Seeing Writers at AWP

by A.L. Major

Though I’m a perfectly socially-adequate human being, who has little issue speaking to other people, the AWP conference still seemed to me the worst possible idea: thousands of otherwise isolated, oftentimes socially inept, or rather “quirky,” writers annually come together in a confined space to talk about the very thing that drives us into insanity. It’s an event that prompts in my mind, first and foremost, “Who came up with that idea?” and, more specifically, “Why?” I might have a very romantic idea of myself as a writer, but I see myself holed up in a tiny room, frustratingly pounding away at my keyboard, not procrastinating on Facebook and certainly not schmoozing and networking with other writers, professors, agents, editors. That’s the way it should be shouldn’t it?

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by A.L. Major

Though I’m a perfectly socially-adequate human being, who has little issue speaking to other people, the AWP conference still seemed to me the worst possible idea: thousands of otherwise isolated, oftentimes socially inept, or rather “quirky,” writers annually come together in a confined space to talk about the very thing that drives us into insanity. It’s an event that prompts in my mind, first and foremost, “Who came up with that idea?” and, more specifically, “Why?” I might have a very romantic idea of myself as a writer, but I see myself holed up in a tiny room, frustratingly pounding away at my keyboard, not procrastinating on Facebook and certainly not schmoozing and networking with other writers, professors, agents, editors. That’s the way it should be shouldn’t it?