Picking one highlight from my Emerson experience is very difficult.  So, Ive narrowed it down to two.  (Now that I’ve finished all my work, I just can’t seem to follow the rules.)  That being said, my two favorite highlights of Emerson’s MFA creative writing program were–drumroll please!—the Lovefest and the Thesis Defense.

1. What I fondly refer to as the Lovefest was actually my first workshop, expertly moderated  by Steve Yarbrough.  The eleven other students and I formed a bond that semester that has lasted through my time here at Emerson.  Part of this bond stemmed from the fact that the workshop highlighted the good in our writing.  Professing our love for a sentence, character, plot point, or entire story was a common occurrence.  Although this was often followed with detail-specific criticism, the atmosphere fostered a special connection between us. And since we were all new to the city, we would go out occasionally after class and socialize. The people in that workshop are my closest friends in the program and my most trusted readers—they are the people who know how I’ve developed my craft throughout my time here.  We celebrate each others successes, and we sympathize in times of writer frustrations.  All of this bloomed out the Lovefest.

2. The Thesis Defense is a very scary sounding experience.  In reality, though, it was a one-hour workshop that reflected my time at Emerson.  A harsh critique, my thesis reader said I was a “poetic storyteller,” my novel was “very publishable,” and that I am “a novelist.”  My reader and chair loved my novel, particularly my main character, and they had some wonderful critiques of how to continue working on the draft and improving the weaker areas.  Coming out of the program with such a wonderful experience gives me the confidence to continue on my own and the knowledge that moving across the country and taking out student loans was exactly the right choice.

Having written this post, I see how appropriate it was for me to choose these two experiences.  The Lovefest and Thesis Defense bookend my time at Emerson, and I know that without them my writing career would be extremely different and far less fulfilling.

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