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I also, as someone who really cares about the writers of the “big daddy monarch” was not really offended by your interest in the current and lack of interest in the former, though, of course, your understanding of even the most contemporary of writers is improved with a strong understanding of its historical place as a work that speaks not only to the works sitting next to it on a bookshelf at Borders, but also to the vast list of works that have come before it and helped shape and influence the genre it falls into. That being said, I completely disagree with Rabble Rouser’s assertion that past writing is much harder to study than contemporary. While the language is more challenging simply because we are from a different time with a different set of phrases and word usage than the bards, complexity and importance is by no mean lacking in the contemporary…Some of the most difficult works of literature are the most modern! Understanding a conceit by John Donne may be complicated, but making it through Pynchon’s Gravity’s Rainbow is an academic victory!

I don’t know if you’ve noticed, Pinky, but the situation is even worse when it comes to history. I read these guys, and I just want to say, with James Tyrone: “For god’s sake, forget the past!”

Have any of you considered that the reason you find works by the “dirty bards” and the “pious poets” not so significant anymore might be due to the fact that its, like, harder to read? Or that contemporary fiction still has to EARN its freaking place in this academy? And for that to occur, boundaries of time, place, and social climate must be transcended? Five years since publication and a bunch of lectures about the writing process (zzzzz) do not a classic work of literature make.

Quite frankly, the fact that the last 80 years of literature (give or take) constitutes 20-30% of the subject test is amazingly generous, considering that the test is meant to encompass ALL OF THE information that will be relevant to those seeking an advanced degree in literature, like Chaucer, Donne, Milton, etc. You know, those guys who had an incredible influence on what we call modern literature, without whom these “moderns” would not be able to exist, at least not in the same way. In spite of that “big bad daddy monarch”, they found a way to pursue their craft and subtly subvert that monarch, an issue that should be incredibly relevant to any self respecting MFA candidate in the current social climate, or anytime, for that matter. The idea that the academy’s focus should shift just because you all think its easier to study contemporary literature rather than sifting through all the big, scary words in classical literature that has given rise to what you claim to love is absurd.

Oh, and Andrew, do you know how many people are still getting their PhDs in 19th Century British Lit? Is that new, timely, or contrarian? Nope! But, somehow, it is still intriguing and worthy of new scholarship.

Again, I’m not arguing for the usefulness of the subject test, I think it is an abomination. However, I think that the grounds upon which you dismiss this particular test are very alarming indeed.

The core at Columbia is one of the most rigorous in the nation, as is the English major and I still got through it without reading The Canterbury Tales, The Faerie Queen, Paradise Lost, or Moby Dick.

So, essentially, NOBODY can do well on this exam. It’s useless. Give us a passage to analyze. Ask us what we are interested in, what we know A LOT about. I’ll write you to death on the line “Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beast and fowl.” Isn’t that enough?!

That method worked when undergraduate English degree coursework was relatively similar, i.e., you don’t get your degree unless you’ve read your Milton and your Hemingway. But it all breaks down when the higher level–the PhD program–wants to see what sets an applicant apart, what their specialization is. So anyone considering a PhD knows to seek out the new, timely, or contrarian topic; bringing in Milton can earn you credit for great diligence, but it’s no longer a dependable measure of an applicant’s potential.

I guess my next question is this: why would you want a phD in creative writing? Sounds impossible.

Here’s the article I wrote. Ed Champion’s got some good insight in the comments:
http://eliot.stlwritersguild.org/wordpress/?p=30

I studied Math and Archaeology as an undergrad (I must be bipolar)…

Advanced math courses had me working obsessively on new applications. Abstract algebra focused on the latest ideas for cryptology, graph theory on indexing computer data, etc.

Whereas the archaeology really emphasized studies, and recreations done before WWII.

Perhaps it is easier to tell whether a recent achievement in the sciences is noteworthy, because people can find immediate use from these achievements. Not so, with literature, as their immediate use is so personal.
(Perhaps that’s why English teachers have a much harder time grading papers as well.)