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Seth Abramson

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Seth Abramson
BornOctober 31, 1976
Concord, Massachusetts
OccupationPoet
NationalityAmerican
EducationMaster of Fine Arts, Juris Doctor

Seth Abramson (born October 31, 1976, Concord, Massachusetts) is an American poet, editor, literary critic, and freelance journalist associated with metamodernism.

Life

Abramson is a graduate of Dartmouth College, Harvard Law School, and the Iowa Writers' Workshop. He is currently a doctoral student in English at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

Publishers Weekly notes that Abramson has "picked up a very large following as a blogger and commentator, covering poetry, politics, and higher education, and generating a controversial, U.S. News-style ranking of graduate programs in writing." In recommending Northerners, the poet's second collection of poetry, the magazine called Abramson "serious and ambitious...uncommonly interested in general statements, in hard questions, and harder answers, about how to live." Colorado Review called the collection "alternately expansive and deeply personal...of crystalline beauty and complexity," terming Abramson "a major American voice." Notre Dame Review echoed the sentiment, calling Abramson "a powerful voice." Don Share, Senior Editor for Poetry, has said of Abramson's "What I Have," awarded the 2008 J. Howard and Barbara M.J. Wood Prize by Poetry, "the poem absorbs certain details but doesn't fasten upon them the way poets are tempted to do; it's not adjectival, it's not descriptive, it's not painting a kind of canvas with scenery on it, and yet those details are really fascinating."

A former public defender and commentator for Air America Radio, Abramson is presently the chief contemporary poetry reviewer for The Huffington Post and a regular columnist for Indiewire. Abramson's Indiewire column focuses on films, television programs, and video games informed by metamodernism, described by the author as "a cultural paradigm that uses both fragmentary and contradictory data to produce new forms of coherence."

The Best American Experimental Writing Series

In October 2012, Omnidawn announced that it would begin publishing, in 2014, an annual anthology of innovative verse entitled Best American Experimental Writing. Abramson and the poet Jesse Damiani were named Series Co-Editors. Shortly thereafter, Cole Swensen was named the first Guest Editor for the series. In April of 2014, Wesleyan University Press picked up the series, and announced that Douglas Kearney would be the Guest Editor for Best American Experimental Writing 2015.

The MFA Research Project

Abramson authors The MFA Research Project (MRP), a website that publishes indexes of creative writing Master of Fine Arts (MFA) programs based on surveys and hard-data research. Indexes appearing on the MRP (which is made public, and available to MFA applicants, from November 15 through August 15 of each year) include ordered listings of program popularity, funding, selectivity, fellowship placement, job placement, student-faculty ratio, application cost, application response times, application and curriculum requirements, and foundation dates. The MRP also publishes surveys of current MFA applicants regarding demographic and application-practice issues such as applicant age, applicants' application strategies, and applicants' genre affiliations. Similar surveys and research are also published with respect to creative writing doctoral programs, low-residency creative writing MFA programs, non-terminal creative writing M.A. programs, playwriting/dramaturgy MFA programs, and scriptwriting/screenwriting MFA programs. Writing for The Cambridge Companion to American Poetry Since 1945 (Cambridge University Press, 2013), Hank Lazer described Abramson's project as "a daring and data-rich endeavor." The Missouri Review observed that Abramson, along with novelist Tom Kealey, "had done a tremendous amount of work to peel back the layers of MFA programs and get applicants to make informed decisions."

In 2009, data compiled by the MRP regarding full-residency creative writing MFA programs were adopted by Poets & Writers for its annual MFA issue. Poets & Writers now publishes data from the MRP annually, having expanded its annual MFA data chart to include (beginning in 2010) a comprehensive assessment of low-residency MFA programs, and (beginning in 2011) a comprehensive assessment of creative writing doctoral programs. The methodology for these rankings was first published by Poets & Writers in 2010; the methodology was most recently updated and republished in 2012.

Beginning in August 2012, Poets & Writers has published MRP data in the form of an alphabetized "MFA Index"; previously, the magazine's annual data chart was referred to as a "ranking." In 2011, The Chronicle of Higher Education termed the Poets & Writers national assessment methodology "comprehensive" and "the only MFA ranking regime." Writing in 2010 for Boulevard and The Huffington Post, novelist and poet Anis Shivani noted the "great brouhaha" caused by "a journeyman's attempt to rank MFA programs...according to input from potential apprentices as opposed to evaluations by journeymen and masters themselves." In 2009, noted poet and literary critic Ron Silliman claimed Abramson's research and writing on MFA programs was part of a larger sea change in American poetics; according to Silliman, "Abramson's take is new and different. And important.... we are moving away from poetry as a literature--let alone as a canon--toward poetry as a practice..."

