|
|
|
|
|
|
Residency Review...
This summer we said goodbye to long-time director Stephen Haven and 17 graduates, but we also said hello to 28 new students and one new faculty member.
|
|
This year's residency featured the usual great fellowship, intense writing workshops, plus knock-out readings and presentations from our visiting writers, visiting editors, faculty members, graduates, and alumni guests. Thanks to all the students, faculty, speakers, and guests who helped make 2016 another inspiring summer for the Ashland University MFA program!
View more photos
Videos of 2016 Presentations
2016 Summer Residency Program Book
More information about the Summer Residency experience
Residency photography by Allison Waltz, Ashland University.
|
|
 Director's Note
Interim Program Director
Dan Lehman
Let me begin by thanking Steve Haven for his twelve years of service to the MFA. The program would not have been here without him, and his imprint is everywhere on it: support, challenge, collegiality, all-out fun, always daring ourselves to be better than we ever thought we could be. My task as Interim Director for Fall 2106 has been to maintain those traditions and to build for an even stronger future. To that end, we have put together a great search committee to find Steve's successor and applications are arriving apace. The Ashland MFA clearly has developed a national reputation as a program that people want to join. Our talented and nurturing faculty mentors--along with Administrative Director Cassy Brown--ensure the sustaining strength that will attract an outstanding new director. Thanks to all students and alumni for being a part of this.
My best for your writing and studies. -- Dan
|
|
Paris Summer Residency 2017
Write in the City of Lights Next Summer
Those who wish to participate in the 2017 Paris Residency must make a $500 deposit by November 1, 2016. This opportunity is open to current MFA students, alumni, or other qualified writers. The 2017 event is scheduled for June 17-July 1, 2017, and will be led by Angie Estes (poetry) and Thomas Larson (prose).
In addition to writing workshops and guest speakers, participants will explore many of the historic and cultural treasures of Paris, engaging in the literary and cultural life of the city. The middle weekend is open for individual sightseeing.
Read more online.
|
|
Cross Genre Applications Due October 15
Students ready for 632 or 633 in the spring who would like to study in a secondary genre during spring semester will need to fill out the cross genre form and submit a writing sample in their intended second area of study. (It's okay to reuse material from your program application writing sample.) Get all the details and download the form from our website. Questions? Contact the MFA Office, 419.289.5098 or mfa@ashland.edu.
|
|
|
Fall Open House
New or prospective students are welcome to join us at the Ashland University main campus for an informational Open House on Saturday, October 15, from 11 am. to 1 p.m. Our AU MFA team will present detailed information about the MFA Program before opening the session to your questions. We'll also have lunch in the university's Convocation Center and a brief tour of the campus (weather permitting).
The Open House meeting will begin at 11:00 a.m. in Room 116 of the Dauch College of Business and Economics Building, located on College Avenue in Ashland, near the intersection of Claremont and College Avenue.
If you plan to attend the open house, please R.S.V.P. to Cassandra Brown at mfa@ashland.edu.
|
|
Faculty News
Follow @ashlandmfa on Twitter and the Ashland University MFA Program Facebook page for regular updates about our faculty, staff, alumni, and students.
Stephen Haven
Former Program Director
Poetry Faculty
Stephen Haven is enjoying his new position as director of the Lesley College MFA Program in Creative Writing in Cambridge, Mass. He will be missed!
 Erika Krouse
Fiction Faculty
Our newest faculty member is already bringing in the accolades. Erika's book, Contenders (Rare Birds, 2015) was one of three finalists for the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award.
Leila Philip
Creative Nonfiction Faculty
Leila's op ed essay " Why I Teach" was featured in The Boston Globe on August 10, 2016.
Robert Root
Creative Nonfiction Faculty
Bob Root’s audio essay “Synchronicity in Nature and Life” was broadcast by Wisconsin Life on Wisconsin Public Radio in April. He gave a craft talk on “Backstory” at the River Teeth Nonfiction Conference in June. His essay “Caves” with photos and a note on research was published in the Spring 2016 issue of Kentucky English Bulletin. At long last, “Creative Nonfiction,” his article about creative nonfiction in the Midwest, appears in the Dictionary of Midwestern Literature, Volume Two: Dimensions of the Midwestern Literary Imagination, published in August by Indiana University Press. |
|
|
Current Students
Misty Burke
Misty's poetry collection, The Ghost Child Ballet (Aldrich Press) is now available for purchase. Three of Misty's poems were accepted for publication by Haunted Waters Press. "Wake Up and Repeat 1-3" will appear in the press' annual literary journal, From the Depths.
Kristin Ryan
Kristin has a poetry collection, Hurricane of Grace and Bones (Black Cat Moon Press), now available through Lulu, Amazon, or Barnes and Noble!
Karen Swortzel
Karen wrote a review of Driving with the Dead: Poems by Jane Hicks, which was printed in the most recent issue of The Appalachian Journal.
|
|
Alumni News
Carolee Bennett
Class of 2015
Carolee's poems "What the surgeons couldn't do" and "Triptych for Sirens in the Park" have been selected to appear in John Hoppenthaler's Congeries at Connotations Press. River Teeth has also published her book review on This Is Only a Test by B.J. Hollars, and a Beautiful Things column "Mars and a Reflection of Mars."
