MFA Writers is the podcast where host Jared McCormack interviews creative writing MFA students about their program, their process, and a piece they’re working on.
The MFA Writers podcast has been an invaluable resource for me since I made the decision to pursue my MFA. Hosted by Jared, this podcast provides insight into what is being taught in MFA programs and features interviews with emerging writers. I listen to it during my walks and on days when I'm not reading, and it has truly enhanced my understanding of the writing process and how to make the most out of my program.
One of the best aspects of this podcast is the diverse range of writers that Jared brings on as guests. They are well-versed and articulate, providing a wealth of information about their writing processes and their experiences in MFA programs. The interviews are insightful and offer a perspective that is often missing from program websites. It's been especially helpful for me as I recently applied to MFA programs and was accepted into a dream program. The advice within the podcast gave me the courage to apply and prepared me for both acceptance and rejection.
Another great aspect of this podcast is Jared's skill as a host. He always asks the perfect questions that elicit thoughtful responses from his guests. His genuine curiosity shines through in every episode, making for engaging conversations that keep listeners hooked. Additionally, hearing directly from current students and graduates of MFA programs provides a unique perspective that is incredibly valuable for anyone considering or currently enrolled in an MFA program.
As for potential drawbacks, there really aren't many to speak of. Some listeners might prefer interviews with famous authors instead of emerging writers, but personally, I find the interviews with emerging writers to be more relatable and inspiring as a beginning writer myself.
In conclusion, The MFA Writers podcast has quickly become one of my favorite listens. It offers valuable insights into various MFA programs and features interviews with talented emerging writers who share their experiences and advice. For anyone considering an MFA or currently enrolled in a program, I highly recommend binging through the episodes for a wealth of informative and entertaining content.
How do voice-driven writers find their characters? Austin Tucker tells Jared how he uses collage and research into his characters' life histories to craft voices that are often “on the edge of collapse.” Plus, Austin discusses the pros and cons of a small program with 6-8 students in each poetry workshop, healthcare access as a PhD student, and opportunities to design and teach composition, workshop, and survey classes.Austin Tucker is a poet and fiction writer who received his MFA from the University of Rutgers-Camden and is currently pursuing a PhD in Creative Writing at Ohio University. He is the current editor of Quarter After Eight and his poetry was selected for The Southeast Review's 2024 Gearhart Prize by Kareena McGlynn, and has appeared in Pleiades, Frontier, and Four Chambers, among other places. His fiction won the 2024 Masters Review Flash Fiction contest and was a semifinalist for the 2018 Halifax Ranch Prize. He's also a two-time finalist for The DISQUIET International Literary Prize in Poetry. Find him at r.austin.tucker [at] gmail [dot] com or via the Quarter After Eight IG (@qaejournal). He is represented by Julia Eagleton with Janklow and Nesbit.MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com.BE PART OF THE SHOWDonate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee.Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts.Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience.Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application.STAY CONNECTEDTwitter: @MFAwriterspodInstagram: @MFAwriterspodcastFacebook: MFA WritersEmail: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Poetic forms are sometimes considered limiting, but can we find freedom within the constraints? On this episode, Brandon Blue tells Jared about how recontextualizing traditional forms through the lens of identity creates an additional, sometimes subversive, layer of meaning. Plus, he discusses writing about intimacy and eroticism within and outside of sexual relationships; how he decided to pursue an MFA after teaching middle and high school for seven years; and the importance of advocating for your needs and goals in an MFA program, writing community, and career.Brandon Blue is a black, queer poet, educator and MFA candidate at Arizona State University from the D(M)V. He is an assistant editor for Storm Cellar Magazine and his work has or will appear in Barzakh, the Saints and Sinners Literary Festival Poetry Anthology, [PANK], and more. His work is also featured in the Capital Pride Poem-a-Day event. His work has received the support of the Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing. His chapbook, Snap.Shot, is forthcoming from Finishing Line Press. Keep up with his work at brandonbluepoet.com.MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com.BE PART OF THE SHOWDonate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee.Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts.Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience.Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application.STAY CONNECTEDTwitter: @MFAwriterspodInstagram: @MFAwriterspodcastFacebook: MFA WritersEmail: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Raise your hand if you've ever felt writing imposter syndrome! We all have our hands up. On this episode, De'Andre S. Holmes of Columbia College Chicago shares his experience with self-doubt, exacerbated by pursuing an undergrad degree in business administration, not English. Plus, he talks about taking a fully-funded semester in Paris through his MFA program, provides advice for students coping with grad school burnout, and describes why racial and ethnic diversity is so critical in the MFA.A native of Philadelphia, De'Andre S. Holmes received a bachelor's degree from Temple University and is a second-year MFA candidate at Columbia College in his current home of Chicago. He is an aspiring author, penning his first book of short stories titled "Daddy, do you love me?" and a novelette titled "Obscurity." De'Andre's work can be found in Contextos Chicago, Short Story Break, SONKU magazine, and Allium Literary Journal. In his free time, he enjoys reading, traveling, exploring different cultures, and binge-watching animal documentaries. Find him at his website dsholmeswrites.com and on Instagram @d.s.holmeswrites.MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com.BE PART OF THE SHOWDonate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee.Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts.Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience.Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application.STAY CONNECTEDTwitter: @MFAwriterspodInstagram: @MFAwriterspodcastFacebook: MFA WritersEmail: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
After writing poetry for nearly 50 years, Jude MacAllen Tatman enrolled in an MFA program. In this episode, he sits down with Jared to discuss what it's like to revisit poems he drafted in the 1980s along with crafting new work. Plus, he discusses writing about his life's most consequential crossroads, treating writing like work, and finding faculty who make themselves available to students even in a low-residency program.Jude MacAllen Tatman is a poet from Missouri who is in his final semester at the University of Nebraska-Omaha's low-residency program. MacAllen has been writing poetry off and on for fifty years while also serving as a deckhand on towboats, playing semi-pro baseball in West Texas, delivering pizzas, waiting tables, owning a bar, working as an historian in Missouri State Parks' Historic Preservation Program, and even once participating in an episode of Jeopardy. His poem, “Salvation,” was published in the literary journal Envy's Sting, and his chapbook, Echoes: Selected Poems & Stories 1984-2023, is now available.MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com.BE PART OF THE SHOWDonate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee.Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts.Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience.Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application.STAY CONNECTEDTwitter: @MFAwriterspodInstagram: @MFAwriterspodcastFacebook: MFA WritersEmail: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Poets are known for considering form in their writing, but form is also critical in prose. In fact, for Tyler R. Moore, form tells us the most about the story. “It's the structure, scaffolding, bones, and architecture.” In this episode, Tyler tells Jared about approaching each story with a different structure, including his recent piece told exclusively through voicemails. Plus, Tyler discusses how being a queer writer from a pseudo-rural Midwestern town shapes his work, finding community across genres and faculty in his MFA program, and what he has learned from his editorial experience at Ninth Letter, like the do's and don'ts (mostly don'ts) of a cover letter.Tyler R. Moore is a fiction writer from Ashwaubenon, Wisconsin and is currently in his second year in the MFA program at the University of Illinois. He is the winner of the Hobart L. and Mary K. Peer Fiction Prize. He also holds the titles of current Associate Managing Editor and Associate Creative Non-fiction Editor for Ninth Letter. His work is published or forthcoming in Michigan Quarterly Review and elsewhere. Find him on Instagram @tyler_rmoore and at his website, tylerrmoore.com.MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com.BE PART OF THE SHOWDonate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee.Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts.Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience.Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application.STAY CONNECTEDTwitter: @MFAwriterspodInstagram: @MFAwriterspodcastFacebook: MFA WritersEmail: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Siloh Radovsky sits down with Jared to talk about her path from anarchistic activism to experimental writing, the blurry line between fiction and nonfiction, and the joys and pains of teaching in an R1 institution.Siloh Radovsky is a prose writer invested in the overlap between narrative and criticism. A recent graduate of the cross-genre MFA program at UC San Diego, she is currently at work on a collection of linked essays. Her essays, articles, and stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Entropy, [PANK], Teen Vogue, Inkwell, Identity Theory, and elsewhere. Siloh is also an educator, a collaborator in a narrative medicine intervention with Adolescent and Young Adult cancer patients, and was a founding editor of Kaleidoscoped magazine. She was an artist-in-residence at the Hinge Arts program in spring 2017, and was the recipient of an Evergreen Foundation Activity Grant and a Summer Graduate Teaching Fellowship at UC San Diego. Find her on Instagram @essence_of_toast and her website silohradovsky.net.MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com.BE PART OF THE SHOWDonate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee.Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts.Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience.Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application.STAY CONNECTEDTwitter: @MFAwriterspodInstagram: @MFAwriterspodcastFacebook: MFA WritersEmail: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
What happens when a tech startup employee starts taking online writing classes? They end up in an MFA program, of course. In this episode, Ray Wise sits down with Jared to talk about finding writing in their 20s and the lessons they bring from the tech world to their creative work. Plus, they discuss Rutgers-Camden's multi-genre emphasis, weekend writing retreats with the MFA community, and the pros and cons of a small program.Ray Wise is a multi-genre writer living in Philadelphia, where they are completing their final semester in the MFA program at Rutgers-Camden. Ray's work has been published in Passages North, Rose Books Reader, Barrelhouse, Hobart, etc., nominated for Best of the Net, and supported by Sundress Academy for the Arts. They are currently at work on a novel manuscript and a poetry collection. Find them on Twitter/X @ray__wise and catch them reading in Philadelphia for the Rose Books Reader launch on April 26th at Clown Bar.MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com.BE PART OF THE SHOWDonate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee.Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts.Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience.Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application.STAY CONNECTEDTwitter: @MFAwriterspodInstagram: @MFAwriterspodcastFacebook: MFA WritersEmail: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Integrating elegy, ekphrasis, and dance notation, Oli Peters's thesis project is a multilingual, multi-genre exploration in translation and lyric poetry. In this episode, she shares how her program encourages creative experimentation, even when she submits work that feels “absolutely unpublishable, verging on unreadable.” Plus, she discusses her courses in Medieval manuscripts and theater, university-funded opportunities in Paris and Ireland, and how being rejected from MFA programs right after undergrad led her to spend five years writing daily for no one but herself.Oli is a second-year MFA candidate in poetry at the University of Notre Dame. Her writing is forthcoming in Annulet, DIAGRAM, DREGINALD, and mercury firs. Her past work appears in Pleiades, New World Writing, Rain Taxi, Heavy Feather Review, and abobo zine. Her dance-performance piece "Body Glyph State" will be performed at the 2025 Iowa Choreography Festival. She is a MFA candidate at the University of Notre Dame. Find her at her website, oliupeters.wixsite.com/olipeters, and on Instagram @olimpeters.MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com.BE PART OF THE SHOWDonate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee.Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts.Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience.Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application.STAY CONNECTEDTwitter: @MFAwriterspodInstagram: @MFAwriterspodcastFacebook: MFA WritersEmail: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Can you find a close community in a low-res program? Emily St. Martin, having met her best friends in her MFA, says absolutely yes. She joins Jared to talk about how her program has helped her craft her memoir-in-progress, the fear and reward of vulnerability in creative nonfiction, and how writing lets us acknowledge and redefine our pasts.Emily St. Martin is an independent journalist based in Los Angeles, CA. She has written for the New York Times, InStyle Magazine, Cosmopolitan, VICE, Los Angeles Magazine, The Fix, The Hollywood Reporter, People and elsewhere, including for the Southern California News Group where she won a third place award for best news feature with the LA Press Club in 2022. She holds a BA in Journalism from The University of La Verne and is currently pursuing an MFA in creative nonfiction in the University of California Riverside's Palm Desert Low-Residency program. Find her at her website, emilystmartin.com, and on Twitter @ByEmilyStMartin.MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com.BE PART OF THE SHOWDonate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee.Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts.Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience.Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application.STAY CONNECTEDTwitter: @MFAwriterspodInstagram: @MFAwriterspodcastFacebook: MFA WritersEmail: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
