feuervogel | My friends aren't helpful.

On Facebook, I said, "talk me out of applying for a PhD in German studies."

Two people are trying to talk me INTO it.

Application deadline is December 8.

It's a joint UNC-Duke program, and I can't find any information on which school's tuition you pay. (UNC's would be so much cheaper.)

The main reason I didn't continue my German studies right after college (aside from thinking I wanted to be an O-Chem professor, hahahaha, lol) was because I didn't think I could get a decent-paying job with that. I really hate that a mercenary decision I made when I was 17 (ie, to go into sciences because $$$) is controlling my present and future.

(I also really like public transit and urban planning and smart growth, but German is something I've loved forever, or since the late 80s, anyway, when I started studying the language.)

Problems I see: a) I want to write. b) There's the barest chance I could get my shit together in time for the December 8 application deadline. c) I wouldn't be able to go to VP next year, if I get in. d) I'm a horrible student--total slacker. Though maybe if it's something I care about, it would be easier.

So, maybe I think about it for the next 6 months, figure out the answers to the questions they want answered on their application form, and make a decision then. I know myself, and, while I make impulsive, snap decisions, this is kind of huge. (Also, I don't really have any 10-20 page papers. The one I wrote on Schnitzler's Reigen when I was in Marburg is 5 pages (I got a 2 on it), and I found my collected papers for Ideas and Power in the Modern World, which included some German philosophy (Marx & Hegel, mainly, also Kant), but they're all 3-5 pages, too.

Argh, I don't know.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I wouldn't rule out Viable Paradise. It is only a week, after all. Although Clarion or Odyssey would fit better in a college schedule. I can't readily find the VP costs, but I had the sense it was quite expensive compared to Clarion. When you factor in duration and Clarion scholarships.

Also, what if you submitted a story that had German or Germany as a theme? Or even if you wrote another paper, 10 pages really isn't all that long once it's doublespaced. Maybe 5000 words or so? Standard short-story size. Couple days of Nanowrimo writing. :)

You might also get away with submitting 2 5-page papers if they're meaty enough content-wise.

It would really depend on the academic schedule and whether I had any exams or papers due that week. VP is $1100 next year, plus airfare, room, and board, so ~2 grand, depending on flights (if I can get someone to drive me from Boston, it'll save me like $200, even if I pay all their gas both ways.)

The thought of Clarion horrifies me. I wouldn't survive that wringer. Six weeks of forced writing and ack. I'd have a migraine by the middle of the first week from lack of sleep plus stress. (Also, I lean more toward novels than short fiction.)

I don't know if fiction counts. I can ask. The story I'm working on right now for my VP application is set in Dresden in 1918, and it may be strongly influenced by All Quiet on the Western Front... My story coming out in December is set in Berlin in 1961, though it's alternate history.

What would I even write a new paper about? Hmm. Fantasy? Literature since 1945? (My college prof's focus.) IDEK.

OH. I could write about Das Leben der Anderen, perhaps compared with Die Birnen von Ribbeck...

Edited 2012-10-27 19:43 (UTC)

I'm doing a second master's online. So for me I'd know I could get the work done in advance for a week or two weeks free (or at least mostly free) from thinking about it. And VP would be in the middle of the semester. Plus I'd think you could talk to the profs and be all 'hey, I have this awesome chance to go do this awesome thing and it's still academic and can we just schedule around it and I'll make it up'. Graduate profs might be more understanding of that sort of thing than undergrad, I think? Partly because they treat you as an adult and capable of being self-motivating, and partly because... you're an adult, with other things going on in your life. (Well, except for that one jerk of an instructor I had in my first semester, but he was crap at other things too. I gave him a bad review.)

As for Clarion, I saw it as space. It's space to think about writing and nothing else. It's not that you're writing every minute, but that you get to talk to cool peers and mentors and other sf/f lovers and awesomeness. I made a point to get enough sleep, because depriving yourself of enough sleep for six weeks is bad. Very bad.

Odyssey focuses on novels, but might be more expensive. And of course is also 6 weeks.

I was thinking I might do Odyssey or VP at some point. Well, try to, I'd still have to get in. :)

I've been working part time since May '09, though I haven't had work since early '10 (yay temp agency), so I've had a lot of space to write. Which, yay? But also no income, which sucks.

I have very weird feelings around mentors, probably because of my mother. I've apparently always thought that I had to figure everything out on my own, rather than ask advice (probably because my mom had no advice to give a geeky extrovert who wanted to learn stuff, and I never saw the point of my guidance counselor in high school).

It's too late for me to get everything together for this year, so I have time to figure out what I want to do, whether that's language or literature (or, if possible, both), and organize all my application materials, including a CV (ack).

I granted you access because I wrote a couple more posts on this topic, but they're locked.

Sounds like taking a bit of time to think about it might be the wisest option, frustrating though it can be.

My friends aren't helpful.

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