Grace Curtis
Class of 2010
Grace Curtis was an alumni presenter at this year's Ashland MFA summer residency. With fellow alumnae Jan Shoemaker, she presented a Sunday panel, "The Emerging Writer: Paths to Your First Publications." Grace gave a reading in Toledo in August and had a poem published in The Ekphrastic Review, "Ripping the Sun out of the Sky."
Kristin Distel
Class of 2014
Kristin Distel recently presented a paper entitled “‘The woman of sin’: Misreading and Negating the Body of Kate Swift” at the 46th Annual Society for the Study of Midwestern Literature conference. Kristin was the co-chair of the panel, “Gender, Androgyny, and the Inscrutable Body in Sherwood Anderson’s Winesburg, Ohio.” Additionally, Kristin’s poem, “Inside my father’s stopped heart,” was recently accepted for publication by Glass: A Journal of Poetry. Her work will be featured on Glass’s website and in their newsletter this fall. Currently, Kristin is beginning her third year of doctoral studies at Ohio University, where she is researching feminist utopias and gendered spaces in eighteenth-century political tracts and twentieth-century novels.
Adam Gellings
Class of 2016
Adam's poem "Dear Charro" as well as five of his photos from Paris, appear in the most recent issue of the online literaray magazine Cargo Literary Journal, which focuses on "narrative and growth through travel and exploration." His poem "The Insurrection" is available on the new issue of Drunken Monkeys. Adam also has two poems accepted for publication in the forthcoming issue of Post Road Magazine. The poems, "Gravel Road" and "The Gymnastics Teacher," will be featured in print and online.
Sarah Freligh
Class of 2013
Two of Sarah's poems from Sad Math were featured on the Writer's Almanac. "Old Flame" was featured on July 1 and "The Beginning of Something Is Always the End of Another" on July 2. Sarah was a guest reader at the 50th anniversary of the Writers Forum at The College of Brockport in New York.
Joy Gaines Friedler
Class of 2016
Joy Gaines-Friedler won two First Place awards in the 2016 Michigan Poetry Society contest. She won in two separate categories: The Margo Lagattuta Poetry Prize for any subject, and the category "Family." Both poems are a part of Joy's MFA Thesis and will be published in the next issue of Peninsula Writers. Sable Books will be including Joy's poetry in Red Sky | poetry on the global epidemic of violence against women, an anthology featuring poems by Naomi Shihab Nye, Thylias Moss, Tony Hoagland, Fady Joudah, Jaki Shelton Green, Hélène Cardona, Zeina Hesham Beck & more.
Judith Harper
Class of 2016
Judith's first book of poetry Driving to Music (Black Cat Moon Press) is available on lulu.com, Amazon, and Barnes and Noble. Judith is working on a second book of poetry, and constructing a draft of my memoirs about my son with Asperger's Syndrome.
Joseph Hess
Class of 2015
Joe has had three poems published recently: "The Paris Commune" on Ephrastic.net, "Curve Winds" on The Plum Tree Tavern, and "Pandora and Orpheus" on Postcard Poems and Prose.
Robert Morrison
Class of 2015
Robert's flash piece "Illusion of Soy" was published on Case Western Reserve Weatherhead School of Management's new literary ezine, Beyond.
Sandy Wickersham McWhorter
Class of 2013
Sandy's poetry won the Black Cat Moon Press Cat’s Meow 2016 poetry contest and will be spotlighted in their anthology this coming December.
N.I. Nicholson
Class of 2016
N.I.'s poetry will appear in the next issue of Assaracus from Sibling Rivalry Press. He was also featured in an interview article recently on The Conversant.
Nicole Robinson
Class of 2011
Nicole Robinson was one of 75 Ohio Artists to to receive a $5,000 Individual Excellence Award this May. Individual Excellence Awards are peer recognition of creative artists for the exceptional merit of a body of their work that advances or exemplifies the discipline and the larger artistic community. These awards support artists' growth and development and recognize their work in Ohio and beyond. Nicole is currently serving as the assistant director at the Wick Poetry Center in Kent, Ohio.
Krystal Sierra
Class of 2016
Krystal published "Fascinating Travel Writing in Stellar Online Mag," her review of the Lowestoft Chronicle on The Review Review this summer.
Nathaniel Terry
Class of 2013
Nathaniel has accepted an Adjunct Professorship with ITT Technical Institute,
Breckinridge School of Nursing in Hilliard, OH and will be teaching English Composition this fall.
Sarah M. Wells
Class of 2015
Sarah's poem "Of Thee I Sing" appeared in Rattle's online Poets Respond series on July 24. She was also interviewed in Under the Gum Tree about her recent contribution printed there "The Body Is Not a Coffin."
|
|
News to Share??
Alumni and current students, we love sharing your good news! Send your latest publications, job changes, or other news for the newsletter to mfa@ashland.edu. Our publication dates are being adjusted due to staffing cuts, but we will try to get a newsletter out at least once per quarter. We also frequently share via social media, so be sure to follow us on Facebook and Twitter!
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