How does our excavation of ancestral history shape our understanding of ourselves and how can writing guide us through this process? On this episode, Derek Chan discusses the role of family stories in his poetry and life, the magic of bewilderment in art, and the dissonance between our external language and our internal being. Plus, as a first-generation and international student, he offers advice for others moving to the United States to pursue higher education.Derek Chan is a writer and educator from Melbourne, Australia. He holds a First-Class Honours in Literary Studies from Monash University, where he received the Arthur Brown Thesis Prize. His writing has appeared in journals and anthologies such asBest of Australian Poems,Australian Poetry Anthology,Cordite Poetry Review,Meanjin,The Margins,Juked, and elsewhere. He has been a finalist for awards by Frontier Poetry and Palette Poetry. He is currently an MFA candidate at Cornell University, where he is an Editorial Associate for EPOCH and a university fellow. Find him at his websitederekchanarts.com and on Instagram@derek_chan_.MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers atMFAwriters.com.BE PART OF THE SHOWDonate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee.Leave a rating and review onApple Podcasts.Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience.Apply to be a guest on the show by filling outour application.STAY CONNECTEDTwitter:@MFAwriterspodInstagram:@MFAwriterspodcastFacebook:MFA WritersEmail:mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Speculative memoir allows Matt Homrich-Knieling to lean into the subjective nature of memory and explore his experience with separation anxiety. Plus, he and Jared discuss how Matt created a specific list of experiences he wanted from an MFA, which allowed him to narrow his MFA application list to just three programs. They also talk about how the WCSU program requires students to choose both a creative and a professional genre, and how they develop community despite being a low-residency program. Matt Homrich-Knieling is a writer and educator based in Detroit, MI. He is a second-year MFA student at Western Connecticut State University focusing on creative nonfiction and editing. Matt currently serves as editor-in-chief for Poor Yorick, the literary magazine housed at West Conn's MFA program. Matt is particularly interested in reading and writing speculative memoir. He has had essays published in Brevity Blog, Metro Parent, Edsurge, and elsewhere. For his MFA creative thesis, Matt is working on a speculative memoir that explores the connections between his family history and his experiences with separation anxiety. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
15 years after her MFA, and 4 years after scrapping a book that just wasn't working, Meghan Perry's debut novel WATER FINDS A WAY is receiving strong positive reviews, including a coveted Kirkus star. She joins Jared to talk about the realities of post-grad writing, going “scorched earth” on revision, and the process of turning short stories into a full-length novel. Plus, she talks about grounding her work in a remote Maine fishing village, overlooked American cultures, and the hardships—and community—her characters face. Meghan Perry graduated with an MFA from Emerson College in 2009 and currently directs the Writing Center at St. John's Preparatory School in the Boston area. She has published stories in Cold Mountain Review, Sycamore Review, The Fourth River, and elsewhere. Her debut novel, WATER FINDS A WAY, was published in November 2024 by Delphinium Books with an audiobook by Penguin Random House. The novel has received a Kirkus star and been featured in Newsday and Condé Nast as one of the top books of this fall. Find her at meghanperry.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
The pod team is traveling this week, so we invite you to travel back to a great episode from our previous season. We'll be back with new episodes in the New Year — how fitting! Wishing you all a beautiful close to 2024. Drawing from her decade-long career in Silicon Valley, Jamie Li tells Jared about writing tech satire that struck her MFA colleagues as far-fetched and her tech friends as totally realistic. Plus, Jamie talks about how her background as a Chinese immigrant and the model minority myth shape her interest in writing about in-group/out-group behaviors, and her attraction to VCFA's emphasis on experimental and cross-genre writing. Jamie Li is a Southern California-based fiction writer and product marketer. She holds a BA from Dartmouth College and is pursuing her MFA at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. Her writing has been recognized in the New York Times and published in Slant'd Magazine, Mangoprism, and elsewhere. She writes the Creative Juice newsletter and exists online on jamieli.co or IG @j.a.m.i.e.l.i. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience.Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
It's winter break! Strap on your snowshoes, brew a hot chocolate, and escape to the heat of the Vegas desert with one of our favorite episodes from last season. Wishing you all rest, writing inspiration, and early-decision acceptances. This week, an MFA with an international focus! Krista Diamond sits down with Jared to talk about UNLV's required (and funded) study abroad component and its emphasis on translation. Plus, Krista shares lessons learned as a freelance writer, info on the Vegas literary community, and how her experience working and living in national parks informs her fiction and nonfiction alike. Krista Diamond is a Las Vegas based writer whose work has appeared in or is forthcoming in The New York Times, Longreads, Hazlitt, Catapult, Electric Literature, Joyland, and elsewhere. Her writing has been supported by Tin House and Bread Loaf. Her essay “That Girl is Going to Get Herself Killed,” which first appeared in Longreads, was adapted for audio by Oscar-nominated actress Naomie Harris. She is currently a third year in the fiction MFA program at the University of Nevada Las Vegas, where she is working on a novel about paparazzi. Learn more at www.kristamariediamond.com and on Twitter at @kristadiamond. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
In this instant classic episode, Wilson M. Sims and Jared talk about the step-by-step process of getting an agent, what they do (or know they shouldn't do) when a story isn't working, how MFA programs are like basketball drills, and approaching craft discussions in ways that are more flexible and time-varying than declarative and concrete. Plus, Wilson discusses making lasting connections with faculty and visiting writers and shares the realities of living on an MFA stipend and pivoting to part-time to maintain a day job. Wilson M. Sims is a behavioral-health worker and policy strategist in the final year of his MFA program at Florida Atlantic University. His work is published in Longreads, The Florida Review, Witness Magazine, and Virginia Quarterly Review. He is the winner of the 2021 Lascaux Prize in Creative Nonfiction, and his essay “Unknown Costs,” received a special mention in the 2025 Pushcart Anthology. Find him at wilsonmsims.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
In this episode, PhD Candidate Mackenzie McGee talks about her process when writing speculative fiction, including how she decides on topics and themes, how her process changes when writing flash versus her novel, and how writers are able to explore politically dangerous topics by leaning into speculative elements. She then tells Jared about her decision to pursue the PhD after finishing her four-year MFA program and how KU is particularly supportive of speculative writers. Mackenzie McGee is a speculative fiction writer from the Midwest. A winner of the 2021 PEN/Dau Short Story Prize for Emerging Writers, her work can be read in Porter House Review, Nat. Brut, Alaska Quarterly Review, and Cease, Cows. Mackenzie earned her MFA from the University of Arkansas and is currently a second-year PhD student in English-Creative Writing at the University of Kansas. You can find her at mackenziemcgee.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Rone Shavers joins Jared for our annual application episode to discuss the differences between MFA and PhD applications and programs. Rone and Jared talk about how to choose the right program, put together the best application, and get the most out of your time in a program. Before that, they discuss Rone's “funky” novel Silverfish and how getting over the pressure of making a commercially viable book allowed him to write the book he wanted to write. Rone Shavers is the director of the creative writing program at The University of Utah, which offers both an MFA and a PhD in creative writing. Rone is the author of the experimental Afrofuturist novel Silverfish from Clash Books, a finalist for the 2021 Council of Literary Magazines and Presses (CLMP) Firecracker Award in Fiction and one of The Brooklyn Rail's “Best Books of 2020.” He is also fiction and hybrid genre editor at the award-winning journal, Obsidian: Literature and Arts in the African Diaspora. Find him at roneshavers.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
