Asking for and Accepting Constructive Criticism

I find it re-affirming to ask people critiquing or giving back notes on your unreleased work to focus on an aspect or two and for them to return with responses similar to your own suspicions. Hearing their different articulations of their responses also helps address a problem or see something good in your work.

This past Wednesday, I attended the Chicago-SF Writer's Workshop. About a month beforehand, I submitted my 10 double-spaced pages. A couple weeks after that, I sent out an inarticulate questions inspired by Alex Epstein's blog entry, "PLAYWRIGHTS". After having made a link to Alex's entry, it's kind of odd since he compares TV writing and theatre writing, whereas I write fiction. Right after reading his opinion on the different styles behind TV and theatre writing, though, I had the question, "Well, how do novelists treat their writing style and characters?"

I still haven't gotten an answer to that question, and other than to fulfill my own curiosity, I didn't see much of a point in asking Alex's to compare novel writing with those two other forms of writing characters. Instead, I asked the Chicago-SF Writer's Workshop the following:

I want to know if it feels like there's too much meaningless squabbling amongst the characters and if that gets in the way of the story moving forward. If so, does anyone have any thoughts how these types of dynamics work? When do characters work too well together, making a story somewhat boring because there's no tension? When do characters argue and squabble too much, thus distracting story with too much frivolous tension? That's all the questions I can think up at the moment, but any thoughts on this topic (at the workshop), would most certainly be appreciated.

More succinctly (especially after the workshop on Wednesday), is the novel more character or plot oriented, do the characters get in the way of the plot, does the story dwell too much on some things so the plot doesn't progress, does so much focus on the characters get repetitive and boring?

In the entries, "Finding My Beat and Chugging Along" and "Keep the Story Linear and Interesting, Stupid, and Other Writers Facing the Problem," I explored this topic somewhat; just mostly in the form of avoid repetition from showing the same event from different perspectives.

I think the issue here may actually arise from trying to write similarly to a TV or movie writer. With a visual medium that allows for splitting the screen for different perspectives and other tricks, the whole different perspective trick can be accomplished easily without too much annoying the audience. The split screen trick allows for showing the story from different perspectives at the same time. Further, the visual medium itself doesn't take so much time or demand too much cognitive processing by the audience to see the scene at hand.

With prose, the visual can get difficult because the author needs to write from different character's viewpoints, which also includes their sense of things that are significant. Two people in the same room with a specific design aesthetic, different objects in it, different actions occurring in it, etc. etc., have different perspectives and assign alternate interpretations of significance to each other, themselves, the design of the room, the objects of the room, the location of the room in the building, the building, itself, the location of the building and the whole matter of significance can go on and on into infinity.

So unless an author wants to go in the direction of James Joyce's Ulysses or various novels of William Faulkner, both of which have infuriated many readers and load readers with much cognitive work, an alternative approach needs to be taken.

I didn't expect the discussion would pretty much go in this direction along with a couple comments that my characters were becoming stereotypes/caricatures (I want to know that this is occurring, and I'm not necessarily sure it's a bad thing; if it serves the novel, it should happen) because of certain degrees of repetition. The direction of discussion shouldn't have surprised me, though, seeing as how I have the same complaints and already have figured out some structural ways to address the matter.

One option for me would be to complain that the workshop doesn't fit my needs because of the page limit for submissions every month (10 double-spaced pages or 5 single-spaced pages) and that the limit doesn't allow the group to critique my current writing (I've submitted work I've done from 5 or 6 years ago and am now submitting work I've done 3 to 5 years ago) and how the writing style has changed. Submitting current work from the novel could get confusing because the group hasn't read everything previously (even though the repetition in the writing could negate that issue since it would provide a tool similar to the "previously on. . ." montages at the beginning of some TV shows, which I think might have been the intention with the repetition originally, after hearing people complain about some shows being too complicated and requiring a person to have watched since the first episode to understand what's going on).

Neither do I have the intention to edit anything I've written first draft yet to provide a satisfying storytelling from the beginning for the workshop because I could get frustrated with the process and not actually reach the end of the novel. I followed the technique of writing and editing a section at a time until I got a satisfactory response from a workshop, and after awhile, I just had to scrap that version of the novel and start over from the beginning. In the process of trying to get that satisfactory response, I ended up getting influenced by other things I read, which ended up changing the whole story, anyway. I figure that I might as well just write, write and write until reaching a conclusion, absorb influences through the process then go back and address points of fact and reader satisfaction at the same time. To me, a lot more efficient than trying to get section by section perfect.

