Betsy Cutler

Most of my studies have been in biology, chemistry, and animal science.  I like to link the characteristics of these studies into my world of writing ultimately through human nature and chaos.  For me, there is no ‘off’ switch to writing.  It doesn’t care if I am miles away from a computer or under my house wondering what to do with an old coal furnace.  At any moment, I can become a victim of the forgotten idea.  The best thoughts can come at the least expected time.  Therefore, when brilliant thoughts come — I never, ever, say, “I’ll write it down later.”  Even when I say to myself, “I’m sure I’ll remember that.  How could I forget?”  An hour later, I’ll be asking myself, “Now what was that great idea I had?”  I try to have ‘writers-idea’ insurance with me — a pen and paper or recorder.

I’m a writer who reads.  My reading tastes can be pictured as a rainbow, or perhaps a grayscale — each color, shade, or tint a representative author.  Some  authors who I admire:  Denis Johnson, particularly his story “Emergency,” shifts from humor to darkness with great talent.  Dorothy Allison’s “River of Names,” sprays out — like buckshot — an unimaginable life on the pages.  Annie Dillard and Alice Walker.  I study their techniques of shifting tense, flashbacks, sentence structure, and visualization.

I’m interested in what I’m interested in.

This changes from time to time as I change from time to time with my writing and the weather and how I decide to spell my name. Lately I’ve been obsessed with tennis and foxglove and sharks, and I’m pretty sure I was supposed to be a fish; which, as I was recently told, there is a theory that suggests we have vestiges of gills. If I could I remember the name I would tell you, but I can’t, I can’t. But what I can share is I’m turning red, and I usually turn red with anything I say and write. So between us I’m not even here. I’m some species of poet and there’s someone at my door.

I am a short story fiction writer and once in a while ... a poet, so it is safe to say that my interests are in the creative work.  I am interested in the use of academic writing and language in defining and redefining characters, relationships, and stories on the whole, thus creating something that is innovative and transient to stereotypes of experimental fiction.  I am also fascinated by non-fiction, especially memoirs, and their juxtaposition to creative work.  So much of the ‘human experience’ is defined by how we think and internalize what is happening around/to us, and writing is a wonderful tool to bring those internal experiences to the external, contrasting fiction and non-fiction and challenging us to question what is real.

My principle area of interest, under the creative writing umbrella, is poetry. Since my freshmen year of undergraduate study at Bucknell University, I have been enrolled in poetry workshop classes. Through the nurturing support and tutelage of my professors at Bucknell, my art has grown and developed exponentially. It was not until my senior year that I realized my uncontrollable desire to continue my education, as I feel I still have much more to learn. Of all the programs I discovered, Virginia Tech’s M.F.A. program was the best fit for me. I am extremely honored to be among the chosen few who will have the opportunity to grow and learn in this incredible literary environment.

Geri Roberts

I first got hooked on writing screenplays, then moved to short stories, followed by creative nonfiction, poetry, and plays.  My writing focuses on sex/gender issues as well as familial and societal dysfunction — its roots and how it plays out.  I dream of writing captivating novels that beg to be brought to the big screen.

A native of the Hoosier state, Josette Torres earned her BA in Creative Writing from Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana in 2007. At Purdue, she received the Martha E. McKinney Award, the Bain-Swiggett Award and the Polymnia Award in Poetry from the Department of English and a first prize poetry award from the undergraduate literary journal The Bell Tower. She holds the befuddling yet still amusing distinction of having her poetry published in The (Purdue) Exponent Literary Edition for six consecutive semesters. At Virginia Tech, her poems can be found in the 2008-09 Graduate School Handbook and Planner, and other unlikely places. She lives in Downtown Blacksburg, along with dozens of boxes from her previous home in Downtown Lafayette, Indiana.

I mainly write short fiction.  Language is not always a dependable medium and I like to experiment with its limitations.  Miscommunication is a common theme in my work.  My stories are often told in snapshots or fragments that do not necessarily follow a cohesive narrative.  I also use humor in my work to help me ask questions and tackle subjects that I normally would not have the patience or the courage to explore.

Robert Walker began writing poetry while playing bass in the cover-band ManHole (an all male group that played songs originally recorded by Courtney Love’s mid-90s band Hole). After ManHole split, sighting artistic differences, Walker enjoyed a brief solo career opening for Ru Paul. After a scandal involving George Michael and a public restroom forced him out of the music business he became a High School teacher in rural Florida; where his colorful tales of life on the road lead him to known as the “eccentric” English teacher. Robert is currently a Knobler fellow in the MFA program at Virginia Tech, and while most of this bio is completely fraudulent Robert does have poetry in or forthcoming from Ashe’: The Journal of Experimental Spirituality, Knockout, 5AM, Mipoesias, Limp Wrist, Pearl, and The Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide. Robert was also part of the reading series for the 2008 Saints & Sinners literary festival in New Orleans. And a portion of his play All of Them was read as part of a panel at the 2009 AWP conference in Chicago.

I’m a North Florida farm boy who comes to Virginia Tech after nearly a decade editing and reporting for the Washington Post, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and a host of other U.S. dailies. I first fell in love with the words of Dr. Seuss, Edgar Allan Poe, Langston Hughes, James Baldwin, Toni Morrison and the Blacks Arts Movement luminaries, including Tech’s own Nikki Giovanni. Music is heaven’s balm and my writing muse, and I feast on an eclectic mix throughout each day. My Pandora.com jukeboxes include Bjork, Lucinda Williams, Donny Hathaway, Mahalia Jackson, Celia Cruz, Stevie Wonder, Amel Larrieux and Stevie Nicks. I have been awarded fellowships from the Dow Jones Newspaper Fund and Cave Canem Foundation. I have been honored with Tech’s 2008 Emily Morrison Prize and am a 2008 New Letters Poetry Award finalist.