The leaves are turning, the pumpkin spice lattes are brewing, and that means the MFA applicants are revising and re-revising their personal statements. To celebrate the arrival of fall, we're bringing you last season's (super informative) application episode. Stay tuned for a new episode in your feed soon. Happy MFA Application Season to all who celebrate! Jess Silfa returns to the show bringing seven years of experience with the MFA Draft Facebook Group. On this episode, Jess and Jared offer advice for applicants across a wide range of topics: teaching, funding, health insurance, fees, faculty, letters of recommendation, writing samples, statements of purpose, negotiations, timelines, and more. Good luck, friends. Jess Silfa is a writer and poet from the South Bronx. They hold an MFA from Vanderbilt University in Creative Writing (Fiction) and are currently pursuing their Ph.D. in Creative Writing at the University of Cincinnati. They have received a Displaced Artist Fellowship from Vermont Studio Center, a grant from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Mae Fellowship, and a Ricardo Salinas Scholarship for Aspen Summer Words. Jess serves as President for the Disabled and D/deaf Writers Caucus and helps run the https://www.facebook.com/groups/1721618781387008/ Facebook group. Jess's first novel, the story of a tight-knit immigrant community rattled by the war on drugs, goes on submission this fall. Learn more at http://www.jesilfa.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at http://www.mfawriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show athttps://buymeacoffee.com/mfawriters. — Leave a rating and review on https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/mfa-writers/id1514694295. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out https://forms.gle/HPQsty5LQJVUR9naA. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: https://twitter.com/mfawriterspod Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mfawriterspodcast/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MFA-Writers-107901427641104 Email: mailto:mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Carlee Jensen reflects on how the American West and constructions of personal mythology shaped her writing, and how coming out “late” taught her that life has no single narrative. She also tells Jared why she avoided MFA application resources before submitting her materials, how the MFA helped her refocus on writing as an art, not just a profession, and she discusses her experience taking advantage of Hopkins's optional third year. Carlee Jensen is a fiction writer and educator, raised in Utah and California, and currently living in Baltimore, Maryland. She earned a BA from Yale University and an MS from Bank Street College of Education, and spent seven years as a classroom teacher before pursuing an MFA from the Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University. During her time at Johns Hopkins, she received the 2024 Benjamin J. Sankey Fellowship in Fiction. Her work has appeared in New Ohio Review and The Master's Review, where it was selected by Kristen Arnett for a 2022 Short Story Award for New Writers, and was a finalist for American Short Fiction's Short(er) Fiction Prize in 2023. Find her at carleejensen.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
On this episode, Jonny Teklit sits down with Jared to talk about crafting odes to small, granular subjects, sharing his personal productivity tips and the common writing advice that doesn't work for him. Plus, Jonny discusses the pros and cons of UW-Madison's rotating genre admissions policy and reflects on how Lynda Barry's comics class changed his perspective on creative talent, revision, and experimentation. Jonny Teklit is an award-winning poet whose work has appeared in The Academy of American Poets, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The Adroit Journal, and elsewhere. He is currently a second-year MFA candidate in poetry at the University of Wisconsin–Madison where he is working on his debut collection. He has an animal fact for any occasion. Find him at his website jonnyteklit.com, on IG @jonnyteklit, and on Twitter @jonnysaysOMG. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
It's not quite Halloween, but on this episode, Emma Allman talks to Jared about the utility of defamiliarization, surrealism, uncanniness, and body horror in ecofiction (spooky!). Plus, she discusses how working in marketing pre-MFA helped her understand professionalism and realism in academia, life in Tuscaloosa as it aligns with and diverges from outsiders' expectations, and unique opportunities of the University of Alabama's MFA program, including teaching in youth writing camps or within the state's prison system. Emma Allmann studied creative writing at UW-Madison and is entering her third year in the MFA program at the University of Alabama-Tuscaloosa. Prior to returning to grad school she worked in market research for several years in Chicago. She has had pieces published with Ellipsis and Ink In Thirds, shortlisted with Smokelong and has had a play produced for the Marcia Légère Student Play Festival at UW-Madison. She has pieces forthcoming with LandLocked and Ink In Thirds. Find her at www.emmaallmann.com and on Instagram @emryal91. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
As the pod team settles into the fall semester, we're excited to celebrate the recent accomplishment of one of our past guests. Simon Graham was awarded an AWP Intro Journals Prize for their story “Blair,” forthcoming in Puerto del Sol. Enjoy our conversation with Simon from Season 3. How do you write about the climate crisis without becoming didactic? On this episode, Simon Graham describes their approach to activist writing, guided by their experience growing up on the beaches of Australia and working in environmental policy. Plus, they talk about queering the crime fiction genre, the financial realities for international students living in Seattle, and remembering who you're writing to, for, and with. Simon Graham is an Australian writer, educator, and climate change worker living in Seattle. They are an MFA Candidate in Prose Writing at the University of Washington, where they won the Eugene Van Buren Prize in Fiction and teach a class on activist writing. Simon is also a 2023 Climate Corps Fellow with the Environmental Defense Fund, and prior to moving to the US they worked on climate policy in Australia and lectured on climate change at Monash University. They are currently working on a queer crime novel set in the shadowy world of Australian climate politics. This episode was requested by Sarah Blood and Rorie Newman. Thank you both for listening! MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Following Venezuela's disputed presidential election, debut author Alejandro Puyana returns to the show to discuss his novel, which explores the revolutionary lives of both ordinary and extraordinary Venezuelans over the span of fifty years. He also shares insights with Jared about the rewrites he made to his MFA thesis before publication, the experience of collaborating with an editor, and the journey of securing book blurbs. Alejandro Puyana is the author of the upcoming novel Freedom Is a Feast, available from Little, Brown on August 20th. Alejandro moved to the United States from Venezuela at the age of twenty-six. In 2022, he completed his MFA at the Michener Center for Writers at the University of Texas. His work has appeared in Tin House, American Short Fiction, The American Scholar, New England Review, and Idaho Review, among others, and his story “The Hands of Dirty Children” was selected by Curtis Sittenfeld for Best American Short Stories 2020. He lives with his wife and daughter in Austin, Texas. Learn more at alejandropuyana.