Writing Lessons: Tightening the Reins by Sarah

Writing Lessons: Tightening the Reins by Sarah - July 2016 Scholarship Essay

The most important lesson I ever learned from a teacher came from my Creative Writing professor. In fact, I learned several, eye-opening lessons from this man, but the one that resonated the most to me was that taking a writing class is about becoming a better writer, not about how to get published.
One of the students was a fifty-odd year old male who came to class early every day, with his fancy fountain pen and leather notebook. To me, this exemplified a serious, thoughtful writer, or so I thought.
This student, “Mike”, immediately sent his “trope novella” on samurai cat mythology to Professor W., before the prof had even given any writing assignments, mentioning he had sent it to “The New Yorker”, with no response.
Professor W. told him, as a yet-to-be established writer, it was better to submit to smaller journals and publications. In addition, if “Mike” had read “The New Yorker”, he would know they didn’t publish pieces like that, for there is no better way to get published than to “get a feel” for what that magazine or publishing house publishes.
Through my time in Professor W.’s class, I learned to accept that I have no control over getting published (unless I self-publish), but I can have complete control over the quality of my work. Any good product will sell itself, as long as people know it’s out there. Rather than focus on getting published that semester, I focused on perfecting my craft, and it has shown.
That semester, I won two, second place writing awards at the school, got published in a “Saturday Evening Post” anthology, and was a “Crosslites” scholarship essay contest winner.
I can’t wait till I can take his English Composition II class.