Vicarious MFA: Jonathan Safran Foer & David Markson
The Vicarious MFA
Last Friday Jonathan Safran-Foer came to do a guest lecture titled “Intersections.” It was clear that he put a lot of work and thought into the lecture and I feel like I will do it a disservice by trying to describe his overall “point,” but I will say that he showed us this short video of a completely insane intersection in Hanoi. Please click on that. It is ridiculous. He also mentioned that one of the buildings on Columbia’s campus (one that is right by the Writing Department) used to be a part of the Bloomingdale Insane Asylum. He also mentioned Hiroshi Sugimoto, a photographer who Jonathan Safran-Foer wrote a fan letter to when he was in college and whom he later got to collaborate with on a project called “Joe.”
There was a point to Safran-Foer’s guest lecture and I felt smarter and more calm when I left, but I can’t quite say why. From what I have gathered in the past 3.5 semesters in an MFA program, this is what it feels like: I have learned something; I feel different/better; I can’t explain why/what happened. READ MORE >
The Vicarious MFA: Let’s Talk About Carl Wilson
Carl Wilson is an adorably nervous Canadian music critic who lives in Toronto and he came to do a little Q & A with some students here yesterday. Carl wrote a great book in the 33 1/3 series about Celine Dion and we read it in Jonathan Lethem’s masterclass a few weeks ago. That would have been the end of the story if it hadn’t been for James Franco mentioning the book while at the Oscars and a bunch of blogs (Pitchfork, Idolator, The Village Voice, etc.) making a ruckus about it. Then he got invited to be on The Colbert Report, thus leading him to Columbia’s Writing department to say hello and presumably thank James for the name dropping.
Discussed:
-Aesthetic relativism
-Autobiographies of taste
-Remembering that Celine Dion is a human being
More notes after the jump…
The Vicarious MFA
The Vicarious MFA: all the fun of an MFA, without the embarrassing degree!
I had a sad realization last Monday in the Non/Fiction seminar. We were discussing Beauty Before Comfort by Allison Glock. This book came out in 2003 and was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year but just six years later it’s out of print. Benson said this is another good reason to go with an independent publisher, since they tend to keep their stock in print for as long as possible. Even so, it’s a little depressing that your work can get lots of gold stars on minute and be marked way, way down at The Strand the next minute.
We started class with a writing exercize (not a normal practice in a seminar, but a welcome deviation.)
“Describe someone you know in third person, but in the way you think that they see themselves. A paragraph or so into it, add something that they might not nesscessarily know about themselves– your perspective/interpretation of their behavior or personality.” Good fun.
Read David Markson’s Reader’s Block for next Monday. Read Kathleen Norris’s Dakota for Thursday and give a presentation about the transgenerational epigenetic effects of endocrine-disruptive chemicals on mate selection in female rats for Friday. (yikes!)
Also on Friday, Jonathan Safran-Foer is coming to do a talk titled “Intersections” for a small group of grad students (which is neat because usually these lectures get a little crowded and/or infultrated with eager, bad-question-asking undergrads.)
Vicarious MFA: Week in review
The Vicarious MFA
Monday: In Amy Benson’s Non/Fiction class we discussed The Things They Carried. Everybody liked it, said smart things, left feeling hopeful. Read “Beauty Before Comfort” by Allison Glock for next week.
+In Lethem’s class we talked about Joe Brainard’s “I Remember” and Carl Wilson’s “Let’s Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste” which was endorsed by a classmate here.
+Joyce Carol Oates came to lecture. (See notes here.)
Tuesday: I turned in a workshop submission.
Wednesday: Lethem took a group from the class to a secret bookstore which is described here. I bought “What Maise Knew” by Henry James. The copy I got is really old and has an Edward Gorey illustration on the cover. There was a whole section of the store devoted to Edward Gorey covers. I can’t explain how great this place was. If any of you are ever in New York let me know and I will try to get you an appointment there.
Thursday: Discussed In Patagonia by Bruce Chatwin and an awesome profile of Chatwin by David Plante. Read Dakota by Kathleen Norris for next week.
**I feel like including my notes is kind of useless for the VMFA, and that the reading lists are what you really want.**
Joyce Carol Oates thinks you should get a life, is on suicide watch
Random Undergrad Question-Asker: I was wondering what you think of blogging?
Joyce Carol Oates: Blogging? What I think of blogging?
RUQA: Um, yeah.
JCO: Well I think that anyone who’s worried about their blogging is wasting their time. Next question? READ MORE >
The Vicarious MFA: Weekend Reading Assignment & Abbreviated Notes
The Vicarious MFA
For Monday:
The Things They Carried by Tim Obrien
I Remember by Joe Brainard
Let’s Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste by Carl Wilson
(I’ve only just started this, but it is awesome. It’s a book that is all about Celine Dion’s album Let’s Talk About Love {the one with the Titanic song on it.} Some chapter titles: Let’s Talk About Schmatlz, Let’s Talk About Hate, Let’s Talk in French and Let’s Sing Really Loud. I am psyched to see Celine Dion burned at the stake of bad taste.)
