When I was halfway through my
MA program for Literature, a PhD student in the program gave me the following
sage advice: “If you’re going to be a serious student, don’t take creative
writing courses.” Partly he meant that
since you’re getting a degree on literature, you should chase one rabbit at a
time. Writing a short story is time you
could be writing your MA Thesis, or drafting an article, or doing something to
get you into a conference or PhD program.
However, beneath this was a threat of not being taken seriously:
enrolling in a creative writing course at the MA level (for a non-creative
writing MA) is amateurish. It smacks of
not being quite serious, or worse, being a dilletante. “I would never enroll in a creative writing
course,” he said, without a hint of sarcasm. I went ahead and took the course, since it was taught by an author
whose works I deeply enjoyed. No
regrets, either: I learned a lot from the course, finished my MA Thesis, and got
into a halfway decent PhD program.
