Tim Brennan Named CLA Russell Chair

Professor Timothy Brennan was named the Samuel Russell Chair in the Humanities for the College of Liberal Arts for a three-year period, 2014-17. The Russell Chair is intended to promote outstanding teaching and scholarship in the humanities and involves an annual allocation of $25,000 in support. Brennan publishes Borrowed Light: Vico, Hegel, and the Colonies with Stanford University Press in March. He has also been awarded Sabbatical Leave with Supplement for the calendar year 2015. Congratulations!

English@Minnesota at AWP

The Association of Writers & Writing Programs holds its annual conference starting Thursday, February 27, in Seattle. Because the schedule is an eye-drying monument of panel and reading information, we made it easy with a quick compendium of what 16 faculty and alums are doing at the festival (which draws 10,000 some attendees). From Professor Peter Campion weighing in on John Berryman to BA alumna Cheryl Strayed addressing the rise of Rumpus.com, there's a plethora of "must see." (Plus, at the conference's book fair, student Carrie Lorig will be unveiling her new chapbook with Forklift, OH, and alumnus Josh Ostergaard his nonfiction debut with Coffee House Press.) Read on.

Thursday, February 27
R123. Teaching Brief, Sudden, Flash, and Very Short Prose
With MFA alumnus Steve Pacheco
(Raul Moreno, Meagan Cass, Damian Dressick, Sara Henning, Pacheco) With The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Nonfiction now a familiar text among college-level instructors and an international anthology of very short fiction due out from Norton, questions about best approaches to attempting brief prose abound. If this can be a good way to teach writing, as anthologist Robert Shapard suggests, how do students negotiate the new horizons of genre and form? Five instructors offer lessons from workshops, grading, new media, doctoral research, and more. 9-10:15 am, Room LL4, Western New England MFA Annex, Lower Level
R126. What Was Is: The Use of Present Tense in Creative Nonfiction
With MFA alumna Kate Hopper
(Hopper, Hope Edelman, Bonnie Rough, Marybeth Holleman, Ryan Van Meter) This panel of memoirists and essayists will consider what happens when we write about past events in the present tense. When does present tense provide needed immediacy, and when does it limit an author's ability to write to the true story? We will explore the benefits, challenges, and drawbacks of using present tense as we craft our lives on the page, and we will discuss how tense affects other craft issues, such as voice, reflection, and structure. 9-10:15 am, Room 202, Western New England MFA Annex, Level 2
R170. All This and More: What Form of Creative Nonfiction is the Essay/Review?
With MA alum Mary Rockcastle
(Rockcastle, Stan Sanvel Rubin, David Ingle, Jocelyn Bartkevicius) In an essay published in the Manilla Review, Jennifer B. McDonald, an editor at The New York Times Book Review, wrote, "A good review introduces a book and attempts a rigorous appraisal, while demonstrating fairness, intelligence, clarity, discernment, and style." A good essay review does all of this and more. In addition to reviewing the books (usually two or more), the essay review serves as a springboard for the author to explore ideas and probe aspects of his/her own life. The panelists, all of them editors and/or writers of the essay review--for Water~Stone Review, The Georgia Review, and Fourth Genre--will focus on what the essay review is and isn't, what it offers the reader as well as the author of the book being reviewed, and how it contributes not only to the literary magazine but to the writer (and field) of creative nonfiction. Noon-1:15 pm, Room 607, Washington State Convention Center, Level 6
R189. Not What I Was Looking For, But What I Found: Deploying Research in Creative Writing
With MFA alumnae Edward McPherson and Ethan Rutherford
(McPherson, Rutherford, Sandra Lim, Amy Leach, Jim Shepard) How can research enrich creative writing? Many writers collect information as a way to engage their inner lives, educate themselves about the world, look out as a means of looking in, animate the historical and political--and then deploy those findings in their work, often to strange, wonderful, and unexpected effect. This cross-genre panel composed of writers of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry will discuss the strategies, pleasures, and potential pitfalls of digging for facts to use in your art. Noon-1:15 pm, Room 305, Western New England MFA Annex, Level 3
