Merrill Feitell

Instructor Biography:

M.F.A. and author of Here Beneath Low-Flying Planes (Iowa Short Fiction Award Winner), served on faculty in the M.F.A. program at University of Maryland and has taught fiction writing at Columbia University, Pratt Institute, SUNY Purchase, Colorado College and Cal State San Bernardino. Ms. Feitell's fiction has appeared in many publications, including Best New American Voices and has earned her fellowships from the MacDowell Colony, The Corporation of Yaddo, Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference,  Taos Writers’ Conference, Virginia Center for Creative Arts and the Bethesda Writers’ Center, which named her an Emerging Writer Fellow.

Instructor Statement:

I think of writing as a three-part process: First, there’s the roar of the unconscious that the writer must pin to the page in a first draft. Second, there’s the challenge of learning to read one’s own drafts, scouting them for subtext and clues as to what the story is most essentially about. Third, there’s the practice of ruthless revision, imposing order on the roar by applying techniques that best transmit the particular story at hand. My hope is that students will use the workshop to forge new skills as writers, as readers of their own work and as visionaries on its behalf.