SewaneeLetters.com

Congratulations to Cheryl Whitehead! She was a finalist for the New Letters Literary Award and received Honorable Mentions for two of her poems– Requiem for A Trumpet and Distant Relations. Cheryl is writing and submitting while the rest of us sleep…

Rachel Van Horn Leroy emailed to let us know her poem Life Cycle has been published in the online journal “Snow Monkey.” Congratulations Rachel!

Huge congratulations are due to Mary Ann O’Gorman on several recent publications! In addition to organizing our yoga class, she has been busy submitting her work…

You can find her short story, Descant, in the Spring 2009 issue of The Coe Review and her poem Separation, will be published in an upcoming issue of The Bellingham Review. Check out Life in This House, from Finishing Line Press. Go Mary Ann!

Current home: Nashville, TN
Age: 33
Program: MFA
Year in the program: Just finished first year

Blog/website: No, but if you find me on Goodreads.com we can have fun conversations about books!

Fill us in on your background. Schools attended, work situation, etc.
I graduated from Sarah Lawrence College and lived in New York City for 10 more years, writing, dancing, and performing.  Eventually I got a Masters in Education, became a math teacher, and moved to Nashville, Tennessee.  Now I teach mathematics and philosophy in a public high school and write poetry whenever I can.

What led you to the School of Letters program?
I had wanted to get an MFA for a long time, but doing a full-time two-year program was impractical for me.  When I saw the ad for the Sewanee School of Letters in the Oxford American, there was no question.  I knew I wanted to go.

What writing/academic projects are you working on currently?
My focus right now is getting more poems published, so I am researching journals and sending work out.

Favorite class so far at Sewanee:
I couldn’t possibly determine. I completely adored both classes I’ve taken as the School of Letters so far:  a poetry workshop with Charles Martin and Jenn Lewin’s seminar in The Bible as Literature. My teachers were wonderfully intelligent and informed in their fields.

What would be your fantasy class or workshop at Sewanee, and who would teach?
A survey of modern literature with Charles Martin, perhaps? Honestly, he could teach anything he liked and I would sign up!

What advice would you give to any prospective students?
If you want to come, do whatever you need to make it happen. It is like a fantasy camp: nothing to do but read and write; no distractions but the beautiful Sewanee landscape and passionate conversations with classmates.

What are you reading these days?
Where to begin? I just finished Alan Moore’s graphic novel Watchmen and have begun An Arsonist’s Guide to Writers’ Homes in New England by Brock Clarke. Also Wodehouse’s Carry On, Jeeves is around here somewhere, probably under the copy of Hermione Lee’s biography of Virgina Woolf I’ve been reading for 6 months!