In September 2011, an open letter signed by nearly two hundred professors from undergraduate and graduate creative writing programs was published, calling the then-rankings "specious" and terming their then-methodology "unethical" and "quite misleading." A week later, Poets & Writers responded to the open letter, asserting that it had "adhere to the highest journalistic standards...Our ethical obligation is to be transparent to our readers about the source of the rankings and how they were derived, which we have done consistently and without reservation." Of Abramson, the rankings' primary researcher, the magazine's Editorial Director Mary Gannon said, " has been collecting data about applicants' preferences and about MFA programs for five years, and we stand behind his integrity."

Controversy

On May 25, 2014, Abramson remixed the audio of the last YouTube video posted by Elliot Rodger. A prefatory note was appended to the remix, calling it a metamodern attempt to reclaim Rodger's language as a "vehicle for amity and compassion," and to "turn on their heads those words of hatred Elliot Rodger left behind him." The note also "condemned in the strongest terms both the words and the actions of Elliot Rodger." The remix, entitled "Last Words for Elliot Rodger," received mixed reviews. While The Los Angeles Review of Books called the poem a "virtuoso formal accomplishment" and "quite moving," Jason Diamond of Flavorwire dismissed it as "a sad and failed attempt at making some kind of statement." Writing for VIDA, poet Laura Mullen opined that Abramson's remix "merely mimics the glossy, insubstantial output of the media machine," and constituted "a hasty scooping up of something the moment it was posted online"; writing for HTMLGiant, poet Donald Dunbar called the remix "life-affirming," and noted approvingly its attempt to be "a message of comfort, understanding, and love." In Litragger, poet and Stegner Fellow Corey Van Landingham criticized the negative response to the poem on social media, calling it evidence of "a hazardous trend in contemporary poetry toward impulsive responses... reactions, grounded in the pretense of leftism, that in fact funnel themselves into a quite conservative position in regard to art and culture."

On May 30, 2014, Omnidawn, publisher of Best American Experimental Writing 2014, indicated in a statement that it was "dismayed, disheartened, distressed" by the remix, and that " actions in this matter are not in alignment with our principles." On June 11, 2014, Abramson published a poem entitled "Art Breaks the Sound Barrier," in which Omnidawn's words were remixed to form a statement in support of experimental writing.

Awards

Works

Books

Anthologies

Interviews

  • As It Ought to Be (March 12, 2014)
  • Poem of the Week (January 29, 2014)
  • Full Stop (November 8, 2012)
  • LitBridge (September 14, 2012)
  • Poetry Society of America (March 12, 2010)
  • Sycamore Review (September 30, 2009)