I guess it just gets dissatisfying when, to a certain degree, I've already answered questions that I raise and have addressed, to my satisfaction, discussion points that arise during workshops. . .but to adequately address current work, these conversations have to start by virtue of submitting short clips of the story in relation to what has already been written. It feels kind of like wasted time because some amount of my time during the workshop involves me saying, "Yeah, I know, I've already raised that question, I'm going to address that when I rewrite it" to a lot of critiques.

Every once in awhile, though, it's nice to hear something new that I haven't thought up, from praise to frustration/dissatisfaction. It also helps to hear my dissatisfactions get articulated differently or even receive some suggestions on how to address an issue (especially when I haven't put too much thought into correcting it).

Hopefully I've come up with a good tactic for cutting down on the inefficient discussions that I've already had with myself. For future submissions, I will do a minimum of editing, taking the form of excising repetitious parts of the text and asking the workshop if they feel like they've missed anything, tightening up the language and welcome any other critiques that come up, which hopefully don't address matters that I've already thought a lot about.

In the meantime, I've got a fair amount of research and writing to do for the academic side of things. The fact that I could do a fair amount of writing for the novel without distracting myself from writing the academic side has just occurred to me. Will have to put some thought into that. . .but not addressing that matter probably won't affect my working with the workshop. Ahh well. . ..

Weighing Entertainment Value, The Message and Realism in Novel Writing

The Chicago Speculative Fiction Writing Workshop had something of a negative reaction to my recent submission. Understandable, considering that I wrote it years ago and see that I will have to go back to do some major revisions at some point later.

One part of the negative reaction they gave me, however, strikes at the heart of an intentional effect I aimed for. I left the connotation and denotation of a word, used relatively regularly and even redundantly, vague in an attempt to make a point in the realm of social psychology. My fellow workshoppers cited the redundancy and lack of definition often, and my guess is that they feel that it takes away from the piece.

Dealing with this critique certainly puts me into an interesting scenario. In one sense, it creates tension between entertaining the audience and trying to transfer some important message, which can take away from the entertainment side. If not handled well, having the important message become heavier than the entertainment can lead down a slippery slide of "what's the point of trying to impart an important message when someone doesn't read the piece in the first place?"

The workshoppers, on the other hand, either had their first exposure to this story through this submission or haven't read previous submissions in months. Such phenomena is the drawback of trying to have a novel workshopped in a very informal workshop that can cancel individual workshops on a moments notice. The people familiar with the story hadn't even recognized a major character, mainly because they hadn't kept up with the story for months. Not really a big deal for me, at the moment. I'm not ready for the story to face serious, major critiquing, anyway.

Weighing these two factors really makes for an interesting exercise, especially when also trying to consider aspects of realism. It's a science fiction (I consider it a bit of fantasy, at times), but the characters in it should be acting like real human beings with their pasts and in their situations. Scary or surprising (well, maybe not as surprising, if you know me), the realistic part has proven very difficult for me and the novel. . .especially since, at times, I have tried too hard to write realistically. . .for a piece of science fiction.

My first reaction to the consistent critique of at least 2 or 3 people on the redundancy of a term without proper definition was resistance. I want to entertain the audience, sure, but I also want to get that message across. These people might be something of a subset of people, too, who have certain tastes that may not represent a lot of people. I don't want the novel to get committeed to death by trying to please everyone. At some point, an author has to put their foot down and ignore some critiques. . .even though there might be a special except for a publisher that says "do this or the book dies."

The context aspect comes into the debate at this point. Do these critiques come from not having read the previous excerpts ever or recently? Or what if after reading a chapter later or by the end of the novel, a reader would go "Oh, that really does work for the novel! At first, I didn't think it did, but it did. It couldn't have been any other way." That aspect, I really can't know until I've finished the novel, and people have read the entirety of it to provide feedback. Working with this in mind, however, falls back on the dependence on committee.

Before the novel gets submitted to a publisher and hopefully once it gets released to the market, it should come down to the novelist's intuition meeting that of an editor's intuition. Market research shouldn't enter into the equation. With anywhere between 6 million to 6 billion people to fill such a market, the tastes of the market would tug a novel in so many directions that in the attempt to please everyone, it wouldn't frustrate them all and please no one. Yes, try to write for as many people as possible, but trying to please EVERYONE is a fool's errand.

I think the reason I have contention with my fellow workshoppers giving me the critique they did is because they're critiquing something I did intentionally. If they saw something that I didn't in my own piece, I would just write down the issue and weigh the pros and cons of it without any internal conflict. Since I meant to do what I've done and it made the critiquers uncomfortable, like the situation would do to me in real life (and I think does happen a fair amount of time), I think the effect has been accomplished, but not to a good extent that it could reach.

