maximum. (I.e., cast them as the supplicants, not you.) Decide what you want and don't settle for a program that cannot provide it to you.

[jsridler.livejournal.com]

My understanding is that the greatest value is the accreditation that allows you to teach creative writing at the university level. Most, though not all, have little interest in genre work, and some actively disdain it. Bruce McAllister wrote a long piece at IROSF on his misadventures in the MFAville during the 70s:
http://irosf.com/q/zine/article/10362

Might want to ask Nick Mamatas, who did his MFA not long ago. Stonecoast and Seton Hill both have MFA programmes that are genre/pop fiction friendly.

JSR

[stillsostrange.livejournal.com]

Did I get your grad school anxiety dreams this morning?

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

Entirely possible! Mine were about sharing a workspace with Charlie Stross and finding out that he actually didn't like me through a story he published in F&SF that said all kinds of disparaging things about my person. I felt very betrayed.

Did I get your Charlie Stross anxiety dream? *g*

[abidemi.livejournal.com]

I was glad to get mine, but I had a fun cohort (and it's where I met my wife). I've heard other experiences. My program was also exceptionally friendly to genre fiction. I turned in science fiction throughout my two years and no one ever complained.

My output has not appreciably dropped, and the teaching experience was valuable. It hasn't been a ticket to instant fame and success but what is? It was a fun way to spend two years.

I've heard anecdotally, through my wife's agent, that MFAs tend to get more attention in the slush pile.

[saladinahmed.livejournal.com]

On the US side of things, not sure how much this applies to Canada:

I have an MFA in poetry, and want to add a caveat to the 'it's useful for teaching at university' idea. While it is true that *technically* an MFA puts one into a position to teach college writing, the reality is that the vast majority of MFA alums are...not doing that.

The simple fact is that there is VERY LITTLE creative writing work at the university level that is not, these days, handled by graduate students or tenured mega-stars. And they ain't making new tenured mega-stars. The tenure-track creative writing gig is more or less a thing of the past, and one generally needs to have a Ph.D. or an MFA + SEVERAL HIGH-PROFILE non-genre books published to be truly competitive for those few gigs that are out there. OTOH, the MFA can be useful in getting check-to-check adjuncting jobs.

If you can get a full ride (tuition+stipend/TA gig), it's worth doing just to have scads of time to just focus on writing. If you can get into a genuinely prestigious program it makes for useful networking (though not so much to be worth doing if that's your primary motivation).

If you can't get a full ride, then you're talking taking on student loan debt. If you can't get into a top-15 program, you're unlikely to be dazzled by all of the new doors that are suddenly open, network-wise -- though you may well have a great cohort that become new friends.

Again, this is a very US-ian assessment. Mileage may vary in countries that actually believe in arts/higher ed. funding.

[saladinahmed.livejournal.com]

Oh, also: there is a deep anti-genre bias in most of the top-tier programs. Low-res programs seem less plagued by this hangup, and there are some GREAT looking ones out there, but you should know that, for hiring purposes, universities generally do NOT look at these programs as being equal to a traditional MFA.

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

That was all super useful, and thank you. :)

[gwynnega]

I have an MFA (fiction and poetry) from Antioch Los Angeles, a limited residency program. The best thing about it was getting to work intensively with some amazing writer-teachers. I know my fiction-writing skills improved a lot. Although I'm not teaching, I like having the option of being able to teach at college level (though of course there's a ton of competition for those jobs).

I only worked part-time while I was getting the MFA, and I don't think I would have been able to handle the workload on top of a full-time job, though many people in my program did.

[gwynnega]

Oh, and re: the genre bias thing--yes, it does exist in many MFA programs, but the novel I wrote while I was in the program had vampires in it, and my critical paper was about fairy tales...

[sarah-prineas.livejournal.com]

If she hasn't commented yet, talk to Rachel Swirsky. I have her email if you want it.

Also there's a MFA in writing for kids at Vermont College that's supposed to be pretty good.

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

Oh, thank you. :) I have her e-mail; I'll drop her a line.

[chibibluebird.livejournal.com]

In writing? Careful to interview current or past students and so on, especially if you intend to write genre fiction in the program. A lot of teachers disprefer genre writing even if it does not say so on the program website. (And the fact that they admit you into the program with a fantasy-only portfolio is not necessarily a guarantee that there won't be trouble later, as I found out.)

[chibibluebird.livejournal.com]

If you want to network with CanLit types, just start attending their readings on a regular basis, going out to the bar afterwards, and volunteering for their lit mags (quick! Before the federal government effectively puts them out of business with that no-mail-subsidies-for-circulation-under-10 000 thing). Much less hassle than attending a creative writing program! (in my experience)

Then again, if you can get a substantial scholarship, I suppose the MFA might be worth it.