Panic? Or procrastinate?
Hi y'all,
I'm so glad I stumbled upon this forum - what an amazing community.
I am at a strange quarter-life crisis point/wondering what my next step should be. Any insight or advice is welcome.
Seriously, thanks for reading this because it's looong...
I'm two years out of school and have been working in book publishing in NYC for most of that time. As I expected, it's a little bit of a soul suck, and I'm at a turning point where I think it's time to move on and go back to school, probably for an English lit PhD. The more I think about it, the more I would really really love to start next fall. But, the only progress I've made is some GRE cramming (both subject and general test in November!). I feel stuck, because:
1) LoRs - Sadly, I've done a terrible job of keeping in touch with professors. My senior essay (that's what we called theses) advisor is a natural person to start with - I took multiple courses with him and he is a "name" of sorts. He seemed to like me ok, but I don't know if he'll be able to write the ZOMG WE MUST ADMIT HER! letter. (Plus, I still need to reach out to him to even ask.)
The other professors I can think of contacting have since left the school or aren't actually professors at all (like a prominent journalist who taught a seminar). The truth is, I don't think there is a professor who would be that outstanding of a recommender in a highly competitive academic pool. While my GPA was fine (3.6) and I was a consistently A- student, I did a lot of my bestest college-era writing for things like the campus newspaper and freelance magazines, as opposed to the academic work. My closest relationships were really with TAs. Think this will completely blow my chances?
2) SOP - I don't quite have a specific, narrow enough research path to craft one of these the way it should be done. My senior essay was a mere 30 pages on V Woolf's Orlando (marvelous book, fyi), which I enjoyed but can't imagine devoting seven years to. I'd like a more interdisciplinary program, that could let me venture into writing about things like film . If I write an SOP that paints me as a modernist interested in women bending the limits of biography and memoir to take ownership of their own narratives, can I end up specializing in something completely different? More to the point, does my lack of certainty about what I want to actually specialize in mean I shouldn't be doing this at all?
3) TIming - really, this is the rub. In an ideal world, I'd take all the time I needed to study for the GREs, go visit schools and cultivate some connections to the faculty who I'd like to work with, revise revise my writing sample. Applying this quickly will be a miserable experience and might hurt my chances of being admitted anywhere/ the right place for me.
And yet, I can't shake the sense that this is the right moment to make a change. I've gone as far as I can go at my job, and I don't know what I'd do for that other year if I wait to apply. I'm starting to feel a bit trapped and miserable the way things are now, to be honest. Better to rush or wait it out?
I know this process can be fraught with angst and frustration... y'all are superheroes. Thanks. :)