Creative writing Master of Fine Arts (MFA) students Jaime Sandoval and marion eames white hosted the final Antics reading of the 2024-2025 school year on May 14. Sandoval and white are co-directors of the Antics program, a space where UCI creative writing graduate students from the fiction and poetry sectors can showcase their work to other graduate students and the general public.
Antics is a long-standing program that has allowed writers from the creative writing program to share works of fiction and poetry for about 60 years. They host multiple events throughout the school year featuring a different set of readers each time. The program’s official name is the MFA Reading Series, but former organizers Lily Grimes and Christie Craig nicknamed the program Antics in 2022, and the name has stuck since then.
During the reading, people from both the fiction and poetry sides of the creative writing program read their work. Fiction M.A. students Sandoval and Zak Buczinsky chose to read excerpts from longer works. Both stories were wildly different from one another but equally as gripping. This particular reading also featured a poetry roulette where multiple poets read one or two poems, making it so that the reading had a lot of variety. The poetry M.A. students featured were Allie Guerts, Xuân Tran, Marc Huerta Osborn, Mishal Syed, Camila Valle and white.
Sandoval read an excerpt from their short story “Believer” about a girl named Layla who was cursed with a strange affliction that caused electromagnetic interference. The story describes how it affects her life from childhood to adulthood.
Buczinsky read an excerpt from a chapter of a longer piece he has been working on. It was about a woman returning to her old town to the house of someone she used to know. When she finds the person dead, she is left a letter that contains a will and instructions for the proper disposal of the body.
Each writer had their own approach when choosing which works to read. Tran told New University that she chose pieces based on what she feels most strongly about. Other poets read unrevised work and shared poems with common themes including death, apocalypse and identity. Antics readings are not meant to be high stakes — it is a casual space where people can share their work and enjoy good vibes.
Writing and reading works of fiction and poetry can be vastly different experiences, but both art forms convey emotion.
“You’re aware of the shape [of the words] on the page,” Syed told New University. “It helps with enunciating what you mean and pacing yourself.”
Reading works out loud is a helpful tool for seeing what works and what doesn’t in writing, and having an audience can help a writer understand what resonates with others in their work.
Antics is meant to build a community for writers and make it so that art is free, accessible and fun to interact with. Sandoval said that in the writing community, it is important to get your work out there. It helps with developing ideas to improve stories and poems. Writing can feel isolating, but communities and reading events like this can make it less so.
“A part of being a writer is not about writing it at home, it’s about sharing it with people,” Sandoval said. “Not only is sharing a piece of work a helpful way to improve writing, but it is also just a fun way to interact with other artists, gather new ideas and reach other people outside of the writing community.”
Since poetry and fiction don’t get many chances to interact within the creative writing program, Antics acts as a bridge that allows both sides to see what the other has been working on.
Even though everyone in the program works on their own projects, white explained that they are also there to “be a part of a writerly community which is a pretty rare and special thing to have.”
“It’s a real serious joy and honor to be able to facilitate that for everyone,” white said of their experiences being an Antics co-director.
Antics readings are open to the public and not restricted to creative writing M.A. students. Anyone interested in creative writing is welcome.
“It’s really special for a writer to share this to a room of people we don’t know,” Sandoval said. “If you like art, it’s for you.”
If you find the time and you want to enjoy a variety of unique pieces of writing, Antics readings are the perfect place to be. Not only is it a space where this helps writers grow, but it’s also a fun and creative space to be in.
“[Antics] is a great space to build community amongst writers,” Valle said. Valle and fiction M.A. student RJ Szuba will be the Antics co-directors for the 2025-2026 school year.
More information about Antics readings can be found on their Instagram page, @antics_uci, along with videos of readings and updates about upcoming events.
Denise Piolo is an Arts & Entertainment Intern for the spring 2025 quarter. She can be reached at epiolo@uci.edu.