Product Description

The Creative Writing MFA Handbook guides prospective graduate students through the difficult process of researching, applying to, and choosing graduate schools in creative writing. The handbook includes profiles of fifty creative writing programs, guidance through the application process, advice from current students and professors including George Saunders, Aimee Bender, Tracy K. Smith, and Geoffrey Wolff, and the most comprehensive listings of graduate writing programs in and outside the United States. The handbook also includes special sections about Low-Residency writing programs, Ph.D. programs, publishing in literary journals, and workshop and teaching advice.

In a remarkably concise, user-friendly fashion, The Creative Writing MFA Handbook answers as many questions as possible, and is packed with information, advice, and experience.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #118847 in Books
• Published on: 2005-12-30
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 214 pages

About the Author
Tom Kealey graduated from the MFA Creative Writing program at the University of Massachusetts in 2001, and afterwards he was a Wallace Stegner Fellow in fiction at Stanford University. He currently teaches at Stanford. He has been in many, many writing workshops, both as a student and as a teacher. At the University of Massachusetts he was the recipient of the Distinguished Teaching Award.

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Customer Reviews

Outstanding Resource
If you only buy one book to research MFA programs, this is it.

I came into this process completely ignorant, and Tom Kealey has brought me up-to-speed in a matter of hours. As a prospective student of a low-residency program, I was impressed with the amount of information he includes for both these and traditional schools.

This book is well-stocked with Q&As and interviews of professors and graduates--truly an insider's guide. Kealey also describes in detail the application process, giving tips on letters of recommendation, personal statements, and so on. But his book doesn't stop there; it also includes a chapter on what to expect once you're in the program--workshops, teaching, public readings, and more.

This book is concise and straight forward, and extremely well-organized. I highly recommend it!

Easily the best resource of its kind
This book is indispensable for anyone considering a writing MFA program. Kealey covers everything that a prospective student should consider: reasons to get an MFA, criteria for choosing programs, how to prepare a strong application (including suggestions for manuscript selection), etc. There's even advice on getting the most out of whatever program you attend, and on your post-MFA options. The treatment of all of this is extremely lucid, and Kealey's tone is casual and easy to read. Most importantly, his descriptions of various residency programs are very thoughtful, with useful information (such as funding levels and program size) that you won't find compiled elsewhere. To the degree that he ranks programs (which isn't complete; he simply mentions on a few schools' profiles that he considers them "top five," "top ten," etc.) his criteria are explicit and clear.

As for the author: Kealey's qualifications are impressive (UMass MFA, Stegner Fellowship, a current teaching position at Stanford), and his dedication even more so -- he runs a blog at creative-writing-mfa-handbook.blogspot.com, where he is willing to answer any question not addressed by the book.

It's all about the funding and the time to write
Everyone considering an advanced degree in creative writing should read this book. The evaluations of individual programs aren't all that important -- what's more important is the way Kealey lays out the whole MFA process: what to look for in schools, what the application process is like, and how to make the most of your time once you finally get in. Kealey doesn't have an agenda, he has a point-of-view: he values programs with good funding that let you get a lot of writing done.

I read this book right after undergrad and realized that the MFA scene wasn't my cup of tea. I owe Tom a big thank you for the time and money he saved me.