 David Shields
Professor Shields always wore black, even on warm days. He would swoop
into the classroom, raincoat billowing behind him like a cape. Taking his
place at the square of desks, he'd peer at us like a hawk examining its
prey. He was a real writer, very Greenwich Village, and I was duly intimidated.
I don't recall ever having called him David. We didn't go out for coffee
after class. He was there, not to be my pal, but to teach me how to write
fiction. I trusted him utterly.
I took beginning short story writing with him in the fall of my sophomore
year. His comments on my stories were blunt and specific. He strongly encouraged
me to come up with better titles than "My Mountains" and "Chasing
the Dream." He urged me to cut my unnecessary verbosity and impossibly
long sentences. But he was liberal with praise when he liked something.
I knew exactly where I stood with him every week.
I jumped at the chance to take his year-long novel writing class during
my senior year. There was space for only 15 students, which Shields selected
based on writing samples. In the basement of Padelford, a woman looked up
my name on the list of candidates. My whole future as a novelist was riding
on that moment.
"He says 'Yes,'" the woman finally said. Elated, I was one
of the chosen few.
I haven't become a novelist (at least not yet), but I have made my living
as a writer for the past few years at the University of California, Davis.
I've also published a few essays as a freelancer. What David Shields taught
me about fiction has served me well as a non-fiction writer. I've kept all
my manuscripts with his comments on them. I read them every so often and
relish his praise--and cringe at his criticism.
Maura Brown Deering, '91
Davis, Calif. | 