R196. Why Can't We Be Friends?: Book Arts in the Digital Age
With MFA alumna Meryl DePasquale
(DePasquale, Anna Lena Phillips, MC Hyland, Drew Burk, Guy Pettit) Alongside the rise of online publishing is a renaissance in the traditional art of the book. Handmade chapbooks, broadsides, artist books, and other literary objects are often viewed in opposition to computers and the Internet; but in fact, the digital world and the book arts cooperate in unexpected ways. Our discussion will address practical strategies to open book arts to a wider audience online and examine what the fine arts gallery has to add to conversations in contemporary publishing. 1:30-2:45 pm, Room 3A, Washington State Convention Center, Level 3
R210. Henry at 100: A Centenary Tribute to John Berryman
With Creative Writing Program Professor Peter Campion and BA alumnus David Wojahn
(Wojahn, Campion, Kathleen Graber, J. Allyn Rosser, Kevin Young) This panel celebrates the lasting legacy of one of the latter 20th Century's most original figures, John Berryman, whose epic poem, "The Dream Songs," occupies a unique place in American literature. Yet Berryman remains a controversial figure, and our panel will commemorate his accomplishment while at the same time confronting the more fraught elements of his writing, among them matters of gender, race, and the limitations of the confessional mode. 1:30-2:45 pm, Room 615/616/617, Washington State Convention Center, Level 6
R249. The Kenyon Review 75th Anniversary Reading
With Creative Writing Program Professor Charles Baxter
(David Lynn, Kimiko Hahn, Baxter, Jaquira Diaz) A reading from writers featured in the Winter 2014 issue of The Kenyon Review, our 75th anniversary issue. The Winter 2014 issue marks our ongoing commitment to publish the very best writing from established and emerging writers. Founded in 1939 at Kenyon College and first edited by poet-critic John Crowe Ransom, The Kenyon Review continues in its 75th year to celebrate writing that maps the spiritual, intellectual, and emotional tides of our contemporary culture. 3-4:15 pm, Room 304, Western New England MFA Annex, Level 3
R263. How to Write About a Murderer
With MFA alumna Arlene Kim
(Madge McKeithen, Jessica Handler, Kim, Kate Sweeney, Nick Twemlow) Can a writer adopt an alternate persona or innovative style to explore disturbing subjects? How does altered identity or medium affect a writer's process and a reader's experience? Five writers who work in prose, poetry, film, audio, and visual art discuss examples of their adopted personae and structural choices and give examples of ways these applications break boundaries and add perspective in articulating story. Participants discuss one another's work and choices that have inspired theirs. 4:30-5:45 pm, Room 604, Washington State Convention Center, Level 6
R280A. Is It Really That Difficult? The Problem with "Difficult" Poetry
With MFA alumna Lightsey Darst
(Chris Fischbach, Darst, Amanda Nadelberg, Raymond McDaniel, Ange Mlinko) Many small presses publish poetry that is described as "experimental" and very often "difficult." What do these monikers mean, and how are they both limiting and freeing? This panel will explore poetry's links to these terms with Coffee House Press poets. Each poet seeks to connect with readers in diverse ways, and each is known for the experimentation and complexity of his or her work. 4:30-5:45 pm, Room 304, Western New England MFA Annex, Level 3
Friday, February 28
F258. What I Wish I'd Known Before I Started Writing for Kids and Young Adults
With BA alumna Sheila O'Connor
(Heather Bouwman, Kirstin Cronn-Mills, O'Connor, Shelley Tougas, Rebecca Fjelland Davis) This panel features middle-grade and young adult novelists who--before starting to write kidlit--also held other roles as poets, professors, journalists, and/or authors of literary novels. In this moderated discussion, they'll answer questions about the surprises they faced when they began writing for children and young adults: craft issues, audience questions, marketing dilemmas, and unexpected wrinkles in professional relationships. 3-4:15 pm, Room 618/619/620, Washington State Convention Center, Level 6
