The last time I wrote a short story was more than 36 years ago. It was for a creative writing class and didn’t exactly go as planned. Prior to university my academic studies were, to put it mildly, nothing less than mediocre, with grades just above passing and college entrance exams to match. It’s not that I was incapable, but rather lacked motivation or any specific interests for that matter—in or out of school.

I was an overweight, non-communicative child that stuttered with few friends—my mother passed away from cancer before I was 14, and the only reinforcements meted out by my father were of the negative variety. As a result of my less than stellar behavior, he had plenty of opportunity to express himself. To this day, whenever anybody says they have something to tell me, an anxious feeling wells in the pit of my stomach. What fun.

When I landed at George Washington University in D.C., the one institution that had accepted me, I stumbled on philosophy and for the first instance in my life discovered a pursuit I could apply myself to, derive satisfaction from, and excel at. I took a double major in Middle Eastern politics which together ensured that I would be all but unemployable upon graduation. The writing class was a senior year elective and the few recollections I have were of a po-faced professor lacking in any sense of joy or levity, which pretty much encapsulated all my concerns during that period.

My final project was admittedly a piece of work hardly worthy of much distinction chronicling the escapades of a young entrepreneur who was an egotistical—yet ethical—overachiever that might have surfaced in the pages of an Ayn Rand novel. Like the author (me), he excelled at nothing in particular but dressed kind of coolly, drove a nice car, and above all, was wholly self-wrought. Though my expectations weren’t overly inflated, I was taken aback when I received a grade of D- and told the writing world would be better served without my continued future efforts.

I was certain the ardent social and political leanings of the teacher played into her harsh, prejudicial and unfeeling dismissal of me and my work. When I returned to the dorm, paper in hand, I broke down in tears. To this day I can visualize the D-, writ large and glaring in red, that loomed at the top of the page. I made an appointment with the dean of the department to lodge my protestations.

When asked to produce my paper for reappraisal I no longer could as I had ripped to shreds the only copy in a mix of sadness and rage—it was before the advent of personal computers; yes, I’m that old. Nevertheless, my grade was upgraded to a C due to the inappropriate nature of my treatment at the hands of the calloused and capricious teacher who, as the role fundamentally implies, was meant to nurture students not discourage them. With the violent mark of her red pen (in both senses of the term) and mean spirited comments, no matter how middling my story actually was, she nearly crushed me and my will.

In the end, the experience served to harden my resolve, which I’d thank her for today if I hadn’t forever blocked her (and her name) out of my mind. With no prospects in the marketplace I ended up at law school honing my writing skills that continued at a firm after the bar exam, where I crafted legal briefs on procedural issues all the way up to the Supreme Court of the United States—an altogether different type of creative writing, but not too dissimilar all the same.

Before I left the practice of law for the art world, I authored hundreds of legal papers including a chapter in a malpractice textbook on cosmetic breast surgeries gone awry, which served as a good segue into cubist art (okay, that amounts to another kind of negligence, sorry). Since then, for nearly 3 decades I have been curating, writing, making art and teaching at universities worldwide—both undergrad and at the graduate level. There is not a lecture I’ve given without imploring students to feel free to contact me for help or advice which I feel compelled to share; and, even more so, grateful for the fact that anyone bothers to ask.

I’ve dedicated my life to accruing information and knowledge and derive immense pleasure from providing encouragement and stirring inspiration. I’ve written catalogue essays and in journals from my regular column in Artnet to NY Magazine and the UK Times, as well as contributed to books published by MIT Press and Springer Verlag. For 3 of the past 4 years I was nominated by my peers as arts writer of the year from a noted journal. I’m not reeling off my accomplishments to boast; rather, being that I hold a grudge for…ever, there’s nothing more satisfying then the sweet revenge of just how very wrong my creative writing teacher got it.

Kenny Schachter

November 22, 2020