MFA Writers

It’s increasingly common for writers to get accepted in their second (or third) attempts at MFA applications. In this episode, Sean Dolan shares what he did differently his second time around that strengthened his application and landed him a spot in a fully-funded, genre-flexible program. Plus, he and Jared talk about how they return to the page even when it’s hard, the blurred line between autofiction and fiction, and, in Sean’s words, “the ephemeral experience of a short story.” Sean Dolan is a fiction writer from Missouri. His work has appeared in Hobart, 805 Lit + Art, The Los Angeles Review, and elsewhere. He is currently an MFA Candidate at Western Washington University where he is at work on his thesis -- a collection of short stories. He recently attended the Tin House Summer Workshop and will begin his position as Managing Editor of The Bellingham Review in the fall. You can find him on Twitter @SyannDoelann. 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

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 on Twitter @ByEmilyStMartin and on TikTok at @edddrock. 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

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. This episode was requested by Erika Walsh. Thank you for listening, Erika! 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, Podchaser, or Podcast Addict. — 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 engaging discussion, Steven Duong, a second-year MFA candidate at the Iowa Writers' Workshop, shares insights on his journey from poetry to fiction. He contrasts the competitive expectations of Iowa with the supportive community he found. Duong explores the relationship between poetry and narrative, discussing how constraints fuel creativity. He also delves into the blending of genres and how his diverse background shapes his writing. Listeners will find inspiration in his reflections on the transformative power of community and collaboration in the writing process.

This week, as the pod team enjoys the last of our vacation, we’ve got a rerelease of a special episode from Season 2 of the podcast: Jared's conversation with George Saunders. This episode is full of advice for emerging writers, especially those considering an MFA. We’ll be back in two weeks with an all-new episode, the first of Season 3. 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, Podchaser, or Podcast Addict. — 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

Pod's out for summer! We wrapped up Season 2 on our last episode and are busy planning Season 3. In the meantime, enjoy one of our favorite episodes from this past season. We’ll be back in August with brand new episodes.  Jared talks to O. Henry Prize winner Adachioma Ezeano of the University of Kentucky about finding her love of literature through Nigerian novels and folktales, learning craft from strong women, and workshopping without the gag order in favor of Crystal Wilkinson’s wild card critique musings. Adachioma Ezeano is a 2021 O. Henry Prize recipient. She is a second-year fiction candidate in the MFA program at University of Kentucky. She is an alum of Purple Hibiscus Workshop. Her fiction appears or is forthcoming in McSweeney's Quarterly, Flashback Fiction, Isele Magazine, Best Small Fictions 2020, and The Best Short Stories 2021. She is Igbo, from Nigeria, and worked with First Bank Nigeria before moving to Kentucky for her MFA. She tweets @adachiomaezeano. 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, Podchaser, or Podcast Addict. — 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 the season 2 finale, Taylor Byas talks to Jared about how her fiction background helps her develop sharp images and accessible lines in her poetry while her poetic knowledge taught her to take more risks in her fiction. She also describes the value of a social media writing community (and how to build one), whether publishing success eliminates imposter syndrome (spoiler: it does not), and how her scholarly studies in her PhD program inform and enrich her creative work (and how to survive the comprehensive exam). MFA Writers will be back in your airwaves in August. Wishing you all a great summer, dear friends, and thank you for listening. Taylor Byas is a Black Chicago native currently living in Cincinnati, Ohio, where she is now a PhD candidate and Yates scholar at the University of Cincinnati, and an Assistant Features Editor for The Rumpus. She is the 1st place winner of the 2020 Poetry Super Highway, the 2020 Frontier Poetry Award for New Poets Contests, the 2021 Adrienne Rich Poetry Prize, and a finalist for the 2020 Frontier OPEN Prize. She is the author of the chapbook Bloodwarm from Variant Lit, a second chapbook, Shutter, from Madhouse Press, and her debut full-length, I Done Clicked My Heels Three Times, forthcoming from Soft Skull Press in Spring of 2023. She is represented by Rena Rossner of the Deborah Harris Agency. Find her at her website www.taylorbyas.com and on Twitter @TaylorByas3. 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, Podchaser, or Podcast Addict. — 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

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. This episode was requested by Marcia Bronstein. Thank you for listening, Marcia! BE PART OF THE SHOW — Leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, Podchaser, or Podcast Addict. — 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

Taylor Sklenar of Iowa State University’s MFA in Creative Writing and the Environment talks with Jared about how growing up in a small town influenced his interests in chemistry and theatre, combining those interests in the MFA, and the myriad considerations that go into writing for the stage. Along the way, they talk about the many unique opportunities at ISU, including editing the Flyway Journal, running the Emerging Writers Reading Series, participating in political action through the EcoTheatre Lab, maintaining the Everett Casey Nature Reserve, and going on writer’s retreats to Lake Okoboji. Taylor Sklenar is a playwright, poet, and theatre artist pursuing his MFA in Creative Writing and the Environment and MS in Sustainable Agriculture at Iowa State University. He received an MA in Theatre from the University of Missouri, Columbia. His writing has been workshopped or produced at Tallgrass Theatre’s Iowa Playwrights’ Workshop, StageWest Des Moines’ Scriptease, Theatre Cedar Rapids, and many other places. His most recent collaboration, Alice in Quarantine: a Drive-Through Adventure, is published with Next State Press. 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, Podchaser, or Podcast Addict. — 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, James Craig Hartz Jr., a Combat Medic turned MFA graduate, tells Jared about flipping the traditional military homecoming story into one filled with resilience, hope, and hard-won healing. He also discusses the role of mythology in modern fiction, the criticality of OSU’s graduate student union for pay and benefits, and his experience of concentrated solitude and intentional boredom at a graduate student writing retreat in the Oregon woods. James Craig Hartz Jr. earned his MFA in fiction from Oregon State University after serving four years in the US Army as a Combat Medic. His writing has appeared in Witness Magazine, the tiny journal, F(r)iction, and Watershed Review. His fiction has been nominated for Best American Short Stories and he is the winner of Witness Magazine’s 2022 Literary Award in Nonfiction and the tiny journal's "(re)tell me a story contest.” Find him on Twitter @jchartz2 and at his website: www.jamescraighartzjr.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, Podchaser, or Podcast Addict. — 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