Author Michael Collins uses his own story to inspire students at SMC
By JEREMY D. BONFIGLIO - H-P staff
Published: Sunday, April 25, 2010 1:07 PM EDT
A student meanders to the front of the class, placing his hands on either side of the podium. He fidgets with the pages in front of him, adjusts his Army cap and begins to read.
"This is called 'Helicopter,'" he says, clearing his throat.
The story describes a soldier hitching a ride on a Black Hawk; the beauty of the blooming poppy plants that litter the Afghan countryside; and the comfort of planting his own two feet safely on the ground. He then recounts the sight of the helicopter flying back down the valley; the panic in the voice of the pilot as the mayday screams across the radio; the effort to reach the bird downed by an enemy's RPG; and the fiery death of the six men left on board.
Steve Carlsen, who spent the bulk of 2002 and 2003 fighting in Afghanistan, settles back into his seat as Michael Collins, the acclaimed author, ultra-marathon runner and, in this particular instance, community college teacher, suddenly chimes in.
"You've really had a coming out as a writer this semester, haven't you?" he says, leaning back in his chair. "Your other stories may be more visceral, but I thought this really captured that sense of war."
Carlsen, like most of Collins' students, never really thought about writing until stumbling into this class at Southwestern Michigan College. Now, it's all he thinks about.
"I have learned more about writing in here than in any other English class I have ever taken," Carlsen says. "That's because the focus isn't on punctuation or sentence fragments. The focus is on putting what's in your head onto paper. He lets you know that he's an advocate working on your behalf, and he gives you every opportunity to succeed."
Chapter 1: The outsider.
After class, the 46-year-old Collins admits that he himself has never really seen war - not in the military sense of the word, anyway - but growing up on a farm in Limerick, Ireland, sharing the name and bloodline of a national hero, the whole specter of the IRA loomed large. He would hear rumblings around town that something was about to happen and the stories of the bombings up north.
To escape the poverty and the politics, Collins ran. He ran before school. He ran for school. He ran after school. He ran so far and so fast that it carried him all the way to America on an athletic scholarship at the University of Notre Dame.
"Coming from rural Ireland to a place like Notre Dame was a complete culture shock," Collins says. "Although I had a full scholarship, there were still things you needed, and I literally had $10 in my pocket. So I would take a dab of shampoo here or some soap there. I just thought it was there for us. Then I heard someone on a bus trip say, 'You know that Collins is a real slimeball.' ... so I think I always felt like the outsider."
After years of winning races and earning All-Ireland and All-American status, Collins realized during his senior year that he was lacking the credits to graduate. Looking for an easy grade, he enrolled in his first writing class. He had never really written before, except for a few observations about this country that he'd scribble on a piece of scrap paper after a run. For his class assignments, and to his own surprise, Collins didn't focus on America, but on his own life in Ireland.
"All of a sudden, all of these autobiographical stories starting coming out," Collins says. "I didn't even know about writing, but the third story I wrote was published in The New Yorker, and within a year I had produced a collection of stories that became my first book ('The Man Who Dreamt of Lobsters'). In retrospect, it was all too easy for me. It all just came together."
Chapter 2: Expectations.
Collins went on to earn a master's degree in creative writing from Notre Dame and by the time he earned his doctorate from the University of Illinois, Chicago, he had written three more books that centered on Ireland. The most significant of these, he says now, was "Emerald Underground," a novel about an illegal Irish immigrant, partly based on some of his own life experiences and his subsequent journey into America's heartland. But by then, Collins' naïveté about the publishing industry had worn off, and he was feeling the pressure to produce.
"I wasn't really aware about the business of writing with that first book," Collins says. "Then there were expectations, which can be a burden. There were just so many competing voices, and then I lost my American publisher, even though I was still publishing in England. Somehow it wasn't clicking here. I had this terrible anxiety, and eventually I just stopped telling people that I was a writer."
While teaching an introductory literature class to immigrant computer programmers at the university, Collins heard about an opening in the computer science department and soon became proficient in the first generation of Web programming languages. In 1998, after completing his doctorate in creative writing, Collins left for Seattle to work for Microsoft.
Chapter 3: One more shot.
He hadn't completely given up the idea of writing, but he no longer needed to write to survive. The money at Microsoft was more than good, and after a 10-year hiatus Collins was enjoying running again. It was on one of these runs into the wilderness less than 5 miles from the Microsoft campus, that Collins scribbled down the words "Ode to a Trainee Manager," the opening to his seminal novel, "The Keepers of Truth."
"I thought, 'I'll try to write one more novel to see if I get noticed and not just published,'" Collins says. "I gave myself one last chance, and it just took off. In that sort of desperation I had to look at writing as a business and make some adjustments, and it worked."