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Ever heard of an MFA program with 12 different genre concentrations? On this episode, Vivian (Xiao Wen) Li tells Jared about how UBC's multi-genre emphasis allowed her to work across fiction, nonfiction, poetry, screenwriting, filmmaking, comics, and more. Plus, she discusses self-funding her degree, receiving a grant to do research in China for her novel, and UBC's online option for distance learning. Vivian is a queer and neurodivergent Chinese-Canadian writer, director, musician, and interdisciplinary artist who recently graduated with an MFA in Creative Writing from The University of British Columbia. She is the winner in the short story category of the Creative Writing Collective Sustaining Shared Futures Writing Award, and her fiction and poetry have been published in The Massachusetts Review, The New Quarterly, QWERTY, and elsewhere. Her chapbook Someday I Promise, I'll Love You from 845 Press was nominated for The bpNichol Chapbook Award. Her debut experimental novel titled To You, in the Waves of the Future will be going on submission soon. She can be reached @vivianlicreates on X/Instagram or vivianlicreates.com. This episode was requested by Michelle D'costa. Thank you for listening, Michelle! MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Welcome to Season 5! On this episode, Rose Jenny talks to Jared about her work queering religious texts, rewriting nostalgia, and crafting formal poems. Plus, she discusses growing up and living as a trans person in the American South, finding her first readers in her cohort, and deciding whether to take the University of Miami's optional third year. Rose Jenny is a trans writer/performer based in Florida. Her debut chapbook, My Apocrypha (2024), is available through Bottlecap Press. Rose's other selected works have been published in Santa Fe Writers Project Quarterly, South Florida Poetry Journal, Pensive Journal, new words {press}, The Athena Review, and The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature. She holds a BA in English with a concentration in Creative Writing from University of South Florida. Additionally, she is the recipient of the 2021 Estelle J. Zbar Poetry Award. Rose is pursuing her MFA in Creative Writing at University of Miami. Learn more at rosejenny.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
As the pod team wraps up our summer vacation, we're highlighting one of the gems from a previous season. Watch out for the Season 5 premiere in two weeks. On this episode, Nikki Lyssy tells Jared about how, as a blind writer, she uses research to access the sighted world and fill her fiction with vivid imagery, while in her nonfiction, she explores her own experience with blindness and plays with ideas about which forms translate between braille and the page. Plus, Nikki talks about diversity and disability representation in young adult fiction, formal training in creative writing pedagogy, and support from faculty, friends, and family when she decided to change her thesis at the last minute. Nikki Lyssy is a third-year MFA candidate at the University of South Florida, where she writes fiction and nonfiction. She is blind, and her thesis is a young adult novel that follows the life of 17-year-old Emma Reynolds as she adjusts to her blindness and sets out on a path of self-discovery and acceptance of her disability. Find her on Twitter @Blindnikkii. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
The pod team is still on vacation! In the mountains! Without recording equipment! The Season 5 premiere will be in your feed soon. Until then, enjoy this conversation with Maurice Carlos Ruffin, author of three books and faculty member twice over. Maurice Carlos Ruffin, author and faculty member at two MFA programs, joins Jared for this special episode about Maurice's multi-year journey from corporate lawyer to professional writer (with plenty of rejection in between), the role of a creative writing professor in guiding students' work, and the criticality of retaining joy in our writing, despite the challenges of publication, deadlines, and stories that just aren't working. Finally, Maurice offers advice on what makes someone a successful MFA student, and where emerging writers should devote their energy. Maurice Carlos Ruffin is the author of The Ones Who Don't Say They Love You, which was published by One World Random House in August 2021. It was a New York Times Editor's Choice, a finalist for the Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence, and longlisted for the Story Prize. His first book, We Cast a Shadow, was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award, the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, and the PEN America Open Book Prize, among others. A New Orleans native, Maurice is a professor of Creative Writing in the MFA program at Louisiana State University and a faculty member in Randolph College's low-residency M.F.A. program. Find him at his website, mauricecarlosruffin.com, and on Twitter @MauriceRuffin. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
The podcast team is on vacation! In the meantime, we invite you to listen to one of our favorite episodes from Season 3. Wishing you all a great summer, friends. As the editor-in-chief of Peach Mag, Rachelle Toarmino is consistently focused on the work of others. She chats with Jared about her own writing career, including finding and using playfulness in her poetry, coping with MFA faculty turnover through collective cohort support, and how learning a second language opened her mind to poetic craft. Rachelle Toarmino is a poet, editor, and educator from Niagara Falls, New York. She is the author of the poetry collection That Ex (Big Lucks Books, 2020) and the chapbooks Comeback (Foundlings Press, 2021), Feel Royal (b l u s h, 2019), and Personal & Generic (PressBoardPress, 2016). Her poems and essays have appeared or are forthcoming in American Poetry Review, Bennington Review, Electric Literature, Literary Hub, Pretty Cool Poetry Thing, Metatron Press, Shabby Doll House, Salt Hill Journal, and elsewhere. She is also the founding editor-in-chief of Peach Mag and an editorial advisor to Foundlings Press. She lives between Buffalo and Western Massachusetts, where she is an MFA candidate in poetry at UMass Amherst. Find her on Twitter @rchlltrmn and at her website rachelletoarmino.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
It's the Season 4 finale! On this episode, Eric Larsh tells Jared about writing into obsessions, whether he's focusing exclusively on sonnets or, for the last two years, diving into a long poem about the Mojave Desert. Eric also discusses how his music compositions and editorship at Portland Review inform his poetry, deciding between a graduate degree in rhetoric or creative writing, and Portland State's built-in opportunities to connect with faculty and visiting writers. Eric Larsh is a writer, bookseller, and musician living in Portland, Oregon. He is currently serving as Editor in Chief at Portland Review and pursuing his MFA in Poetry at Portland State University. His writing can be found at Los Angeles Review, Thin Air, The Daily Drunk, and elsewhere online. His music can be found at universalhealthcare.bandcamp.com. Learn more at ericlarsh.com. This episode was requested by Emily Jacobson. Thank you for listening, Emily! MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Former stand-up comedian Max Delsohn sits down with Jared to talk about how humor and detailed line-level revision show up in his work for the stage and the page. Plus, he discusses a pleasure-forward writing process, switching MFA programs after the first year, and his experiences with big-name faculty like George Saunders and Mary Karr. Max Delsohn is a third-year MFA candidate in fiction at Syracuse University. His writing appears in McSweeney's Quarterly Concern, VICE, Joyland, The Rumpus, Passages North, Nat. Brut, and the essay anthology Critical Hits: Writers Playing Video Games, edited by J. Robert Lennon and Carmen Maria Machado, among other places. He has been awarded fellowships and residencies from the Saltonstall Foundation for The Arts, Mineral School, and Hugo House, and has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize three times. His debut short story collection, CRAWL, is forthcoming in fall 2025 from Graywolf Press. Find Max on social media @maxdelsohn, and sign up for alerts to pre-order his collection via his website, www.maxdelsohn.com. This episode was requested by Amy Peltz, Sarah Blood, and Frank Turner. Thank you all for listening! MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