F264. Crossing the Veil: Engaging the Editor Who Rejects your Work
With MFA alumna Jennine Capó Crucet
(Marianne Kunkel, Capó Crucet, Tim Johnston, Stacey Waite) The editor may always be right but, more importantly, he or she always has the final say. Two poets and two prose writers open up about personalized rejection notes--glimpses into literary journals' behind-the-scenes discussions--and instances in which editors wrestled with publishing their somewhat risky work. This panel will showcase accomplished authors speaking frankly about respectfully talking back to editors and will promote a submission culture of professionalism, transparency, and candor. 3-4:15 pm, Room 302, Western New England MFA Annex, Level 3
Saturday, March 1
S153. Queer Translation
With BA alumnus Johannes Goransson
(Joyelle McSweeney, Goransson, Don Mee Choi, Lucas DeLima, Jeffrey Angles) As translators, artists, scholars, and performers, we'll consider how 'queer translation' might host a queer interaction or strange meeting; how it might undermine nationalist demarcations of the body, including binaries separating male and female, able and disabled, human and inhuman, whole and partial bodies; the force of translation as a 'political uncanny'; and whether translation itself might figure a queer or middle body, an activist body, a political resource. 10:30-11:45 am, Room 612, Washington State Convention Center, Level 6
S165. Writing, Rumpus, and Community
With BA alumna Cheryl Strayed
(Brian Spears, Strayed, Stephen Elliott, Roxane Gay, Isaac Fitzgerald) Since going live in 2009, the Rumpus has been a place for unknown writers to find an audience and for established writers to find new ones. It redefined the advice column and has become one of the foremost publishers of personal narratives and book reviews online. This panel will discuss the Rumpus' first five years and its plans for the future. 10:30-11:45 am, Room 305, Western New England MFA Annex, Level 3
S189. The Latino Short Story: Continuity, Innovation, and the Voices of Story Writing
With MFA alumna Jennine Capó Crucet
(Fred Arroyo, Lorraine Lopez, Benjamin Alíre Sáenz, Capó Crucet, Daniel Chacón) The short story is a vital American literary form. Through its continuity and innovation, the short story hears and reflects the individual and collective voices of culture and history. This panel of Latin@ short story writers, who have recently published collections, will consider the problems and possibilities--aesthetically, traditionally, ideologically, and culturally--of publishing short story collections, while also exploring the tensions and joys of publishing with smaller presses. Noon-1:15 pm, Room LL5, Western New England MFA Annex, Lower Level
S223. It's About Time: A Tribute to Philip Levine
With BA alumnus David Wojahn
(Consuelo Marshall, Wojahn, Kathy Fagan, B. H. Boston, Tomas Morin) Philip Levine is one of America's most revered and influential poets. Often referred to as a voice for the voiceless, Levine's work is also known for its emotional intensity tempered with the control and concentration of a master. Five poet/teachers discuss Levine's impact on the literary world and beyond and will read their favorite Levine poems. 1:30-2:45 pm, Room 302, Western New England MFA Annex, Level 3
S243. A Reading from Obsession: Sestinas in the 21st Century
With PhD alumna Marilyn Nelson
(Carolyn Beard Whitlow, Marilyn Nelson, Herman Beavers, Dana Gioia, Robin Becker) Come celebrate this anthology offering a hundred examples of the sestina's versatility from poets of the Sixties to the present. Experience through this form and the editors' cogent commentary our fascination with Americana, and with politics, sex, love, hate, art, nature, memory, contemplation, and death. What shape does obsession take when run through the sestina's rigorous pattern? Contributing poets will read from the anthology and engage in discussion with the audience. 3-4:15 pm, Room 609, Washington State Convention Center, Level 6

