The Postgraduate Writers Conference at VCFA (2009 Edition)

After all the inspiration that overwhelmed me, along with some bad stomachaches, from the Pan African Literary Forum last year I decided I needed to be active and continue on with another writing conference this summer. However, I decided to stay stateside.

I narrowed it down to two conferences, both of which I heard about via Poets & Writers magazine. P&W started to dedicate a section of their magazine's bi-monthly space to conferences and residencies, and the Postgraduate Writers Conference in Montpelier was one of those mentioned. I had never been farther north or east of the US, only to some parts of Ontario in Canada. And hearing that Vermont is lovely I figured it wouldn't hurt since the travel to the nation's smallest capital would be cheap, plus it wouldn't cost me as much as it would to go across the world.

One of the things that solidified my decision to attend this conference was the consistent and friendly communication from the program's director, Ellen Lesser. When I emailed people at the other conference I was interested in I got various delays in response. And when it came down to the wire for me to make my decision and know my status I didn't get an answer for a week or so and then having found out I didn't get my first (and only choice for an instructor) I was offered an opening in a genre class rather than the literary class I had requested. This subpar way of getting me to join the conference by the director to fill in some gaps irritated me because it was obvious that he didn't have any idea of what my work was about and how it wouldn't fit with the workshop he was trying to sell me on. I quickly contacted Ms. Lesser and said that I was hoping she still had an opening in her short story class. Within the day Ellen responded back and I hot-tailed it to the post office to buy stamps and send over my deposit.

The Postgraduate Writers Conference has several things going for it in my opinion:

1. Clientele: Target attendees are those with graduate degrees or in the process of getting a graduate degree. Hence they'll have familiarity with the workshop process.
2. Size: Workshop classes are no larger than 6 or so people. For a five day conference this means that people will be critiqued thoroughly and possibly have time left over for additional discussions in workshop classes. One of my classmates told me the Suwanee conference has 15 people in a workshop and at Pan African Lit Forum that number can range from as few as four to as many as ten.
3. Classes: The separation of classes from larger scale works and smaller works was a big draw. There were two workshops for novels, two for short stories, three for poetry manuscript, one for poetry, two for non-fiction, and two for YA. Not a lot of conferences split up fiction between novel and short story. Usually the two are lumped together. So knowing beforehand that someone's piece was short and being able to judge it on that made classes run smoother and more efficiently in my opinion since a larger work didn't have to be discussed (except in my and another classmates case in which we're doing linked short story collections). I do hope more conferences and perhaps even some graduate programs split the two up so people can focus more on the structure of a condense story and others on the evolvement of a larger work.
4. Location: The capital of Montpelier has a nice city in the downtown area that is only a ten minute walk down a hill from the Vermont College of Fine Arts campus. There are plenty of nice eateries in downtown Montpelier and the population there is extremely polite and helpful. Of course it's nice to have a car to go further out, but not necessary.
5. Staff: Full of reputable authors and poets there's definitely a strong roster of people who truly care about helping you develop your work and are adamant about one-on-one sessions with their students.
6. Full Schedule: This can be a good and/or bad thing. With the packed schedule for readings, lectures, workshops, additional classes, evening social events, hiking, etc. it can get pretty jam packed. What I appreciated most were the Participant readings where one could hear the work other people in other workshops were reading. This proved to be helpful in being more social when admiring someone's work a fruitful discussion on craft could commence. (Not all conferences do this for the participants and considering size it can be understandable.)
7. Cost: Compared to some conferences the cost for room, board, the conference itself, and food came in under $1200. Not including travel costs you're pretty much covered while there. And Montpelier isn't an overly pricey place either. Comparing food prices to those in NYC it's comparable or comes in less.