Elements of realism enter the equation at this point, and it becomes a useful tool. I believe that I can pull off a useful effect in the novel without compromising the entertainment of my audience. The critiquers will get what they want. At least, depending on the critquer, they'll get part of what they want. I don't plan on denoting the vagueness for the words used by this character. Plenty of connotations will be presented, but nothing completely and utterly clear will be given. Such denotations get made in academic and scientific spheres and for the law, but even then, the denotations change in adaptations to reality.

To accomplish this goal satisfactorily for the audience, I'm going to have to do a fair amount of research and experimentation. I will have to push my brain to its limits and beyond. Already, I have touched upon the topic and even crtiqued one or two other people's works based on this research, but I still have a fair amount to do. Some ideas are form in my mind, but trial and error will have to occur to see if the novel will accept it or some kind of immune response will try to reject it. Something good will come out of all this, though, and hopefully moreso than just satisfactory.

I will have to face a lot of work and frustration. That's what's fun about writing a novel and taking on these big projects, though. The work, the frustration, the engagement and, in the end, the accomplishments. Unfortunately, I would be happy with admiring my accomplishments of a finished novel and project at the moment. Oh well, at least there's something to look forward to.

Trying to Create Flow

I'm trying to get back into the Flow, especially after reading most of Flow: The Psychology of Optimum Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. Some people, especially athletes, refer to the Flow as being in "the zone." I guess we could probably consider it the "groove," too.

In the book, Csikszentmihalyi explains that the Flow is essentially a time when our attention facilities are honed and at an optimum point. It can happen spontaneously, but more often than not, though, we engage Flow through the practice of a skill and/or activity that focuses our attention a ton. Meditation, ritual, habits and other things that help organize our attention can help us get into the Flow.

As a warning, though, we can get addicted to the Flow. One semester, I had got really into enter It. It involved a lot of dance classes, a yoga class, a martial arts class and playing 4-square after meals (which reminds me, I've really got to check out the 4-square games just down the street on Sundays. . .). All these disciplines gave me a good excuse to get away from my writing and classes that weren't going so well. Where once I found Flow, I couldn't find it again. Not necessarily the best time of my life for productivity. . .but I've gotten over it and have moved on.

I also found Flow pretty good when I had worked a state park in Vermont for about a month or so. Early in the morning, I would wake up, do some stretches then meditate a little. Throughout the day, the team would do work around the Park, have meals together, have some interesting discussions and do a lot of chilling. Lots of writing got done then, too. I really enjoyed the Flow I experienced there and wish I hadn't messed it up. Once again, though, that's in the past, and I've come to a good place again.

Back in September and October, when I worked at Fannie Mae, I had a good groove going on. It switched around a little, but it basically went: get home from work, empty litter box, clean dishes, make food for the next day then write, write and write some more until I couldn't write anymore. Unfortunately, I neglected the job search at the time but everything has turned out well, for now, and I really enjoyed the experience of doing all that writing while in the Flow.

A couple months ago, when the Chicago-SF writing workshop started, I wrote A LOT. Every day I would come home from work at the insurance agency, get my pen and paper out then start writing like a fiend. While in the Flow then, I could write something like 2 or 3 pages without even trying. The experience just carried me away and sucked me into it. I lost myself.

Now I may have some factors against me: wedding, tons of people coming to stay with us and help do tons of wedding errands, the wedding errands, family, work at the insurance agency has started hitting a rough spot (because I need to use my empathy and imagination more, apparently, and find Flow there, too), practicing the fox trot for the wedding, attempting to have a social life, trying to keep the TiVo from getting cluttered and making sure that shows don't conflict now (especially since Comcast in Chicago has digitized most of the channels, so they end up going through the cable box rather than direct to the TV), playing with kitties, etc. etc. I doubt I'll have a great routine set up until after the wedding, but I'm OK with that. Then. . .then I'll get my Flow going.

One thing I always wonder, though, about creating Flow. As much as it's good to enter, things will happen that will throw off routines. A long while ago, I brought up a conversation I had with someone where they criticized my large amounts of organization and routine as not normal. Well, it gets me into Flow, but there's a point there: What happens when that routine gets thrown off? Making that routine and creating Flow is hard work. Does it take a special person to shrug off the routine getting thrown off on a regular basis? How much work does it take to get back into that routine? How possible is it to enter the Flow without routine? How does one acquire the sense of calm and flexibility to adapt to different situations and create Flow even as things change?