Selected Poems

References

  1. Author website, http://www.sethabramson.net/
  2. Author biography, The Huffington Post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/seth-abramson
  3. Author biography, AGNI. http://www.bu.edu/agni/authors/S/Seth-Abramson.html
  4. Review of Northerners, Publishers Weekly (May 2011). http://www.publishersweekly.com/978-1-930974-96-4
  5. Northerners] (review), Colorado Review http://coloradoreview.colostate.edu/reviews/northerners/
  6. "From Ruin to Rebirth," Notre Dame Review http://ndreview.nd.edu/assets/60036/ripatrazone_review.pdf
  7. "You're Always Moving Toward Silence," Poetry (March 2009 Poetry Foundation Podcast). http://www.poetryfoundation.org/journal/audioitem.html?id=727
  8. "Living on LIPP," The Harvard Law Record (September 22, 2005). http://media.www.hlrecord.org/media/storage/paper609/news/2005/09/22/News/Living.On.Lipp-996018.shtml?norewrite200611151509&sourcedomain=www.hlrecord.org&&&xmlsyn=1
  9. The New Hampshire Review (Masthead). http://www.newhampshirereview.com/about.htm
  10. "July 2012 Contemporary Poetry Reviews, The Huffington Post http://www.huffingtonpost.com/seth-abramson/july-2012-contemporary-po_b_1690087.html
  11. "A New Press Play Column: Seth Abramson's 'Metamericana'", Indiewire (January 31, 2014) http://blogs.indiewire.com/pressplay/a-new-press-play-column-seth-abramsons-metamericana-is-martin-scorseses-latest-offering-unbelievable-on-purpose
  12. "Metamericana: Paolo Sorrentino's The Great Beauty Is Exactly That," Indiewire (February 28, 2014) http://blogs.indiewire.com/pressplay/metamericana-paolo-sorrentinos-the-great-beauty-is-exactly-that
  13. "On American Metamodernism," The Huffington Post (February 7, 2014) http://www.huffingtonpost.com/seth-abramson/on-american-metamodernism_b_4743903.html
  14. "Talks on Metamodernism with Seth Abramson," As It Ought to Be (March 12, 2014) http://asitoughttobe.com/2014/03/12/talks-on-metamodernism-with-seth-abramson-part-3-of-3/
  15. "Best American Experimental Writing Anthology Announced," The Poetry Foundation (November 12, 2012). http://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet/2012/11/best-american-experimental-writing-anthology-announced/
  16. "Announcing Omnidawn's New Annual Anthology, Best American Experimental Writing," Omnidawn (November 7, 2012). http://www.omni-verse.net/announcing-omnidawns-new-annual-anthology-best-american-experimental-writing/
  17. "Best American Experimental Writing: Guidelines for Submitting," Wesleyan University Press (April 17, 2014). http://www.wesleyan.edu/wespress/bax/
  18. The MFA Research Project http://mfaresearchproject.wordpress.com/
  19. "American Poetry and Its Institutions," The Cambridge Companion to American Poetry Since 1945 (February 8, 2013) http://books.google.com/books?id=nKMQ5b0VKz0C&pg=PA160&dq=cambridge+companion+lazer+%22daring+and+data-rich%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=tilQU4W3DIaKyASZhYLQBQ&ved=0CD8Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=cambridge%20companion%20lazer%20%22daring%20and%20data-rich%22&f=false
  20. "The MFA Degree: A Bad Decision?", The Missouri Review (August 29, 2011) http://www.missourireview.com/tmr-blog/2011/08/the-mfa-degree-a-bad-decision/
  21. "2010 MFA Rankings: The Top 50," Poets & Writers. https://www.pw.org/content/2010_mfa_rankings_top_fifty_0 Template:WebCite
  22. "The Top 50 MFA Programs," Poets & Writers. https://www.pw.org/content/top_fifty_mfa_programs_united_states_comprehensive_guide
  23. "2011 MFA Rankings: The Top Fifty," Poets & Writers. http://www.pw.org/content/2011_mfa_rankings_the_top_fifty_0
  24. "2011 MFA Rankings: The Top Ten Low-Residency Programs," Poets & Writers. http://www.pw.org/content/2011_mfa_rankings_the_top_ten_lowresidency_programs
  25. "2011 Poets & Writers Magazine Ranking of MFA Programs: A Guide to the Methodology," Poets & Writers. http://www.pw.org/content/2011_poets_amp_writers_magazine_ranking_of_mfa_programs
  26. "2013 MFA Index: Further Reading," Poets & Writers. http://www.pw.org/content/2013_mfa_index_further_reading?cmnt_all=1
  27. "What Defines a Successful Post-M.F.A. Career?", The Chronicle of Higher Education (November 3, 2011) http://chronicle.com/article/What-Defines-a-Successful/129638/
  28. "M.F.A. Application-Season Etiquette," The Chronicle of Higher Education. http://chronicle.com/blogs/arts/m-f-a-application-season-etiquette/29172
  29. "The MFA/Creative Writing System Is An Undemocratic, Medieval Guild System That Represses Good Writing," Boulevard. http://www.boulevardmagazine.org/shivani2.pdf
  30. "Creative Writing Programs: Is The MFA System Corrupt And Undemocratic?," The Huffington Post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/anis-shivani/creative-writing-programs-corrupt_b_757653.html
  31. "The Most Underappreciated Profession," Ron Silliman (August 12, 2009). http://ronsilliman.blogspot.com/2009/08/most-underappreciated-profession-in-our.html
  32. Stoeffel, Kat (8 September 2011). "Creative Writing Profs Dispute Their Ranking–No, the Entire Notion of Ranking!". The New York Observer. Retrieved 13 September 2011.
  33. ^ "Poets & Writers Responds to Open Letter". Poets & Writers. 13 September 2011. Retrieved 13 September 2011.
  34. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/seth-abramson/the-last-words-of-mass-mu_b_5387953.html
  35. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/seth-abramson/the-last-words-of-mass-mu_b_5387953.html
  36. http://marginalia.lareviewofbooks.org/poetics-tragedy/
  37. http://flavorwire.com/459354/rap-genius-and-bad-poetry-its-always-too-soon-to-grab-personal-attention-after-a-tragedy/
  38. http://www.vidaweb.org/writing-murder-last-words-for-xx-xx/
  39. http://htmlgiant.com/web-hype/on-bullying-isla-vista-seth-abramson-and-social-media/
  40. http://www.litragger.com/craft-and-life/advice-and-opinion/this-isnt-about-elliot-rodger-by-corey-van-landingham/
  41. http://us8.campaign-archive2.com/?u=b17e2ef2fd06178523ee500f7&id=797b6af66e&e=abb43610db
  42. http://www.inknode.com/piece/2394-seth-abramson-art-breaks-the-sound-barrier
  43. "Abramson - Thievery". The University of Akron Press. Retrieved 6 September 2012.
  44. "Abramson - Northerners". New Issues Press. Retrieved 13 September 2011.
  45. "Prizes". Poetry Foundation. Retrieved 13 September 2011.
  46. "Best New Poets 2008: 50 Poems from Emerging Writers". University of Virginia Press. Retrieved 13 September 2011.
  47. "The Creative Writing MFA Handbook". Continuum Books. Retrieved 6 September 2012.
  48. http://www.bloomsbury.com/us/the-bloomsbury-anthology-of-contemporary-jewish-american-poetry-9781441125576/
  49. http://linebreak.org/two-weeks/
  50. http://www.threecandlespress.com/books.htm
  51. http://myweb.wvnet.edu/~jelkins/lp-2001/intro/

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