The Cult of D [continued]

Characters are assigned letters, so anonymity is the condition we each live in.

Even as each character lives in the real, the real is continued anonymously due to the fear of vulnerability.

Can we come together as writers?

C: I do not think so. Everything you've said is didactic.

But is it a function of art? To come together?

At least there was a time when R and I were alienated by the workshop leader, and I felt some kind of alliance out of that horrible gathering. M would say, "What is this? What is this saying? What kind of poem is this?" And this started it off. No one liked that class, I think.

My favorite moment: When R and I would talk about the use of "kind of" in language, and M said, "This is kind of kind of kind of a poem about..." We laughed to each other.

But The Cult of D! What was that about? D was gone, so all authority was vacated.

Is there something anyone could have said? Can say?

Effing yes!

Think I found bone in my mcdonalds chicken nuggets

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20110606212649AAi3Wcz
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100927142426AAnoXg8
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20120327032752AA0BYwl
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100812135711AApaUfN
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071226185901AAQCDSa
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20120513131934AAkFLqr

Fiction workshops

In a graduate Fiction workshop class, people knew I was writing memoir. However, they read the "madeup" parts as true and the accurate parts as "stereotypical."

Michelle : it's hard work, coming up with the truth.

Sarah : Stranger than.

Bethany : I remember getting castigated in an undergrad class because the main characters struggle with narcolepsy was unrealistic and cartoonish. They thought I should have done more research. Smh

Dennis : That's EXACTLY what I mean. You should read a book called Reality Hunger. It talks about such things that happen.

Dennis : BTW: Sorry that happened to you, Bethany.

Bethany : Oh, I laughed. Adam was the instructor and the only one who knew I had narcolepsy (I tell all my teachers ) and he had his head in his hands the whole time. Then I got to tell everybody that I'd been diagnosed since I was sixteen and they ended up feeling silly. Teehee.

Dennis : I'm planning on conducting my worksops like Laura. I've had so many bad experiences while a student--except in her class. Thanks, Laura!

Dennis : workshops!

Bethany : I know, she was so good!

Another project

Topeka

As a fifth-gen Topekan who did not work the railroad

As a son of two mothers in the town of Fred

As the complications of a circle, highway circling, entrapping



Also, Chicken McNuggets are bad for you



"[E]ight times out of ten, an erasure of a poem, made by the author of that poem, will be better than the original poem. It is sometimes called revision, but of course you cannot actually read the original poem, you can only look at the words." Mary Ruefle • Quarter After Eight

The Cult of D: A Fiction

D is an amazing fiction writer, experimental in the way art is an experiment to represent, and the students flocked to the university where she taught. I was a student of D's. Amazing work was written. Amazing feedback was presented. However, the clique of D turned to a cliche of D into the Cult of D when she announced she was leaving.

The animosity of the cult turned against L, another amazing fiction writer who did not write like D. However, amazing is not a qualifier for the Cult of D.

In fact, any fiction workshop turned into Cult vs. Non-Cult.

Are you a new student? Get ready for the initiation by the Cult.

When T visited, the first hints of the Cult came in the form of the Cult's blogs. Also, the responses of blogs by the NYC Cult of T.

The Cult of D took on aspects of the Cult of T.

In fiction, any of this is plausible, which is why it seems real.

The more elitist the school overall, the more elitist overall cults will be created.

Does this sound didactic? Yes, it is didactically true, as the Cult of D operates out of the didactic outside of a certain style of writing.

This style goes against everything D is: humble, humility, a search for Art outside of cults.

Luckily, the Cult of D moves on to other cities.

Not before students drop out of programs because of the Cult of D.

I would rather be didactic than inconsiderate, rude, anti-writer. Call it my Midwest Fiction. Call it my idealistic room of gathering around to celebrate the air in the room.

Projects for the fall

I am taking on the task to write alongside the people enrolled for me Contemporary Forms class.

I've thought a lot about Jack's passing when I was younger.  That might be a project.

Any suggestions?

Rachel Blau DuPlessis says "yes"

So I have permission by Rachel Blau DuPlessis to use Pink Guitar for my latest creative conceptual collage work. She was hesitant, but I assured her I would show her the finished text--and use her complete text sentence by selected sentence.

What amazes me is she could have igmored my email. She's in South Africa, and she could have blown it off.

One thing about being a writer, critic, poet, etc.is the humility, the humble life, that I've found among other writers, critics, poets, etcs. I've made the best friends, feel accepted in a community, and as I ask, people are willing to give me permission to use their work for mine.

However, as rose-tinted as I may seem, I know the ugly side of this biz. It especially happens in MFA programs. It's better to find the like-minded professors and peers--those who look at writing as a community, rather than a power trip or system. (A topic for another blog.)