I think everyone has their worries when entering a workshop. Will people like my work? Will they get my work? Did they even pay attention? Will we get along over the course of the intense five days of workshops and such? And so on and so forth. Seeing that the population at the conference averaged fifty years of age it was good to find out that these people being older made them even more determined to finish their project and hone their craft. They took things seriously, which was a stark contrast to the younger generation I dealt with during my MFA program where many didn't get 70s references or deeper meaning and couldn't (or wouldn't) read between the lines. This time around I met two PhD candidates, a mom and lawyer, an entertainment professional, and a retired English high school teacher in my class who (to my surprise and amazement) read through my two stories thoroughly, providing detailed feedback and concrete advice that helped me immensely. After a while I considered my comments trite after hearing the deep readings done for my works. And our instructor Ellen Lesser proved to be the Braniac of everything! She delved so deep into our works at one point each one of us was left scratching our heads, considering her comments, while in the same breath pointing out that Ellen is a "genius."

For the first two evenings I was a bit of a hermit working on some writing I neglected for the past two months and focused on that. At the halfway point I got more involved in events and got to know my workshop mates a bit more. At different junctures in our life we all had a lot in common nonetheless. Good sense of humor, an enjoyment for letting loose through alcohol, the love of the craft and wanting to make it and ourselves better at it, love of food, and a general concensus that this conference was a really good thing for us.

In lectures I met one of the sweetest women, Sue William Silverman--A non-fiction author who got through and wrote about incest and being a sex addict. She has an affinity for pink and the brightest smile you'll ever see. Her lecture was amazing and in the end bringing up two voices (voice of innoncence and experience) as a tool for non-fiction authors to express themselves was a valuable tool for me writing a character with reminiscent narration. I also attented a lecture about the difference between YA and Adult fiction to hear author An Na break it down to voice. She believed that the voice being present in the action and that of an adult looking back and analyzing these events is the main (and not necessarily sole) difference between the two genres using The Lover and The Chosen as examples. An Na also notes that many of these can cross over to one another, but that authors need to know the difference and not just assume YA literature is "dummed down" literature for the audience. So much of it is rich and intense as is adult fiction so it's not good to assume that your audience isn't as advanced as you'd think.

I met and admired the YA classes reading from their books, the non-fiction writers delving into their lives, the poets reflecting on everything around them, and the fiction writers composing an interesting story and reading it emphatically. And I never hesitated to tell someone when I liked their work. It initiated lots of great conversation from my perspective as a person writing for a more adult audience and engaging in some deep conversation with the YA group and how hard it's been for them to create the worlds they illustrated behind the podium and on the page. I met retired women focusing on writing about subject matter important to them or exorcising their demons. I met young mothers trying to carve a certain amount of intrigue in their story to entice readers. I met men writing about talking dogs and people writing about being raised by hippie, poet parents. And I learned I needed to work on structure and not so much on voice.

I met the most amazing, generous people in a span of five days and am going through some heavy duty withdrawal I must say. I missed my bed and not having to walk down a moth-riddled hallway to the bathroom in the middle of the night (that's dorm life in the country for you). Yet, I didn't miss television. I didn't miss the day-to-day monotony of work and rush hour.

Now, I miss being embroiled in talking about writing on a regular basis. I miss hearing new work that excites me from people all over the country. I miss waking up at 7am and being served pancakes with Vermont's own maple syrup. I miss our daily workshops and readings. And I miss the bright sun beating down on the Vermont College of Fine Arts campus and slowly setting as I sit in front of my computer to plunk down my latest thoughts for my collection in MS Word.

I received a hilarious e-mail from workshop mates these past couple of days referencing things only we'd get and also crying out for the daily intake of cookies we got at lunch & dinner everyday. I'd strongly suggest going to the Postgraduate Conference in Montpelier if not for yourself then for the community because I assure you, you'll be invigorated to keep pushing yourself to get your story out there. If it's important to you it'll be important to them.