What's involved in an English PhD with a creative dissertation? Abhijit Sarmah tells Jared about how this path allows him to pursue his research on global indigenous literatures while continuing to craft poetry on identity and insurgency in Assam, India. Abhijit also discusses postmemory, or the memories we inherit from earlier generations, writing about your homeland when you live far from it, and the strong literary scene in Athens, Georgia. Abhijit Sarmah is a poet and a researcher of Indigenous literatures with particular focus on Native American women writers and writings from the Northeast of India. Currently, he is a second-year PhD student in the creative writing program at the University of Georgia where he is also an Arts Lab Graduate Fellow. He was a finalist for the 2023 Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowship and his work has appeared in magazines like Poetry, The Margins, The Lincoln Review, and elsewhere. Find him on Instagram @abhijitsarmahwritespoetry and on Twitter @abhijitsarmah_. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
On this episode, Sam Herschel Wein tells Jared about their path to finding poetry outside of academia, co-founding and editing Underblong, and their approach to collaboration and humor in their writing. Plus, they discuss the nuances of MFA program decisions (Two or three years? English or Art departments?) and whether creative writing should live within institutions of higher education at all. Sam Herschel Wein (he/they) is a lollygagging plum of a poet who specializes in perpetual frolicking. They have an MFA from the University of Tennessee (2021-2023) and were the recipient of a 2022 Pushcart Prize. They have published 3 chapbooks, most recently Butt Stuff Flower Bush from Porkbelly Press, and are the co-founder and editor of Underblong Journal. They have recent work in American Poetry Review, The Cincinnati Review, and Gulf Coast, among others. Find them on social media @samforbreakfast and at their website, samherschelwein.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
The podcast team is on spring break, giving us (and you) the perfect opportunity to revisit an episode we love. In celebration of her new short story collection, GREEN FROG, we invite you into this conversation with Gina Chung who spoke to Jared last season about her debut novel, SEA CHANGE. Gina Chung, debut author of the speculative novel SEA CHANGE, tells Jared how the book began with a writing prompt in her MFA program and how her fellow students encouraged her to turn it into a novel. She and Jared discuss how her experience in publishing shaped her understanding of the business of writing and the importance of a trusted writing community. Plus, Gina offers advice for making the most of your MFA experience. Gina is a Korean American writer from New Jersey currently living in New York City. Her debut novel SEA CHANGE was a 2023 Barnes & Noble Discover Pick and a New York Times Most Anticipated Book. Gina has also written a forthcoming short story collection titled GREEN FROG. A recipient of the Pushcart Prize, she is a 2021-2022 Center for Fiction/Susan Kamil Emerging Writer Fellow and holds an MFA in fiction from the New School. Her work appears or is forthcoming in Kenyon Review, Literary Hub, Catapult, Electric Literature, Gulf Coast, Indiana Review, and Idaho Review, among others. Find her at gina-chung.com and on Twitter @ginathechung. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Memoirist and director of the Institute of American Indian Arts MFA program Deborah Jackson Taffa talks to Jared about her new book, Whiskey Tender. Deborah shares how memoir writing is a form of familial and historical preservation, and offers advice on having difficult conversations with the real people who appear in our creative nonfiction. Plus, she discusses the value of the low-res IAIA program for both indigenous and non-indigenous writers, offers strategies for sustaining creative energy, and describes methods to avoid falling into a common misstep for MFA students: social comparison. A citizen of the Quechan (Yuma) Nation and Laguna Pueblo, Deborah Jackson Taffa is the director of the MFA in Creative Writing program at the Institute of American Indian Arts. She is the author of the memoir WHISKEY TENDER and holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Iowa. Her writing can be found at PBS, Salon, LARB, Brevity, A Public Space, The Boston Review, The Rumpus, and the Best American Nonrequired Reading. In late 2021, she was named a MacDowell Fellow, Kranzberg Arts Fellow, and Tin House Scholar. In 2022, she won a PEN American Grant for Oral History and was named a Hedgebrook Fellow. Find her at deborahtaffa.com and on social media @deborahtaffa. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Drawing from her decade-long career in Silicon Valley, Jamie Li tells Jared about writing tech satire that struck her MFA colleagues as far-fetched and her tech friends as totally realistic. Plus, Jamie talks about how her background as a Chinese immigrant and the model minority myth shape her interest in writing about in-group/out-group behaviors, and her attraction to VCFA's emphasis on experimental and cross-genre writing. Jamie Li is a Southern California-based fiction writer and product marketer. She holds a BA from Dartmouth College and is pursuing her MFA at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. Her writing has been recognized in the New York Times and published in Slant'd Magazine, Mangoprism, and elsewhere. She writes the Creative Juice newsletter and exists online on jamieli.co or IG @j.a.m.i.e.l.i. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
The podcast team has been busy at the annual AWP conference, so we're bringing you a rerelease of a great conversation from Season 2. A new episode will be in your feed in two weeks. Luna Adler talks to Jared about moving between fiction and non-fiction, Brooklyn College's unique novel-writing workshop aimed at accommodating the long form, the tension between a slow revision process and rapid MFA deadlines, and the benefit in recording one's writing time while allowing grace for a broad definition of writing time that may or may not include thinking time. Luna Adler is a Brooklyn-based writer and illustrator. She's currently an MFA candidate in fiction at Brooklyn College, where she was a recipient of the Truman Capote Fellowship. She is a fiction editor for The Brooklyn Review and a reader for Pigeon Pages. Her words, art, and comics have appeared or are forthcoming in Bon Appétit, Bust Magazine, Interview Magazine, Literary Hub, Gossamer, Autostraddle, Electric Literature, Backpacker Magazine, The Rumpus, The Belladonna Comedy, Hobart Pulp, and Lux Magazine, among others. Find her on Instagram @lunaadler or at lunaadler.com, where you can subscribe to her illustrated newsletter. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Kate Brody, debut author of the literary thriller RABBIT HOLE, sits down with Jared to talk about crafting a true crime novel that focuses on the victim's family. Drawing from her own experiences with publishing, she also offers advice for choosing an agent, pivoting if your book doesn't sell, and marketing your work. Finally, she shares the most memorable pieces of advice from her own MFA teachers, including Mary Gaitskill, E.L. Doctorow, and Amy Hempel. Kate Brody holds an MFA from NYU and her work has been published or is forthcoming in The New York Times, Parents, Crime Reads, Lit Hub, Electric Lit, Noema, The Literary Review, Write or Die, and other magazines. RABBIT HOLE is her debut. Find her on Instagram and Twitter @katebrodyauthor and at her website: katebrodyauthor.