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Monday, February 10, 2014

And You Thought You Had MFA Troubles

This article entitled "How Iowa Flattened Literature" published today in the Chronicle of Higher Education is a hot mess and yet kind of fascinating. I'm not even sure I understand where it *is* going, even though author Eric Bennett writes in the middle of it, in his super confiding tone, "I'm sure you can see where this is going."  Also, confusing: the the article seems to be a mash-up of a personal essay about being a student at the Iowa Workshop published in an anthology entitled MFA vs NYC: The Two Cultures of Fiction in America and the author's new historical book entitled, Empire of Workshop, about the CIA and communism at the heart of the prestigious MFA program's inception. The latter is published by guess who? University of Iowa Press. So, it is a criticism? Anyway, though I have my own set of torturous topics, I am glad the cold war and questions of greatness are not among them. Check it out.

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