Blurb:

I am glad to thank the brightest light in my life, my wife Dr. Leigh Graham (a.k.a. poet Lea Graham), for her encouragement and acute advice. I am also grateful to the extremely savvy Martha C. Pennington for being so supportive of this project, even in the aftermath of a hurricane that took its torrential toll. I’ve never been challenged by an editor this hard in my life, and she really made a difference in making this book as strong as it could be. Ryan Boudinot was helpful in the evolution of the polemical chapter, and his responses to interview questions are greatly appreciated. Thanks also to Dr. Janine Peterson for coordinating the various departments that led to the wild people/wilderness lecture at Marist College and the chapter that developed from that. Many thanks to the editors and support staff at Equinox Publishing Ltd. Thanks as well to the students who granted permission for their work to be used as examples in this book. But most importantly, a salute to the hundreds of students I’ve known throughout my teaching career who taught me about the teaching of writing.















Acknowledgements are due to the editors of the following publications and the organizers of the following events who influenced early incarnations of essays and articles that eventually became chapters in this book:














“Teaching Students to Show Not Tell” was first published as “Teaching Students to Show, Not Tell” in The Chronicle of Higher Education, September 27, 2012 (https://www.chronicle. com/article/Teaching-Students-to-Show-Not/134614). Reprinted






in revised form with permission from The Chronicle of Higher Education.














“The New Weird: What Happens to Creative Writing When the Truth Is Stranger Than Fiction” was first published as “The New Weird: What Happens to Literary Realism When the Truth Is Stranger Than Fiction?” in The Chronicle of Higher Education,June 12, 2012 (https://www.chronicle.com/article/The-New-Weird/132121). Reprinted in revised form with permission from The Chronicle of Higher Education.






“Multiple-Personality Pedagogy: A Hybrid Teaching Tool for Varying Voice in the Classroom” was first published in Hybrid Pedagogy, Spring (http://www.digitalpedagogylab.com/ hybridped/on-pedagogical-manipulation). Reprinted in revised form with permission from Hybrid Pedagogy.













“Extreme Puppet Theater as a Tool for Writing Pedagogy” was














first published as “Extreme Puppet Theater as a Tool for Writing














Pedagogy at K–University Levels: A Vehicle towards ‘Something Else’” in Writing and Pedagogy, vol. 6(1), Spring 2014, pp. 121–126. Copyright owned by Equinox Publishing Ltd.














“May the Farce Be with You: Reflections on Extreme Puppet Theater as a Vehicle towards Something Else” was first published as “May the Farce Be with You: Reflections on ‘Extreme Puppet Theater’ as a Vehicle towards ‘Something Else’” in Alice Chik, Tracey Costley, and Martha C. Pennington (eds.), Creativity and Discovery in the University Writing Class: A Teacher’s Guide, Equinox, Sheffield, UK, 2015, pp. 233–245. Copyright owned by Equinox Publishing Ltd.














“How to Sell a Creative Writing Program Based on the Question ‘Why Study Creative Writing?’” was first published as “Why Study Creative Writing?






Speaking in the Language of the Other to Sell Writing Programs to the State” in Writing for the Curious: Why Study Creative Writing?, edited by Kishor Vaidya, The Curious






Academic Publishing, Canberra, Australia, 2015, no page numbers (Kindle publication). Reprinted in revised form by permission from The Curious Academic Publishing.














“Experience Investigative Eco-Fiction” was originally a PowerPoint presentation at the Creative Writing & Innovative Pedagogies Conference (CWIP) at the University of Central Missouri in Warrensburg, Missouri, October 17, 2015. Copyright owned by author.














“From Wild People to Wilderness: An Education in Investigating Monsters in Our Midst” was originally a public lecture sponsored by the First-Year Studies Program, the School of Liberal Arts, the Department of History, and Medieval and Renaissance Studies at






Marist College in Poughkeepsie, New York, on October 22, 2015. The original subtitle was “An Education in Researching Monsters in Our Midst.” Copyright owned by author.



Mark Spitzer
Mayflower, Arkansas
August 2019