On some level, I'd like to make Flow an important goal and topic of my life. I think I'm doing that even now with my bachelor's project, focusing on utopianism. Utopia and Flow could be synonymous, for all we know. At least, I'm following that path for my project.

Here's to Flow.

Random Notes and Yay for Writing Workshops!

Before I get onto the joys of last night's writing workshop, I want to know something: What attracted all the new, obscure people to the site? The Dark Knight or The Time Traveler's Wife?

Also, notice as we take another step closer to Orwell's 1984, 59 years after the year he satirizes and 23 years after the year his publisher wanted to predict: Student Arrested After Talking About [Virginia Tech] Gunman. I'm not a sympathizer of this gunman (as my upcoming short story will attest -- come on, Lex, finish it and get it published!), but neither do I agree with the government arresting someone exercising their First Amendment rights before investigating further. . .maybe someone's trying to making up for not looking into the VT gunman with all the telltale signs he had broadcast (come on, finish your story and publish it!).

And another stray thought: The death of Kurt Vonnegut pushed me to finally start reading some of his work. Picked up Galapagos the beginning of this week. Published in 1985, makes me think the writers of LOST were heavily influenced by Kurt Vonnegut and Galapagos. Hmmmmm. . .?

Writing Workshops

Last night, went to the monthly Chicago-SF writing workshop. So happy I went. This and the other workshops I've joined really have become the monthly event that I looked forward to. . .after spending time with the fiancee and family. This recent one really live up to the anticipation.

We had a lot of fun beyond just critiquing our works, too. Fun and stimulating conversation without things becoming argumentative or trying to force someone's world view on someone else, except for maybe a minor little thing when I confused details about an institution that two of us acquaint ourselves.

Other than that, good stuff. I think an easy chemistry with other members of a workshop becomes key. We, after all, expose ourselves to these people in ways that we don't to the rest of the world. Yes, some of us may have publishing as a goal, but we show the people in our group stuff in development, not publishing-quality. It takes some degree of courage to say, "Look at this incomplete thing that may suck. Tell me what you think, no matter how negative your thoughts." In a world that makes us feel that we have to do everything right the first time, this kind of workshop can take a lot courage. . .similar to the courage to get stuff on paper in the first place (in other words, the courage to possibly suck).

We also talked about some interesting technical matters when we got to the meet of the meeting, critiquing. I, for one, am immensely grateful for the other two people pointing out that one of the characters in my novel prologue didn't stand out as much as other characters. The ironic thing, he's supposed to stand out and tends to do so after this part. Will need to work on that.

The meeting also got me to re-read that section of the novel. I had a lot of the same feelings as my "associates" about the mechanics of the piece. For a piece written something like four or five years ago, it somewhat passes the test of time. It mixes a lot of bad writing style that I had back then trying to "write properly" (still working on that one) but had a great "innocence" that imparts a certain excitement that I don't seem to have in my current writing. I'd like to channel that energy while keeping the more recent enjoyability of the grammar and other technical matters.

I won't get into any detail about the other people's works, since they own them. Nonetheless, we got into some very interesting conversations about point of view, first- and third-person narratives (make sure to visit Tightrope Girl's blog for some great writing geek ruminations on that topic), how to transfer information about a world without overwhelming or boring the reader, the potential of flashbacks and starting a story earlier, later or on certain notes of tension or excitement and the artifices allowed in literature (narrator, characters only in there for commentary, events and social codes in there or not in there, etc.) but wouldn't happen so much in real life. Unfortunately, I can't really articulate much of the conversation or my thoughts, mainly because of my executive dysfunction.

The workshop experience last night really reminds me how much I'd like to express my process and craft geekiness rather than just talk about things in general or the "courage to create." The geek stuff of writing fascinates me, a ton, especially with how useful it becomes to make a good story.

I love Tightrope Girl's and Denis McGrath's blogs when they get deep into technical and craft topics of narrative. Even Alexander Epstein and Will Dixon can have some great stuff, even if they can get more involved in the movie/TV technology side of things. On that note, Denis McGrath's seems to be losing his emphasis on the narrative craft side of things and moving onto the Canadian TV business and more of an emotional response to his experiences in the biz. In the end, though, I enjoy the narrative/storytelling craft type stuff and would like to expound more on that stuff, if I can get inspired and have the chance.

Maybe if someone had any questions about narrative craft. . .?

EDIT: Jane Espenson also writes some great stuff about craft, just in a not so geeky way. She writes in much less technical terms. Quite a lady, with her great advice.