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Noah Evan Wilson spent ten years finishing his undergraduate degree while developing as a musician and a photographer. On this episode, he talks with Jared about how that decade of experiences animates his current writing, how the craft of music and photography overlaps with and informs his fiction, and how the MFA has provided him the opportunity to experience college in a way he wasn't able to before. Noah Evan Wilson is a writer and musician based in New York City, and a second-year MFA candidate at Rutgers University-Newark, in the fiction track. His short stories have been published in Beyond Words, Third Street Review, and the anthology, Ten Ways the Animals Will Save Us, from Retreat West Books. He received third place in the 2022 Dreamers Creative Writing Flash Fiction Contest, and second place in the 2021 Prime Number Magazine Flash Fiction Prize, and has stories forthcoming in both Chautauqua and Orca. Noah is currently working on his first novel, exploring the lasting power of a brief and intimate friendship between two young men who become entangled with a high-control religious cult. His solo records, Desert Cities, and The View from the Ground, are available on all major music streaming platforms. Find him at noahevanwilson.com or on Instagram @NoahEvanWilson. This episode was requested by Marisha Hicks and Dawn Angelica. Thank you for listening, Marisha and Dawn! MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Happy New Year from the pod team! We're ringing in 2024 with a vacation, so enjoy this episode from our last season. Regular programming will resume in two weeks. What's it like writing historical fiction in an MFA program? On this episode, Kayla Cayasso tells Jared about the family histories and archival research that informed her collection portraying families affected by generational trauma. She also talks about the unique role of Florida in Southern literature, the advantages of multi-genre workshops, and the importance of Black and Brown representation in literature. Kayla Cayasso is an Afro-Latina writer and poet from North Florida. She is a recipient of the 2012 Hollins Creative Writing Book Award, the Florida A&M University Graduate Feeder Fellowship, and placed first in Fiction in the 2021 FAMU Annual Writing Contest. She has stories, poetry, and essays published in CaKe Literary Journal, Olit Magazine, Hyacinth Review, Jabberwock Review, The Amistad, River & South Review, Saw Palm, and elsewhere. Kayla graduated from the University of Central Florida in 2023, where she received a Creative Writing MFA in fiction. Her thesis, a historical fiction collection titled Save the Drowning Child, draws on traditional elements of Southern Gothic, horror, and magical realism to explore the impacts of colonialism and the Maafa on the North Florida region and its Black and Brown peoples. Find her at her website, cayassokg.wixsite.com/writes, and on Instagram @while.smoke.rises. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
When she became a mother, Sarah Ann Noel turned to autofiction as a way to process her own childhood. In this episode, she sits down with Jared to share how those reflections became a novel about teenagers growing up in a high-control Evangelical environment. Plus, she talks about shifting from magazine editing to creative writing, attending jet-lagged residencies in Paris, and getting feedback on her work from her literary heroes. Sarah Ann Noel is a writer and editor of fiction and non-fiction. She holds an MFA from NYU's Writers Workshop in Paris. Her first short story will appear in After Dinner Conversations in April 2024. She is the Co-Founder of the Read Write Brew reading series in Denver. Find her at sarahannnoel.com or on Instagram @sarahannnoel. This episode was requested by Ryan Babcock. Thank you for listening, Ryan! MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Finance proofreader turned full-time poet Matt Farley joins Jared to share how his transition out of the corporate world affects his perspective on his MFA program and future career. Plus, Matt talks about his manuscript on mycology and post-traumatic growth, becoming a parent during the MFA, setting up a thesis committee, and Miami University's emphasis on play, practice, and experimental learning. Matt Farley is a queer poet, activist, and multimedia artist from Ohio. He is currently studying to earn his MFA from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. His work explores liminality, queer identity, family, and shame. He has work published in the anthology SOS Art Cincinnati presents Poems and Drawings Inspired by Social Justice. Find him on Instagram @mattfarleywrites. This episode was requested by Rajiv Thind. Thank you for listening, Rajiv! MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
During this season of gratitude, we are grateful for all of you, dear listeners, writers, and friends. We're also grateful for a university-sponsored break from our laptops. So, as we take a pause from the screens, we hope you enjoy one of our favorites from Season 3. We'll be back to our regular programming in two weeks. Jonathan Escoffery, author of the highly acclaimed debut collection If I Survive You, sits down with Jared to discuss how this book grew out of his MFA writing sample and how he plays with form while exploring “the unsolvable problem of family.” A recent MFA graduate and current PhD student, Jonathan also offers advice for emerging writers and shares what it's like to go on your first book tour. Jonathan Escoffery is the author of the linked story collection, If I Survive You, a New York Times Editor's Choice and an Indie National Bestseller. If I Survive You (MCDxFSG) was long-listed for the National Book Award, the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence, and was a finalist for the Southern Book Prize and a Golden Poppy Award. Jonathan is a graduate of the University of Minnesota's Creative Writing MFA Program and currently attends the University of Southern California's Ph.D. in Creative Writing and Literature Program as a Provost Fellow. He is a 2021-2023 Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University. Learn more at his website, www.jonathanescoffery.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
This week, an MFA with an international focus! Krista Diamond sits down with Jared to talk about UNLV's required (and funded) study abroad component and its emphasis on translation. Plus, Krista shares lessons learned as a freelance writer, info on the Vegas literary community, and how her experience working and living in national parks informs her fiction and nonfiction alike. Krista Diamond is a Las Vegas based writer whose work has appeared in or is forthcoming in The New York Times, Longreads, Hazlitt, Catapult, Electric Literature, Joyland, and elsewhere. Her writing has been supported by Tin House and Bread Loaf. Her essay “That Girl is Going to Get Herself Killed,” which first appeared in Longreads, was adapted for audio by Oscar-nominated actress Naomie Harris. She is currently a third year in the fiction MFA program at the University of Nevada Las Vegas, where she is working on a novel about paparazzi. Learn more at www.kristamariediamond.com and on Twitter at @kristadiamond. This episode was requested by CC Molaison. Thank you for listening, CC! MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Happy MFA Application Season to all who celebrate! Jess Silfa returns to the show bringing seven years of experience with the MFA Draft Facebook Group. On this episode, Jess and Jared offer advice for applicants across a wide range of topics: teaching, funding, health insurance, fees, faculty, letters of recommendation, writing samples, statements of purpose, negotiations, timelines, and more. Good luck, friends. Jess Silfa is a writer and poet from the South Bronx. They hold an MFA from Vanderbilt University in Creative Writing (Fiction) and are currently pursuing their Ph.D. in Creative Writing at the University of Cincinnati. They have received a Displaced Artist Fellowship from Vermont Studio Center, a grant from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Mae Fellowship, and a Ricardo Salinas Scholarship for Aspen Summer Words. Jess serves as President for the Disabled and D/deaf Writers Caucus and helps run the MFA Draft Facebook group. Jess's first novel, the story of a tight-knit immigrant community rattled by the war on drugs, goes on submission this fall. Learn more at www.jesilfa.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Spooky season? More like application season! To help ease your fright, we've got our annual MFA application episode in preparation. Before then, we invite you to check in with last year's episode featuring MFA Admissions Coordinator Lindsay Bernal. Our new episode will be in your feed in two weeks. It's the third annual MFA application episode! This time, Jared is joined by Lindsay Bernal, poet and Academic Coordinator for the MFA program at the University of Maryland. She answers listener questions (starting at 27:15), including: What makes a personal statement good? Should I submit similar or varied poems? How do I know whether a program is truly invested in anti-racist work? Plus, Lindsay describes her path to an MFA, taking time between degrees, and the pros and cons of academic jobs, including positions beyond the tenure track. Lindsay Bernal was born and raised in Rochester, NY, and holds a B.A. in English and Spanish from the University of Virginia and an M.F.A. in Poetry from the University of Maryland, where she coordinates and teaches in the Creative Writing Program and co-directs the Writers Here & Now reading series. Her first collection of poems, What It Doesn't Have to Do With, selected by Paul Guest as a winner of the National Poetry Series competition, was published by the University of Georgia Press in 2018. Find her at her website: www.lindsaybernal.