So you’ve been writing, revising, reading magazines and books (as I suggested in Part 1 of this series), and you feel like you’re ready to start the application process. How can you navigate the difficult journey to an MFA? Fortunately, there are a lot of resources that can help you choose a program and figure outContinue reading “How to Prepare to Apply for an MFA Program, Part 2”
Author Archives: Kendall Dunkelberg
How to Prepare to Apply to an MFA Program, Part 1
Okay, so you want to apply for an MFA in Creative Writing, but you don’t know whether you’re good enough or where to start. You want to brush up on your writing and you want to put together the best application you possibly can. But how? In this post, I’ll try to give you someContinue reading “How to Prepare to Apply to an MFA Program, Part 1”
Meet Me at the Book Festival
One of the great developments for writers in recent years has been the inception of state-wide or regional book festivals across the country. Mississippi holds its @MSBookFest in August on the Capitol lawn, and I’ll be there next weekend, August 17, for the fifth year. My first time, I went as a volunteer. My second year,Continue reading “Meet Me at the Book Festival”
Learning from My Students
When I first started The W’s MFA in Creative Writing, I wrote in our Student Handbook (which I’ve been editing this summer) that the students are our colleagues, perhaps the teachers are a little further along in their writing careers (though not always older), but the students shouldn’t feel like they are any less becauseContinue reading “Learning from My Students”
Fig Pesto Pizza
We have another bumper crop of figs this year, and since we don’t make fig jam or fig preserves, we are always on the lookout for good ways to use them. Sure we freeze quite a few to enjoy later in the year (just wash, let dry, and freeze whole), but we love eating themContinue reading “Fig Pesto Pizza”
My First Decade as Occasional Blogger
Recently, WordPress was kind enough to inform me that this month is my 10th aniversary of writing this blog. As I looked back, I noticed the very first first post was July 24, 2009. What a long, fun, and a little crazy trip it’s been. I started blogging mostly as a dare to myself. I’mContinue reading “My First Decade as Occasional Blogger”
Keeping the Res in Low-Residency MFA
As our low-residency MFA program enters its fifth year, it seems like a good time to reflect on where we’ve come and how we’ve evolved, and that includes why we’re committed to the low-res format for the degree. Our program is different from many low-res MFAs out there because we follow an online class model.Continue reading “Keeping the Res in Low-Residency MFA”
The Best Little MFA
t’s been four years since we started the low-residency MFA program in creative writing at Mississippi University for Women, and in that time, I think we’ve created the best MFA of it’s size around
Facebook, You’re Such a Nag
Or Why writers Should All Say No to Constant Content I don’t know about you, but I manage several groups and pages on Facebook, and one constant source of annoyance is the notifications that my readers haven’t heard from me in awhile. The only thing more annoying are the ones telling me a post isContinue reading “Facebook, You’re Such a Nag”
The Art of Implication: replying to emails
If there’s one thing I’ve learned over many years of replying to email as an educator and a literary magazine editor, it’s to take a deep breath before writing a reply and to imply the things I’d like to say. So you can imagine the reply I might have sent to the submitter tone ourContinue reading “The Art of Implication: replying to emails”