Brooklyn fiction writer, Martha Cooley, is the author of this wonderful first line in her acclaimed novel, The Archivist.

With a little effort, anything can be shown to connect to anything else; existence is infinitely cross-referenced. And everything has more than one definition.  A cat is a mammal, a narcissist, a companion, a riddle.

Speaking of connections, Martha, who also wrote, "Thirty-Three Swoons," called the other day to tell me all about the new MFA program at Adelphi (which is in Queens). And to invite the readers of OTBKB to an Open House introducing its new MFA program to interested potential applicants.   

The evening will include a short program of faculty readings, a question and answer session and an informal conversation.  Refreshments will be served.  Monday, March 27th at 6:00 p.m., 75 Varick Street, 2nd floor (Adelphi Manhattan Center)

Martha is trying to get the word out to SERIOUS WRITERS LOOKING FOR AN INTERESTING, TOP NOTCH MFA PROGRAM IN THE NYC AREA.

In addition to getting a chance to study with Martha Cooley, here are some other reasons you might want to check out Adelphi’s MFA program:

Why go for an MFA in Creative Writing at Adelphi University?  To become a better writer, of course.  To gain the versatility, confidence, and discipline to sustain yourself through a lifetime in the arts.  And to step off the sidelines, engaging actively with the literary realm at large–and with the particular cultural pleasures of New York, where novelty, variation, and flexibility constitute the most venerable of traditions. 

In our new Creative Writing Program, fiction writers, poets, and playwrights refine their skills in small, single-genre writing workshops, literature courses, and exchanges across the borders of prose, poetry, and drama.  Our students participate in a lively community encompassing not only Adelphi’s campus in Garden City, Long Island, but also nearby New York City’s artistically active boroughs

Adelphi’s creative writing faculty provide one-on-one mentoring for each MFA student.  Our students will have opportunities to run a reading series in SoHo, edit our literary journal, pursue lit-blogging and other on-line ventures, guide undergraduates at the university, and teach in public schools.  They will emerge from the program with a novel or set of stories, a play, or a collection of poems and a realistic sense of what a "life of letters" is all about.  They’ll connect with professional networks and opportunities in teaching and publishing, freelance writing, editorial consulting, and community-based writers’ workshops and organizations.  And they’ll be involved in the off- and off- off-Broadway stage as well as regional theaters.    

Faculty:

Judith Baumel, Poetry
Martha Cooley, Fiction
Imraan Coovadia, Fiction
Anton Dudley, Playwriting
Kermit Frazier, Playwriting
Jacqueline Jones LaMon, Poetry
Jiri Wyatt (Igor Webb), Non-Fiction Memoir

For more information, call the Department of English (516-877-4020).