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Poetic forms are sometimes considered limiting, but can we find freedom within the constraints? On this episode, Brandon Blue tells Jared about how recontextualizing traditional forms through the lens of identity creates an additional, sometimes subversive, layer of meaning. Plus, he discusses writing about intimacy and eroticism within and outside of sexual relationships; how he decided to pursue an MFA after teaching middle and high school for seven years; and the importance of advocating for your needs and goals in an MFA program, writing community, and career. Brandon Blue is a black, queer poet, educator and MFA candidate at Arizona State University from the D(M)V. He is an assistant editor for Storm Cellar Magazine and his work has or will appear in Barzakh, the Saints and Sinners Literary Festival Poetry Anthology, [PANK], and more. His work is also featured in the Capital Pride Poem-a-Day event. His work has received the support of the Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing. His chapbook, Snap.Shot, is forthcoming from Finishing Line Press. Keep up with his work at brandonbluepoet.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
What can you learn from a veteran of two MFA programs and an admin of the MFA Draft Facebook page? A lot! Jess Silfa joins Jared to talk about how living in New York, growing up in a Caribbean oral storytelling tradition, and being disabled has influenced their writing. They also discuss their decision to leave one MFA program for another, explain what makes Nashville a surprisingly supportive community, and offer advice for disabled applicants. Jess Silfa is a writer and poet from the South Bronx. They hold an MFA from Vanderbilt University in Creative Writing (Fiction) and are currently pursuing their Ph.D. in Creative Writing at the University of Cincinnati. They have received a Displaced Artist Fellowship from Vermont Studio Center, a grant from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Mae Fellowship, and a Ricardo Salinas Scholarship for Aspen Summer Words. Jess serves as President for the Disabled and D/deaf Writers Caucus and helps run the MFA Draft Facebook group. Jess's first novel, the story of a tight-knit immigrant community rattled by the war on drugs, goes on submission this fall. Learn more at www.jesilfa.com. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Poet, essayist, and Professor Ross Gay talks to Jared about his new book, The Book of (More) Delights. Together, they discuss how social connection evokes joy, grief, humility, and heartbreak, and the value of practicing radical empathy in our writing and our daily lives. Plus, they talk about Ross's approach to the creative writing classroom, a space he conceives of as generative, experimental, and cooperative. Finally, he offers advice for students and emerging writers. Ross Gay is the author of four books of poetry: Against Which; Bringing the Shovel Down; Be Holding, winner of the PEN American Literary Jean Stein Award; and Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude, winner of the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award and the 2016 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award. In addition to his poetry, Ross has released three collections of essays—The Book of Delights was released in 2019 and was a New York Times bestseller; Inciting Joy was released in 2022, and his newest collection, The Book of (More) Delights was released in September of 2023. Find him at his website: rossgay.net. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
The pod team is wrapping up our summer vacation. In the meantime, we're rereleasing one of our favorite episodes from our first season. We'll be back with new and exciting episodes in two weeks. How is the zombie of Haitian folklore a poetic metaphor for how society treats Blackness? Bryan Byrdlong of the Helen Zell Writers' Program at the University of Michigan tells Jared about his project on the traditional and modern conceptualization of zombies, whether poetry can transcend fake news, and how his MFA program gave him an inner editorial voice. Bryan Byrdlong is a Black poet from Chicago, Illinois. In high school, he was part of Chicago's Louder than a Bomb poetry slam competition. He graduated from Vanderbilt University where he received an undergraduate English/Creative Writing degree and was the co-recipient of the Merrill Moore Award for Poetry upon graduation. He has been published in the Nashville Review, Heavy Feather Review, and Pleiades Magazine. Most recently, he received the Gregory Djanaikian Scholarship from The Adroit Journal. He is a graduate of the Helen Zell Writers' Program at the University of Michigan and a current Zell Fellow. You can find him on Twitter @BByrdlong. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
The pod team is on summer vacation! While we rest, recharge, and record some fabulous Season 4 episodes, we hope you enjoy this rerelease from our first season. With political and social unrest rocking his home country of Venezuela, Alejandro Puyana turned to writing as a way to process. He applied to MFA programs four times before landing an acceptance at the Michener Center for Writers. Now, you can read his work in The Best American Short Stories anthology for 2020. Alejandro and Jared talk rejection, revision, and reimagining the world through fiction. Alejandro Puyana is a second-year fellow at the Michener Center for Writers whose primary focus is fiction and secondary genre is screenwriting. His non-fiction pieces have been published in The Toast, Tin House Online, NPR, The Huffington Post; his fiction in Huizache, The Examined Life, and Idaho Review. His short story, "Hands of Dirty Children" was awarded the Halifax Ranch Prize by American Short Fiction, chosen as the winning story by ZZ Packer. That same story was then chosen by Curtis Sittenfeld to be included in the 2020 Best American Short Stories. Find him on Twitter @Puyana. MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
Prose encompasses fiction and nonfiction, but how does the genre affect our process? On this episode, Amanda Scott discusses her “fragmented” approach to the page both across genres and with hybrid techniques. Plus, she discusses how diverse family backgrounds have shaped her identity and writing, as well as how her background in technical communication and her editorial experience informs her current PhD work. Finally, Amanda and Jared chat about the thriving literary scene in Kalamazoo and the challenges and rewards of being a student after spending years as an instructor. Originally from Houston, Amanda E. Scott is a Latinx writer currently pursuing a PhD in fiction at Western Michigan University, where she also serves as Editor-in-Chief of Third Coast Magazine. She is also co-founder and Assistant Executive Editor of Porter House Review, and her writing has been published in Crab Orchard Review, Gulf Coast, HAD, Hayden's Ferry Review, New South, and elsewhere. Find her on Twitter and Instagram @alizscott. This episode was requested by Jared Kubokawa. Thank you for listening, Jared! MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack and Hanamori Skoblow. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com. BE PART OF THE SHOW — Donate to the show at Buy Me a Coffee. — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. — Submit an episode request. If there's a program you'd like to learn more about, contact us and we'll do our very best to find a guest who can speak to their experience. — Apply to be a guest on the show by filling out our application. STAY CONNECTED Twitter: @MFAwriterspod Instagram: @MFAwriterspodcast Facebook: MFA Writers Email: mfawriterspodcast@gmail.com
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