Big Think: Lionel Shriver on the “Unwholesome” Side of MFA Programs
By Celeste Ng
Lionel Shriver / photo by Terri Gelenian-Wood / Via http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Lionel_Shriver_for_Wikipedia.jpg
[It] does have a kind of indulgent, middle-class gestalt. The grim truth is that most people who get MFAs will not go on to be professional writers and therefore when I’ve been on the other side of it and occasionally taught creative writing, I felt a little bit guilty because so many of the people that you should be encouraging, because there’s no point to it if you’re not encouraging, are not going to make it. And I think that’s true across the board in the arts.
Watch the whole video here. And tell us: if you attended an MFA program, did you find it helpful? If you teach creative writing, do you feel “guilty” at encouraging writers who, statistically speaking, are almost certainly never going to make it?
I don’t have an M.F.A, but I hope to enter a program in the near future.
With that being said, I feel in no way hesitant about going in that direction. I understand Shriver’s concern, but I see the situation differently. Personally, I want to teach AND write, making the M.F.A. a good degree for me, as I can develop my craft, but also put myself in a position to teach. I realize that CW positions, especially on a tenure level, are difficult to come by, but an M.F.A. gives me dual opportunities.
Shriver seems to discount the teaching opportunities. Teaching, it seems, sustains the arts, carries on the traditions and experiences. Many people, I know, share my want to teach and write, and the M.F.A. seems a good degree to get there.