Please note, this post was originally published on November 12, 2014 on my old blog Meghan Cantwell. Writer. on Wordpress.
As the title of this blog post suggests, I am a fan of musicals. However, that is less pertinent to this blog than the rest of the information below. Here is the dry background info: I graduated from Christopher Newport University with a B.A. in English in 2012. I am currently a graduate student at George Mason University pursuing my M.A., studying both literature and professional writing and rhetoric (PWR). I am a technical writing intern with a small government contractor as well as a research assistant for a professor at GMU. Now here is why the dry bits are important: These experiences have been absolutely wonderful. I entered graduate school with a very vague idea of what I wanted to do with my career. The idea was: “Get Masters, Get PhD. Teach at UT-Austin. Rule the World.” See what I mean about vague? I had no real concept about what graduate research was really like. Now that I have been in the program for nearly two years, I understand the mental and physical toll academia can take on people. And while I still want to get my PhD and teach somewhere, preferably in southeast or southwest U.S.A. I don’t want to do that right now. I want to take the theories and practices of professional writing, rhetoric, and literature into a career in technical writing. I hope I will have a job or several jobs that allow me to experience various forms of documents and research. Later in my career, when the academic wheels in my head have not turned for a while, I’ll grease those up again and attempt to attain a PhD at which point I will thoroughly enjoy lecturing, writing, and reading (SO much reading) about the discipline of English. Another rather vague goal I’ve had since the fifth grade when I read a personal essay in front of my homeroom and a student, who rarely ever spoke to me, said “Your diary is like Anne Frank’s,” is to publish my creative fiction and non-fiction works. I am currently working on a collection of short stories (something Annie Dillard says is a waste of time in The Writing Life, but I will persevere nonetheless) and personal essays that I am prepared to shove in publishers’ mailboxes, inboxes, outboxes, shoeboxes until someone puts my writing out there… Writing of all sorts satisfies not only my career ambitions, but also my desire to express myself in a productive and (hopefully) beautiful way. I look forward to writing professionally and creatively for many years to come.
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AuthorI use this blog to record my thoughts on my life in Kanagawa, Japan, continuing creative projects, and career as a professional writer. ArchivesCategories© Meghan Tompkins and Meghan Tompkins.Writer., 2019. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Meghan Tompkins and Meghan Tompkins.Writer. with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
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