Re-jected and it feels somewhat good: Finding the strength to submit (one's work)

Last week I had a short short (or micro story) rejected by an online magazine. Even though the heart immediately begins to race as you read the first few words searching for anything confirming acceptance you then see the word "regret" and feel your heartbeat slow down and all is as it was. Excitement be damned. A year or so ago I blindly (and in the sense of that term mean carelessly) submitted a short shortI had written a few years ago while getting my MFA. Now, when writing short shorts for a workshop class people will be positive about anything that is entertaining for the few minutes they need to hear it. Thus, my short shorts tended to lack depth. But they made people laugh. So thinking that at least some people saw the humor in what I had written I submitted it to a relatively new online zine figuring "what the hell". What the hell indeed came about in an e-mail that said they preferred more mature prose and that the story didn't go anywhere. Hmph, saw that coming. This time around I had worked on a random prompt just to get the juices flowing and kept developing it over a few months. Again I thought "what the hell" and submitted this piece to the same place that had rejected me initially for knowingly sending something subpar. This time I was prouder of my prose and sent it on. Reading the rejection e-mail that was almost two months in the making put a smile on my face because I indeed got much better critique from the editors than I had before. They simply said that the story needed a bigger hook, but that the prose worked and was "solid" and "vivid". Hook I can try to fix. But if they said the voice sucked or that the prose was sloppy or weak again I probably would've just erased the whole incident from memory and acted as though they didn't exist. Knowing that in comparison to the two works they received from me they also so the growth in my narrative voice made me really happy. Yes, the rejection stung still, but vast improvement was made and I did it and they acknowledged it!

Now, let me lay out the types of writers there are in this world when it comes to submissions. There's the writer that toils over every single sentence, every word until it is perfect before submitting anything to anyone, anywhere on this planet. Let alone showing the piece to people and holding their breath as their workshop mates go around the room giving their piece a thumbs up, down, or marginal either way.

There's the writer that composes, may look things over once or twice then submits because they're carefree. What is rejection? It only makes me stronger laughs this "no-holds-barred" writer that throws caution to the wind and has a stack of rejection letters, e-mails, post-its tucked away as their reference to keep on truckin'.

Then there's the reluctant submitter. This is the category I fall into. Why do I not submit? Because I never feel anything is good enough. Yeah it may be better than it was last week, last year, or even in the last decade. Perhaps the prose is steadier, more mature, more vivid, but that doesn't mean it's any good. Yeah, my friends may say it's straight forward and interesting, but once you thrust it out to an editorial board of a large lit mag, small lit mag, or one some hunched over, sleepy-eyed grad students just created to get the stuff "they like to see in print" doesn't mean they'll feel the same way.

I know my voice has grown substantially since I started writing in junior high school, but that still doesn't mean I'll beat out the hundreds of thousands of other aspiring writers in a contest, for publication, or elsewhere. Once it's out there, being read by people in the depths of Mississippi or the most "urban" area of Westchester doesn't mean they'll get my intent. So why even try? Just let the story that slowly increases to stories that inflates into stories & a partially finished novel which will evolve into those two half-done novels, a poetry collection written after a bad break-up, and several dozen stories marinate over time until you're truly ready to have the world (or the editor of Tin House) lay eyes on it and go on to judge it? There's time after all, right?

Judging one's art is the most sensitive thing because (whether you believe it or not) it is a representation of oneself. So when your friends or family look at your painting, listen to your song on a loop, read your story/poem, watch that film you made as your college thesis, listen to the joke you wrote on drunken night many tend to not want to hurt the ego. Some of you may have family and friends who don't mind being an honest, hard-ass or that actually know how to critique your work or someone who'll take the time (if you bake them cookies) to read & absorb your art and tell you what they really think of it. The rest of us may have a dwindling group that continues to compliment us and heavily rely on school, supplemental workshops, fellowships, or online help to get that criticism we desperately need because we haven't quite immersed ourselves in that particular medium we love and toil at so much.

If you're in the "I need more help!" boat I can imagine conversations go something like this...

