Non-MFA Debuts?

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Jamesaritchie

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In literary fiction, an MFA matters. Anyone who says it doesn't hasn't been around literary fiction very much. This doesn't mean you can't sell a literary novel without an MFA. Of course you can. But you absolutely will be taken seriously much easier in the right places if you have an MFA. That's just how it is.

Lacking an MFA, any degree along these lines matters.

The best way to think of an MFA is that they work just like really good credits. An MFA won't sell your novel, but it most certainly will get you read faster, by the right people, and chances are that whoever does the reading also has an MFA.

IT really is a sign that you've not only studied literary fiction in a serious manner, but also a sign that you can make your way through a tough program by writing it.

But this:

We're pretty aware of the state of the diminishing publishing industry, hence the increased risks imposed by taking on new authors.

Is not even remotely true. The state of the punishing industry is not diminishing, and not only is there no increased risk by taking on new writers, about three seconds of actual research shows it's pure nonsense. I don't where such fallacies oroiginate, but they certainly don't come from knowledge.
 

cmi0616

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Haha, "punishing industry" is an interesting Freudian slip.

I would say only that while statistically it seems untrue that the publishing industry is collapsing, as everybody seems to say it is, it also seems to be the case that people are no longer interested in talking about writing as a medium with significant cultural influence, and also that the number of people reading "serious" or literary fiction seems to be a lot smaller than it used to be.

Whether that's because we've internalized this mentality via all of the writers who constantly lament "the death of the novel" or whether we as a culture legitimately aren't interested in reading this stuff anymore is debatable.
 

gettingby

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Haha, "punishing industry" is an interesting Freudian slip.

I would say only that while statistically it seems untrue that the publishing industry is collapsing, as everybody seems to say it is, it also seems to be the case that people are no longer interested in talking about writing as a medium with significant cultural influence, and also that the number of people reading "serious" or literary fiction seems to be a lot smaller than it used to be.

Whether that's because we've internalized this mentality via all of the writers who constantly lament "the death of the novel" or whether we as a culture legitimately aren't interested in reading this stuff anymore is debatable.

I strongly disagree with this. Literary fiction will always have a place. Every year, authors are awarded prizes for literary works of fiction. There is no shortage of people looking to get into MFA programs which are very competitive and only take a small fraction of applicants.

Also, literary fiction isn't always so serious. It can even be quite funny.

Just because it is not something you like doesn't mean you should make a statement that people are not reading literary fiction because they are!
 

cmi0616

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I strongly disagree with this. Literary fiction will always have a place. Every year, authors are awarded prizes for literary works of fiction. There is no shortage of people looking to get into MFA programs which are very competitive and only take a small fraction of applicants.

Also, literary fiction isn't always so serious. It can even be quite funny.

Just because it is not something you like doesn't mean you should make a statement that people are not reading literary fiction because they are!

Are awards indicative of cultural interest in something? There are awards for all kinds of art--poetry, for instance, which hardly anybody reads outside of poets.

There may be people writing literary fiction, but I don't know if there are many people reading it who are not themselves writers (again, literary fiction starts to look a lot like poetry does now--insular and self-sustaining).

I would also submit to you that "funny" and "serious" are not mutually exclusive adjectives. Pynchon and Wallace, for instance, are at once funny and serious. When I say serious, I don't mean it in the sense that means "somber." I mean that it is making a valid effort to be extremely well-written and is usually conscious of socio-culturual issues. For instance, Jonathan Franzen once said that "serious fiction" is probably synonymous with "cliche-free" fiction.

Finally, I don't know how I gave the impression that I "don't like" literary fiction--it's my favorite genre, and it gives me no pleasure to say that its readership is waning. But it seems to me that less and less people are bothering to do the work literary fiction demands on its readers--and if they are still reading, novels as a whole don't hold the kind of cultural currency they used to. I don't think we'll ever see another coming of The Jungle, for instance.
 
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WriterBN

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I strongly disagree with this. Literary fiction will always have a place. Every year, authors are awarded prizes for literary works of fiction. There is no shortage of people looking to get into MFA programs which are very competitive and only take a small fraction of applicants.

This doesn't necessarily equate to sales, though. Take a look at some of the best-sellers on Amazon. I would tend to agree with cmi0616's observation that the overall readership of literary fiction has declined over the years.
 

rohlo

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This doesn't necessarily equate to sales, though. Take a look at some of the best-sellers on Amazon. I would tend to agree with cmi0616's observation that the overall readership of literary fiction has declined over the years.

I'd like to see how many of those MFA students are looking to become proper literary writers. I know the programs are strongly literary based, but how does that stack up to students' interest? I bet there's a good mix of students interested in genre and literary fiction.

The lack of interest in literary fiction is an indication that Joe Public perceives literary fiction as too challenging. I would also say that the class novel in public education gives many people (I would include myself a few years ago) the idea that literary fiction is a chore to read.
 
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