In the midst of the Microsoft empire, Collins turned off the computer and wrote "The Keepers of Truth" with pen and paper. He added a murder to the plot, to symbolize as one critic wrote "the mood of a nation on the edge," and the publishing world did take notice. "The Keepers of Truth" won The Kerry Ingredients Irish Novel of the Year in 2000 and was short-listed for The Booker Prize. Perhaps more important, Collins once again considered himself a writer.
Chapter 4: 'Fire and ice.'
He fueled his craft with his other passion - running. During "The Keepers of Truth," he was running upward of 80 miles a week, stopping here and there to write down expressions that became the touchstones for what he would write about later that night.
By the time the book was finished, Collins had regained some of his status as a national class runner. He entered and won - beating sponsored professional athletes - both the Himalayan 100 Mile Stage Race and Everest Challenge Marathon. Four years ago, he also won both The Sub-Sahara Marathon and The North Pole Marathon within a six-week period, a feat Collins dubbed his Fire and Ice challenge.
In between marathons, he has continued to churn out quality work: "The Resurrectionists," "Lost Souls" and "The Secret Life of E. Robert Pendleton," released in the U.S. as "Death of a Writer."
John Madden, the Oscar-winning director of "Shakespeare in Love," has signed up to helm a film adaptation of "The Resurrectionists," while "Lost Souls" is currently being adapted by A Film Monkey Production.
Collins' latest novel, "Midnight in a Perfect Life," which was released earlier this year by The Orion Publishing Group in the United Kingdom, is also earning some early praise. The first-person narrative tells the story of a writer named Karl, a penniless failure who writes pornography to survive. He's a voyeur and a misogynist - and maybe even a murderer - in a work that certainly debunks any romantic notions about the literary life.
"Writing isn't always easy," Collins says. "That's what I tell my students all the time."
Chapter 5: Putting down roots.
Collins wrote "Midnight in a Perfect Life" in Dowagiac, a town he admits may not seem like the most obvious choice for an established author to put down roots. But it's easy to spot Collins' fondness for his adopted community. During college he would often attend the town's Dogwood Fine Arts Festival, which has hosted such notable writers as Kurt Vonnegut, John Updike, Joyce Carol Oates and Norman Mailer.
It was also here where Collins, who was doubting his ability to put words on a page, received some much needed encouragement after reading his work in a high school auditorium. So when he left Microsoft and Seattle behind, he came here.
He has since started The Collins Award for high school students, and turned down offers to teach at more established four-year institutions so he could join the faculty at Southwestern Michigan College.
"I was looking for something else in life because you can't run forever," Collins says. "And the community college, more than any other place, has this sense of want. Education means something. These students come in here with a hope of finding a sense of purpose. They don't know what they want to do, but they know they want to do something."
Chapter 6: Classroom passion.
Collins' creative writing class can feel like a therapy session. The stories and poems are often autobiographical and delve into some tough subject matter.
Shortly after Carlsen reads his latest tale about the war in Afghanistan, another student breaks down while reading her piece about her own abuse. Another student reads a poem, titled "Daddy's Choice," about a father who couldn't pay for drugs so he traded his daughter, who was repeatedly raped, to settle his tab.
"People are coming here damaged," Collins says. "They try to write their way through all they have seen, all the hardships they've endured. These are students willing to take that journey into themselves to do that. I don't think I could get to that passion at a four-year school with students who have been writing all their lives."
There's certainly no lack of passion in Collins' classroom.
Amanda Rodriguez, the youngest student in the group at age 19, reads her fictional account of a Middle East assassin who falls for his battered and bruised female target.
"I told her I was going to check to see if she stole it," Collins says. "That's a compliment. That's how good it was. These students are really some of the most accomplished writers I've ever met."
Rodriguez has some equally high praise for her mentor.
"What makes him such an excellent teacher is not only his experience as a writer but also where he comes from," she says. "Michael had to work so hard just to come to America and ... he had to work even harder to get where he is now. He can easily relate to his students and has a genuine and sincere passion for them as individuals and as writers."
As class begins to wind down, Collins notices the stacks of paper that have accumulated over the course of a semester.
"Who here has a folder with all their writing in it?" he says, as most of the students raise their hands. "You take it with you everywhere you go now, don't you? That's because this is you. You're not a writer just in this class anymore.
"I think you are doing a disservice to yourself if you think your writing is just for me or for three credits, but it's up to you to pursue it. Take more classes with me or someone else - just don't let it go. I'd say a lot of you are more creative than I am. All I have on you is perseverance."
jbonfiglio@TheH-P.com