Dear MFAW people,
I’m guessing that, for the majority of you, your first desire to write was a way to express an emotion that you were having difficulty feeling or understanding. Or it might have been an early attempt to document, to explore the world in which you lived. But then you grow up and reality kicks in big time, and reality can be an obstacle to working with your imagination. It can mess with your mind. If you’re not careful it can catch you with your guard down and say things like: Oh please, you think your little poem is going to change the plight of people living as refugees? You think your little novel is going to make people think about a compassionate society that cares for its citizens?
In response to this voice, we can choose to focus on the value of the conversation that our writing will prompt with our audience. Because, as writers, we are not only recorders of history and memory, we are also striving to be forward-thinkers and visionaries. Our job is to promote thought, to witness, to explore, to dream, and above all, to create connection.
In her poem, “Children of our Age,” the 1996 Nobel Laureate in literature, Wislawa Szymborska, wrote:
“Whether you like it or not,
Your genes have a political past
Your skin a political cast,
Your eyes, a political slant.”
She is speaking here of what separates us from one another, and at times like these, there is so much to separate us that it becomes an incredibly huge task to look for what unites us. But as writers, it is our responsibility to keep reminding our country of this connection.
So when someone asks you, What do you do? perhaps you can come up with a sentence or two that says something like: “I am part of an international conversation. I use my imagination to explore possibilities, to investigate the past, and to dream about the future.” And when someone asks you, What can you do with a degree in creative writing? perhaps you can say something like, “Well, my degree is just the key that opens a door. But once I step over the threshold, I can be a poet or a playwright or a novelist or a memoirist or a blogger or a protestor or an activist.” It really doesn’t matter what label you claim; you will be – you are – a writer in the world and it is the action you take that holds all the promise.
I know that many of us are having a difficult time with the outcome of the election. Remember that we are a community: a community of writers, whose role in our society is to attempt to witness, document, invent, and imagine a different kind of future. Imagination is our strength. Faith is our call to action.
With gratitude for community,
Elena Georgiou,
Program Director, Goddard MFA in Creative Writing
Latest posts by Elena Georgiou (see all)
- BITING THROUGH: In recognition and celebration of Juneteenth - June 22, 2020
- When Words Insist On Their Self-Isolation - April 13, 2020
- The Grief Telephone - June 11, 2019
- Tiny Stories, Big Influence - December 3, 2018
- The Sugar Balloon - July 30, 2018
Thank you.
Thank you Elena!
Thank you.
Dear Sistren,
Please know that I am reading all of your comments and absorbing them. I apologize that I don’t have the time to write to each of you individually, but it is a workday and my to-do list looks like Mount Everest. I truly appreciate all of you taking the time to read this letter, and I hope it helps youto feel that you have a home.
Warmly,
~Elena
Thank you, Elena, for this encouragement and inspiration.
Thank you for the reminder and the affirmation ;o)
Scout
Thank you for this E. I needed this grounding today.
Just beautiful, thank you!
Thank you, Elena, and thank you Goddard community.
If you don’t know the kind of person I am
and I don’t know the kind of person you are
a pattern that others made may prevail in the world
and following the wrong god home we may miss our star.
For there is many a small betrayal in the mind,
a shrug that lets the fragile sequence break
sending with shouts the horrible errors of childhood
storming out to play through the broken dyke.
And as elephants parade holding each elephant’s tail,
but if one wanders the circus won’t find the park,
I call it cruel and maybe the root of all cruelty
to know what occurs but not recognize the fact.
And so I appeal to a voice, to something shadowy,
a remote important region in all who talk:
though we could fool each other, we should consider–
lest the parade of our mutual life get lost in the dark.
For it is important that awake people be awake,
or a breaking line may discourage them back to sleep;
the signals we give–yes or no, or maybe–
should be clear: the darkness around us is deep.
-William Stafford
Bless you, and bless this post.
Beautiful, Elena. Thank you!