R167. CANCELLED: A Foot in the Door: How to Break into the Book Industry Post-MFA
Status: Not Accepted
Thursday, March 5, 2020
10:35 am to 11:50 am
This panel will bring together recent graduates of creative writing MFA programs who are now beginning careers within the book industry—at Tin House, Open Letter, Jack Jones Literary Arts, and Adroit Journal. We’ll discuss what drew us towards this industry, and outline steps you can take within MFA programs (lit mag work, internships, publishing reviews/interviews) to prepare. We’ll also discuss how to market yourself for a publishing job, and what it’s like to work in publishing with an MFA.
Participants
Moderator:
Elizabeth DeMeo is an assistant editor at Tin House Books. The former managing editor of the Arkansas International, she is also the former director of the Arkansas Writers in the Schools program. She holds an MFA in fiction from the University of Arkansas Program in Creative Writing & Translation.
Anthony Blake is the marketing director for Open Letter Books and holds an MFA in poetry from the University of Arkansas, where he cofounded and edited the Arkansas International.
Jenny Tinghui Zhang is a Chinese American writer from Austin. A VONA/Voices alumna and graduate of the University of Wyoming's MFA program, she serves as a prose editor for The Adroit Journal.