5 X Friday: MFA Candidate Scott F. Parker

Third-year Creative Writing Program nonfiction student Scott F. Parker this year won the Monkey Puzzle Press' prose chapbook contest with a slim collection entitled in here--authored, provocatively, by The Synthesis. The book itself declares that its inventive texts may be read as poetry, philosophy, or fiction but seek to be memoir. Chapters include "all criticism is autobiographical," which mashes together quotes from Parker's widely published book reviews, and "unanswered questions?" which features nearly four pages of them (favorite: "Why not . . . accept that it's time that uses you?"). As Patricia Weaver Francisco notes on the back cover, this is an intimate little book that despite (because of) its challenging form effectively communicates aspects of the writer's personality and interests as much if not more than a standard "I was born in XX and did XX" narrative. Parker has also published a runner's memoir (Running After Prefontaine), two musings on musical icons (Revisited: Notes on Bob Dylan and ME | EM: One Listener's Confession), and an edited volume of writings on coffee (Coffee - Philosophy for Everyone: Grounds for Debate). Read more.

1. What was your impetus for writing in here?
It started as a rebuttal to the idea that memoir must be the work of an "I" reckoning with the past. I wanted to experiment with writing against genre as a way of questioning the status of that "I" and other assumptions of the form but do so while still writing memoir.
2. When you write at the beginning, "There is memoir. There is not-memoir," how are you defining the latter? It's interesting that even seemingly "not-memoir" writing is quite revealing.
The first thing to say is that the form of the Reader's Note is borrowed from the tetralemma of Buddhist logic that you find in [second century Indian philosopher] Nagarjuna. Any proposition (here, "There is memoir") suggests three more cases: the negation ("There is not-memoir"); the affirmation of the proposition and the negation ("There is memoir and not-memoir"); and the negation of the proposition and negation ("There is neither memoir nor not-memoir"). As soon as you try to write memoir you become attuned to all the ways not-memoir encroaches on the simple reflective "I." The subjectivity of memory is the most obvious example here, but there are others, too, including the logic a text develops (whether narrative or something else) that inevitably shapes the material; any representation of experience is selective and limited--the interesting question for any given work of memoir is how. Typically memoirs begin on the solidest ground they can find and then try to find an artful way of handling the not-memoir they encounter. This book tries to work from the other direction and play around in the space of not-memoir first and end up as memoir only after, insofar as the proposition and its negation are inseparable.
When I write, for example, from the POV of someone who isn't me, it's always the narrative "I" imagining that POV, so even though the form isn't typical of memoir the result is the same. And it would have been so had I interviewed people instead of inventing their testimonies; still I would have selected, edited, framed, etc., and the same question would have been begged: What is the objective self? The book tries to dramatize the possibility that there isn't one even as the urge for one remains (or at least recurs intermittently). But the tension, I hope, isn't academic. As your question points out, it is an intimate and vulnerable-making work; at the same time, it's a somewhat aggressive one. The narrative presence of The Synthesis is relentless and doesn't leave a ton of space for the reader, even as the status of the writer-reader relationship is one of the book's primary concerns.
3. How did you come up with the form of in here? What if any role did your colleagues in the Creative Writing Program play?
One of the things I enjoy is things that are other things. Philosophy as literature, literature as philosophy, questions as answers, basketball as fountain, so the formal play is motivated in part by that. Can I write a list that is not just a list? Facts that are more than facts? Questions that . . . ? The final piece, "Me Too," is an older work. I wrote it when the wound of David Foster Wallace's suicide was still fresh in me, and part of the piece is a struggle to think about what kind of writer I want to be, what my relationship to literature is/will be, following the loss of one of my guiding lights. The rest I wrote about two years ago. There was no plan starting out, but pretty quickly I recognized that the anti-form approach was freeing me up to think about some of my interests in a way I couldn't have if I'd gone straight at them. Every time I finished one of the pieces I wanted to start another. Before long, I had a bunch and showed them to Victoria [Scher], Bridget [Mendel], and Flor [Lauria], who appear in the text reading and commenting on the text. Two or three other Creative Writing people appear in scene and/or in disguise.
4. Would you describe how your next publication, an edited volume of interviews with One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest author Ken Kesey, came about?
Doing research for an essay I was working on about Kesey, I was looking for old interviews of his. This meant spending lots of time in the Anderson and Wilson Libraries going through archives and spinning through rolls of microfiche. This kind of research was new to me, and I enjoyed feeling scholarly, but I got to wondering why the interviews weren't already collected. I knew the University Press of Mississippi does their Literary Conversations series, so I wrote to them about doing a Kesey volume and they were pretty into it from the get-go.
5. What's next? Are the questions/conundrums you're confronting with in here changing how you write/structure the next memoir project?
I just edited a collection of essays about Eminem that should be out this fall. That was a fun project. I got to work with MFA alumnus Aaron Apps and two of my favorite rappers, Talib Kweli and Guante. It might be a stretch to connect that project to in here except that the complicated ways in which Eminem employs persona almost certainly influenced the formation of The Synthesis. But as for another memoir project, I'm working on something that's sort of an outgrowth of in here. It's too soon to know exactly what it is, but I'm having fun with it. Though in here has kind of a serious feel to it, the main thing I'm taking from it is a sense of playfulness, a reminder of how much fun it can be to play with words.
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5 X Friday: BA Alum Nadia Hasan

Nadia B. Hasan (BA 2002; JD 2006) braved her father's disappointment when she chose to major in English; he preferred pre-med or engineering. But her degree prepared her for the reading and analytic rigor of the University of Minnesota Law School and nine years thus far of law practice, first with Johnson & Condon, then Hinshaw & Culbertson, and since last summer in the Minneapolis office of Cozen O'Connor. These days, she notes with amusement, her dad claims he was the one who suggested English. Read more.