EDIT 2: Forgot to mention two other things for the workshop. I don't think there's necessarily enough discussion nor do I feel like my gets enough criticism. The latter issue could be that I simply have submitted some good stuff (see this discussion for my changed mind). In regards to the discussion matter, I think the low attendance contributes to it, but the newness to fiction writing and workshopping could be a matter for some of the people. Not trying to criticize. . .I just enjoy discussion of things. Could just be me.

And I do still receive a lot of value from the workshop.

Check Out Kargadan

Budding new blog hosted by the Chicago Speculative Fiction [or Sci-Fi] Group:

Kargadan

It has some interesting bits of information.

Preparing for Some Humble Pie

I tell you, the minister who sermonized today at church must have sensed my anxiety. He called the sermon "Humble Pie." In a couple days, when I go to my first writer's workshop in a long while, I expect to eat a big piece of the pie.

Except for four or five people, I haven't let anyone read anything I've written seriously for something like 6 or 7 years. I felt like I had two reasons:

1. I had nothing short enough to keep re-submitting to a workshop and finish within a reasonable amount of time.

2. Previous workshops had bruised my self-esteem way too much to feel submitting drafts to one worthwhile.

At the moment, I have protest number 1 addressed. I've mentioned in an earlier entry that I revived a 2-page piece I wrote during my adolescence and published in my high school literary magazine. It hasn't advanced beyond the expansion-development stage yet, but after three passes by the fiancee, I think it needs some more unfamiliar eyes. The story is short enough (clocking in at around 15 or 17 pages double spaced at the moment), however, to get some criticism, revise then submit again.

I still have to face protest number 2, though, which I have chosen to address by jumping straight into the fire. To make things even more crazy, the group will workshop my piece first without any other pieces at the first meeting getting addressed and before any organizational issues get addressed. Taking this tact will probably benefit the group, but I bet my ego will get a good bruising. One case probably doesn't provide enough basis to create a structure for workshopping other pieces, but one works better than none.

Getting my ego bruised can't be avoided. I would, of course, appreciate good tact and graces of fellow workshoppers, but if they have to say something that hurts me to improve the story, then I hope it gets said. Unfortunately, more likely than not, I will probably take something quite personally that may or may not be needed said. I believe such an encounter inevitable to the beginning of a writing workshop endeavor.

Even back in college when the teacher had many years of experience moderating writing workshops, the first workshop of the year would crush my ego. That crushing doesn't even take into account proceeding classes when my bad writing would incite reactions (amongst audience critiquers that I couldn't stand in the first place on the basis of personality) that grinded my ego under a boot heel. The first workshop would rip apart my ego the most, sending me back to my dorm room, both seething and wallowing in a puddle of despair. I expect something similar to happen Tuesday night, when we hold our first workshop.

I hope, I really hope that after the first meeting, though, this workshop will prove a more rewarding experience than my college workshopping experience. On the one hand, I'm older. Further, the average age of my fellow workshoppers will be older. We also all will mostly have the same interest of speculative fiction, since we met though the Chicago Speculative Fiction group. I don't think that necessarily means that we will all write speculative fiction (I mean to branch out, if the inclination strikes me), but I think it will provide some common basis other than going to the same school.

We will probably differentiate from each other in numerous other ways, though. After all, some may think that students at Marlboro College are all black-turtle-necking-wearing Kerouac-reading smokers, but all the students differed. THAT SCHOOL had plenty of social and economic conservatives, even if the school probably leaned more toward liberalism. The workshops I attended had a fair mixture of people, too, even if we had similar political and social leanings. We all had different temperaments, sensitivities, tastes, etc. etc. This workshop with Chicago SF will probably have an equally numbered different viewpoints, if not more, than the workshops I experienced at THAT SCHOOL.

I also fear the over time homogenization tendency of workshops. Essentially, if not careful, a writing workshop group can end up writing too much like each other. They can create a consensus of taste and criticism. At THAT SCHOOL, I made sure to stay vigilant of the homogenization, but I think having the roster of the class changing every year helped that goal. For a workshop with an indefinite length, I wonder if it will make resisting the homogenization tendency any harder. Nonetheless, other people can provide some really good advice, so I'm ready to take each bit of criticism and advice for its worth. If it intuitively works or requires me to do a little research to evaluate the usefulness of the opinion, then I'll use it. If I find something that doesn't work, though, I also have the freedom to ignore it.

Not much else to say about the hazy memories of workshop experiences. Still feeling pretty anxious about the zero hour of the workshop Tuesday night. Nonetheless, I look forward to facing the hardship and becoming a better, refined and enriched person after the experience. Too bad I will have to suffer an injured ego before receiving benefits from the workshop.

Oh well, such is life.