Abdel
9.25.2013
Into
the Lion’s Den
The first time I
walked into Shelly Atkins’ graduate writing workshop ten minutes late, I knew
there was going to be trouble. Before the semester started, the students who
took her class before had scared us. She was intense, harsh, demanding, and
brilliant, they said. Not only was she an acclaimed novelist and scholar, she
also had a part-time law practice where she took on animal rights cases. In the
words of my students, “she did too much.”
So, it really
wasn’t a good look when I showed up late. I opened the door and everyone was
gathered around a long table, with Shelly at the end. The conversation paused
and she looked up. She had on a black leather jacket and a mane of frizzy
blonde hair with a huge black burette. The hair made Shelly look like a lion.
She flashed me a tight smile and I tried to find a seat as quietly as I could.
My classmates
had taken strategic positions in the chairs away from Shelly. I took one of the
empty seats near her. The heavy chair groaned across the floor as I sat. The
seat was hard and cold. My roommate Dennis grinned, enjoying my agony.
“Are you Abdel?”
she said.
“Yes, that’s me.
I’m sorry for being late.”
“We were just
discussing the syllabus,” she said. She laid the syllabus down with a smack and
slid it across the table. I glanced at it and tried not to show surprise at its
thickness. This was going to be the most challenging class I ever took.
Besides having
to read my classmates work, we also had to read complex critical theory, and
challenging fiction. All of us taught undergraduate creative writing classes as
well. On top of that there was the work that was most important: writing our
own stories.
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