Writer: "So what did you think of the story I sent you?" Friend/Family Member: "Story?" (scratches chin as though contemplating the reason as to why Rachel Ray and Paris Hilton are famous) Writer: "Yeah, the one I sent you about two weeks ago? You said you'd give me feedback, remember?" Friend/Family Member: "Oh yeah! Sorry. Yeah, I did read it." Writer: (leans across table, in this case the duo are at Arby's, expectantly with eyes wide in anticipation) "And? What did you think?" Friend/Family Member: (looks around a bit before committing to a statement) "I thought it was good." Writer: (skews eyebrows) "Good?" Friend/Family Member: "Yeah, I liked it." Writer: "You...liked...it? That's all?" Friend/Family Member: "Yeah, that's all. I liked it." Writer: (points accusingly at Friend/Family Member then pokes him/her/them in the chest with said index finger) "Fuck you! Fuck you and your Goddamn BA in (insert Major here)! Good means shit to a writer." Friend/Family Member: "Oh, sorry. I just really don't know how to comment on these things. Don't get all bent out of shape. I said I liked it." Writer: "Shut up and give me back my curly fries. You're cut off." Friend/Family Member: (solemnly passes fries on tray with a pout) Writer: "And don't try that shit out on me." (points to himself/herself) Writer, remember? We invented anguish."

We've all been there whether it took place at an Arby's, an Applebee's, in your living room while watching a marathon of Sex and the City or Battlestar Galactica, or what-have-you. And when you have no outlet that is subjective enough you start to feel downtrodden.

Then of course there are those of us immersed in college life whether it is finishing off our BA or going into graduate work where workshops can be somewhat hostile or even less helpful. You may have the instructor that always points out the positives because they don't believe in being negative (yes, the term constructive criticism is considered wholly negative for the most part). Or if you have the instructor that likes "literature" and hates contemporary work, yet that is all you write & read so criticism may not always be...how-do-you-say, open-minded. You may be of a different generation born in the early sixties, seventies, or eighties that remember groups like The Bee Gees, the fight for Civil Rights, were alive during Roe v. Wade, recall how badly the AIDS epidemic began in the U.S. and are not familiar with the words "whatever" or "ginormous" and thus are thrust into a workshop with people just out of school while your work may be on a different level and there's is just about "stuff". As a thirty-nine year old with a husband, two kids (which means three kids in total) that has worked ten different jobs in twenty years thinks what the hell is criticism from a twenty-two year old that just came into her own independence and still clings to "happy endings" to come to (insert City here) going to help?!? Or how about being one of two African-Americans in an all Caucasian workshop writing about slavery?!? The subject matter itself doesn't bode well for an honest, bare-bones discussion and the perspectives from people who may just not be comfortable about race could make things even worse.

Yet, we writers rely on them to push us harder, dig deeper, tug at the heart strings, bring in more action, grab me at the first sentence on the first page, dig into what makes you scared or others uncomfortable. Improve your prose, use less passive voice, be more illustrative, for God's sake stop using cliches! You learn these "rules" try to stay within a certain scope of what you think is decent. You work, work, and work some more until things are crisper, prettier, entertaining and then you send it off to someone who doesn't know you from a hole in the wall and ask them to "please, please accept me into this club of 'published' authors!" "Validate me!" "Tell me I'm pretty and that I smell like sunflowers or a mountain breeze, please!" And you wait, sometimes days, sometimes weeks, many times months (if they like you in some cases) to hear whether you are what they're looking for or not. It's like offering yourself to a good looking guy/gal in a bar every week when you feel you look your best and getting kicked in the shin time and time again because they don't want you. The whole "your story isn't right for our magazine" is the dating equivalent of "let's just be friends". They're not telling you outright they despise you and want you to harbor no ill will towards them per se. Yes, it sucks. And frankly I'm just not up for that type of rejection on a regular basis. So I hope to build myself into the first category I listed of making things perfect before submitting my work instead of saving it on my desktop, backing it up on a CD, and wondering if I should go back to it day after day. It's going to happen I feel it. Baby steps after all. At least I know that I'm getting better, even if it is only the opinion of two people I've never met...and myself.