How to Become an NEA (and Stegner!) Fellow
Turning literary icons into personal mentors, tips for crafting effective statements of purpose and how to overcome being stuck on "The Ladder of Sorrow."
Today we’ll cover:
Why we should absolutely be reading author bios
How to pitch ourselves for statements of purpose that hit
How to maximize the benefit of workshops, conferences, and fellowships
How to turn literary icons into personal mentors
What to do if you’re stuck on “The Ladder of Sorrow”
For writers in the wild, with no institutional support, grants and fellowships can make all the difference. And two of the biggest difference-makers for early career strivers might be the Stegner and the NEA.The Stegner, or the Wallace Stegner Fellowship, is operated out of Stanford University and is a 2-year program that offers no degree and makes no demands, really. All you have to do is write and attend a 3-hour weekly workshop. Think of it like a long artist residency or a super-MFA. You get mentorship, manuscript feedback, a $50k stipend per year, and a sparkling brag on your CV.
Meanwhile, the NEA, or The National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellowships program, offers $25,000 grants in prose and poetry, in alternating years. In return, they ask that you write an impact statement. That’s it!
If you’re a writer with a handful of strong publications and an overarching project to pitch, these opportunities are for you. But sorry to the genre folks, both are a little more geared toward the “literary.”
The Stegner and the NEA are both huge honors and highly selective, and, in a bio or CV, they’ll catch the eyes of editors and agents for sure. The best part is they’re not so far out of reach. The bar to quality for the NEA is only five publications (5!). And you know those writers with a list of pubs and honors longer than a CVS receipt? They’re less common than you’d think among past awardees.
In July, I got to video chat with NEA and Stegner Fellow Vida James to discuss how she improved her chances for both.
Meet your guide, Vida: Vida James is Puerto Rican by way of New York, a social worker by trade. She is a 2024 National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellow and a 2023-2024 Center for Fiction Emerging Writer Fellow. She holds an MFA from the University of Massachusetts - Amherst. Her writing has been supported by Periplus, Storyknife, Tin House, Bread Loaf, MASS MoCA, the St. Botolph Club Foundation, and VONA. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Kenyon Review, Story, New England Review, and elsewhere.
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