Writing : New People

I think I've had both types of reviews.  Ones that were zero help because they said "Yay gorillas,".  And then also ones that were edited with a heavy hand, but with no suggestions or reasons.  I get easily confused when people change my sentence, but then don't tell me why they changed my sentence.  And by confused, I mean defensive and rude. 

Both are difficult. 

Although I must say, I am always thrilled when someone takes the time to go super editor on me and those have been some of the best.

Except for that time the guy showed up at my front door, that was just plain spooky. But I always think about the Suzy Vitello/ Chelsea Cain/Cheryl Strayed/ Monica Drake/ Chuck Palahniuk/Lidia Yuknavitch workshop where people cry because everyone is going super editor on their asses.

But those are some super editors.

@utah I'm in the Suzy Vitello workshop right now and holy hell; the woman a whipcracker; no fucking around. Easy to see how shit gets done in "that" Portland writers workshop. I spent no less than 5 hours re-working an opening this week and then peer reviews on top. And I don't know meatseeker. Yet. 

@chester Yes, I did do the first Lidia one. How was it? Ummm, sort of like crying and fucking; no, scratch that, it was exactly like bawling and cumming. All about challenging convention, digging into how our bodies experience ecstasy and agony, kicking the shit out of the stale scripts that tell us what sex is and what loss does. Her lectures alone are worth the price of admission; if anyone you know is considering doing it, I say do not miss the opportunity and register like yesterday. Trust me. I'm still mopping up around here ; ) 

Well, if Chuck just re-wrote my whole story with no explanation...yeah...I'd just go with it.

I've had three stories critiqued by Chuck.  Honestly though, I got much more out of the peer reviews from other workshoppers.

- Really? Why do think that is? I'm just curious. I've read a couple of his critiques over on Cult and they were really in depth.

...but after you've had your piece kicked around by ten or so people, it's hard to add much more to that.

- True... Very true. Thanks Brandon.

I think I know who you are talking about, Renee. That guy isn't on so much anymore.

What sucks is when someone can't write very well but they are supercritical of everyone's work and acts like they are an English professor then you read something of theirs and it is written like a third grader.  It is like, "what the fuck"?!  I'm frustrated because I did my fourth draft of my story for the anthology and I thought it was done and then I got a lot more feedback. I feel like it's the story of rewrites that will never end. The third version I posted though got like almost five stars by you and others. I just don't want to "overwrite it".

Drea Said:

@chester Yes, I did do the first Lidia one. How was it? Ummm, sort of like crying and fucking; no, scratch that, it was exactly like bawling and cumming. All about challenging convention, digging into how our bodies experience ecstasy and agony, kicking the shit out of the stale scripts that tell us what sex is and what loss does. Her lectures alone are worth the price of admission; if anyone you know is considering doing it, I say do not miss the opportunity and register like yesterday. Trust me. I'm still mopping up around here ; )

Woo-hoo! Yeah, she is fucking hilarious. And real. Tears and cumming are the same, aren't they? I am so going to post this on her FB page. Damn, I want to take that next class.

Fucking money.

The thing is all of the women in Chuck's workshop are much better writers than he is.

@Renee, that would be so fun to be in that class with you. Well, you and Linton. 

I am still lost on this Linton thing...

You can win a class here.

@Renee, 

A Linton Robinson Story

A Linton Robinson Thread

Another Linton Robinson Thread

WTF?

Looks like  I am taking the class. Chester--you in?

Getting the credit card out now, registration in the other tab.

Damn. Jealousy is welling up. I have to think about this one. What is the tuition?

Can we pirate it?

@PandaMask

Thanks! Submitted?

@Chest Pane

Thank you but it's supposed to be Michelle.. Unfortunately, the name isn't avail.. Appreciate the info though... =)

I love this thread. I keep coming here and cracking up at, just, well, let me explain.

For a variety of reasons we are all aware of communication via on the internet has it's shortcomings, there is no body language, tone of voice, inflection, which serve the dual role of helping us convey our meaning more easily and providing non-verbal confirmation that we are understood. So, on the one hand it is possible to offend people unintentionally because the medium can rob connotations from words and in any event tone serves to denote sarcasm, levity, or seriousness and so interpretation happens willy nilly even without the fundamental problems of language and the evolution of meaning.

But, more interesting (for the purposes of this thread) than the possibility to offend people is the lack of feedback such as we would traditionally get from body language, the possibility to completely lose your shit because you think you might have offended someone but you don't know for sure. I have had several conversations on various internet boards take a swerve for the absurd because I freaked out thinking that I had offended the other party.

But to see other people sharing this problem, and even making a thread about how worried they are about it, ahhh, it makes me feel so much better about so many embarassing desperate and unnecessarry apologies I've send out via PM, I know how you guys feel.

But as far as it goes, Linton will either post again or not, nothing any of us can do to influence that at this point. I think it can be a teachable moment, sure, maybe we went a little overboard on that one (I too might have gotten freaked out by the second or third meme, just from the feeling of being a punchline to some deeply inside joke upon arrival).

So, I understand why there is concern here about scaring off new members. Look, on the one hand if they can't handle a little ragging when they join then how hard are they going to cry when they get into the workshop? On the other hand maybe we should make at tops, like, one extra thread with their name in it and 2 personalized memes at most. On both hands, let's just put all of this stuff down, because for real, I don't need to be just sitting around holding things in my hands. Let's just chill out. Deep breaths.

Like I said, most any time I had such misunderstandings I was either a) blowing it out of proportion in my own mind or b) completely unable to repair the damage. So, there's nothing to be done about it except to get another drink.

Also, hello Meshel.

-

The list also cracked me up. I'm pretty sure I wrote something to the effect of "You probably don’t need about half of what’s written here.” on a LBL once.

@nkwilczy Dammit! I had this exact conversation (well, not exact, more the body language part) with Averydoll yesterday! Stop talking behind my back woman! Its either that or this is some sort of weird Twlight Zone and a gremlin is going to attack my car on the way to work....hmmmm