For Tuesday:
Three Workshop Submissions (60 pages)
Turn-in second workshop piece
For Thursday:
In Patagonia by Bruce Chatwin
For Friday:
More stuff I don’t understand for Psychology elective
(see the presentation I gave last week)
Incredibly abbreviated notes from 2 weeks of The First Book seminar are after the jump….
Vicarious MFA: Two week round-up.
The Vicarious MFA
The thing about getting an MFA is that time tends to move really quickly when your “job” is to read and talk about great books and write on a deadline all the time. So, it looks like two weeks went by without me really noticing. Things were discussed. Revelations were had. D’agata talked about dancing in sequined pants…
First, the notes from John D’agata lecture:
Vicarious MFA: Note Taking
The dreaded blank page.
Discussed in Non/Fiction:
A Lie That Tells the Truth: Memoir and the Art of Memory by Joel Agee
A great essay about the memoir in the modern age that anyone working in fiction or nonfiction should read. (What are un-bendable facts? Where does lying end and art begin? Fact ≠ Truth.)
We talked about how much we liked Another Bullshit Night in Suck City * and/or what sections were brilliant and which were just myehh. Most were brilliant.
One of the assigned readings that we didn’t talk about was Jo Anne Beard’s Werner. Excellently strange essay. Would have liked to hear someone’s opinion on it. (It’s in the Best American Essay edited by DF Wallace if you’ve got that on your bookshelf and want to read it and report back to me. No pressure.)
Writing Assignment: Write a short piece (or essay or story) that responds to the title, “The Use of Nonfiction.”
Read By 2/9: Needs by George W.S. Trow, Captivity by Sherman Alexie, “…and nobody objected” by Paul Metcalf, and A Tin Butterfly by Mary McCarthy (a selection from Memories of a Catholic Girlhood.)
Lethem’s Masterclass was full of zingers. Lots of furious note taking and laughter.
Here’s an idea: What if Wikipedia means the death of post-modern uncertainness? What if Wikipedia necessitates the end of the novel of facts, the novel that is freckled with reportage? Lethem said something to the effect of “putting a fact in your novel is almost a wasted line,” considering that anyone can look up almost anything at any time on the internet.
We mostly talked about Terry Castle’s My Heroine Christmas and The White Album by Joan Didion. Both awesome.
Read by 2/9: Out of Sheer Rage by Jeff Dyer, which looks fun because I took a killer DHL survey my first semester here and I am still digesting
Vicarious MFA: Participation Grade
We always get really great guest speakers here and I always wish I had a good question at the end, but I never do.
John D’Agata is doing a talk about something next week, and I know you kids love D’agata, so let’s come up with something good. Post your inquiries in the comments, and assuming that a good question is generated and I get the chance to ask it, I will post his answer here also.
Vicarious MFA: Assignment for Monday
The Vicarious MFA
For Jonathan Lethem’s Masterclass about the essay:
1. Joan Didion’s “The White Album”
2. David Antin’s “The Theory And Practice of Postmodernism: A Manifesto”
3. Annie Dillard’s “Total Eclipse”
4. John D’Agata’s running commentary in between the various entries.
(All of these can be found in The Next American Essay, edited by John D’Agata)
Also, it was your turn to hand-in an essay yesterday, so I hope you did it. And I should probably remind you that that psychology book isn’t going to read itself by 10 AM this Friday.
Vicarious MFA: 3 classes & assignments.
The Vicarious MFA
School is in session! I got an email saying to go get “The Next American Essay” edited by John D’Agata and read a bunch of essays in it by Feb 2, when the Lethem masterclass starts. Hoorah. First classes for The First Book, Inheritance and Non/Fiction are after the jump….
The Vicarious MFA, Part One
Don’t let the economy stop you from getting that Creative Writing MFA you’ve always dreamed of! Or, maybe, do let it stop you and just get the knock-off version here. For this semester everyone reading this blog has a full scholarship to get a Vicarious MFA from me/Columbia. Tomorrow’s the first day of class, so I thought I might post a back-to-school warm up, in the Jimmy Chen fashion, using Google image search to find out what the internet thinks you can expect from your Creative Writing MFA.
Your new, narcissistic friends will always look like they’re posing for their (future) author photos.
Make sure you take advantage of free hot dog condiments because it’s probably the only meal you can afford today.
Get ready to have your stories torn apart by your workshop professor who brings in his dog to illustrate how worthless your work is.
