Dear Committee Members by Julie Schumacher

by Lucy Moore | 26 February 2015

Dear Committee Members is a novel that began as an experiment: would it be possible for me to write an entire book in the form of letters of recommendation? I wasn't sure this plan was a good one, but once I realized that in order for the book to succeed, my recommendation letter-writer, Professor Jay Fitger, would have to be a monstrous egotist, writing about himself in letters intended to benefit other people -- well, it became great fun. The book is entirely composed of letters of reference written by one irascible professor of English, whom the reader gets to know, one letter at a time.

Dear Committee Members

You write both short stories and novels so do you have a preference between the two?

I like both. Some ideas that come into my mind feel like stories immediately; others feel like novels and need more space in which to unfold. But I happily read both; right now I'm reading Molly Antopol's short fiction collection, The UnAmericans. You also write for younger readers, so how difficult is it to make the shift for your audience?

I haven't found find this a difficult shift at all, because even in the fiction I write for adults, I often write about younger characters, who are invariably interesting, because their lives and personalities are still being formed. The important thing is not to "write down" to younger readers. C.S. Lewis has a terrific essay on this topic, called "On Three Ways of Writing for Children." He emphasizes the importance of treating the younger reader with respect. His approach, he said, consisted "in writing a children's story because a children's story is the best art form for something you have to say: just as a composer might write a Dead March not because there was a public funeral in view but because certain musical ideas that had occurred to him went best into that form."

How much does teaching creative writing help your own progression as a writer?

Teaching demands a lot of time, which is challenging; but it also means that my work day involves reading and talking to others about literature I admire. I'm very fortunate to have the job that I do. I learn things from my students all the time.

What is the advice you give to every one of your students when starting out on a writing certificate?

Open-mindedness and persistence are key. Be able to listen to criticism while maintaining your own particular goals. And don't expect success -- in the form of publication or money raining down out of the sky -- when you get your degree. If you're writing only because you want success (rather than because you love to write, and need to write), you're probably in for a lot of disappointment.

Your first book was an ALA Notable Book of the Year, and a finalist for the PEN/Hemingway Award and Minnesota Book Award, so how did this affect your confidence as a new writer?

It made writing my second novel very difficult -- in fact, impossible. That second novel lives in a cardboard box on a shelf in my closet and will never see the light of day again. I spent eight years working on it, and finally understood that it had absolutely no plot and needed to be shelved. The writing process is smoothest for me when I have no expectations and no deadlines, and I'm writing just to please myself, and to see what will happen.

Please tell us about the character of Jason Fitger.

Some see Professor Fitger as a purely angry, unpleasant man -- and he is certainly angry, but I'm very fond of him. Though he's often wildly inappropriate, he cares deeply about literature, about his students, about the arts, about education -- things I care about deeply as well. He rages about bureaucratic snags and red tape, and I sympathize with some of his rages (though I would never write the letters he sends). In sum, Jay is a tiny, evil, satisfying person who lives inside me, but I don't generally let him out.