Writing workshops suck, and other tales of woe

[ecosophia]

Last night we had dinner out with friends, followed by a very pleasant evening sitting around the apartment with snacks and drinks. Delightful all around, but one bit of conversation has me brooding this morning. 

One of our guests mentioned a relative who wrote several chapters of a very fine young adult novel. (The guest in question is a retired university professor with a crisp and highly readable prose style, so his judgment on the subject is tolerably reliable.) The aspiring author took this to a writing workshop, where -- inevitably -- the other participants tore it to shreds, and did so in such a way that by the time she got back from the writing workshop, she'd lost all confidence in the project and has never been able to finish it. 

This isn't the first time I've heard this kind of story. It's not even the hundred and first. I know, and know of, way too many people who could have become successful writers, but fell victim to one or another of the bloodstained traps that lie in wait for aspiring authors these days, and will probably never manage to haul themselves out again, bind their wounds, and find their way into print. Some of those traps are internal, personal issues -- but some of them are not. 

I suppose in theory that it's possible to benefit from the kind of writing workshops where a circle of aspiring writers sit around and critique each other's work. I've never met anyone who did. My takeaway from my few personal encounters with such things, and a vast number of tales of woe I've heard, is that your fellow participants in such a writing workshop aren't your friends -- they're your competitors, and they will gladly trample you into the bloody muck in order to clamber over your corpse toward the same goal you're seeking. 

Part of why I'm brooding over this is because my coeditor and I just announced the list of stories that will be appearing in Vintage Worlds, an anthology of science fiction set in the imaginary solar system of mid-20th century space opera -- think canals on Mars, jungles on Venus, humanoid aliens all over the place, and so on. We got a lot of good stories, a lot of so-so stories, and a lot of stories by people who want to write but haven't had the opportunity to learn how. And of course I also got a flurry of requests from people whose stories didn't get picked, asking me for personal critiques of their work. 

I'm never sure what to say in response. It's fairly easy to figure out whether a story works or doesn't work -- you just read the thing -- but to explain to an aspiring author why a failed story failed is hard work, involving a lot of time and personal attention, and far more often than not, all that happens is that the aspiring author either melts down on you, or tries to argue you into changing your mind. Thus I tend to back away nervously from the whole subject. 

There are two very common and equally straightforward reasons why stories don't get picked, by the way. The first is that the author didn't pay attention to the call for story submissions, and sent something in that isn't what the editors are looking for. The second is that the author hasn't learned the basic elements of English prose style. The first can be solved by reading the call for submissions and taking every word seriously, remembering that playing rebel without a clue is the fastest way to have your story chucked into the dumpster. The second can be solved just as easily by picking up a copy of Strunk and White's The Elements of Style, reading it, and going through your story with an editor's blue pen, marking every place where your prose doesn't follow the Strunk and White principles. (Can you break the rules? Sure, but first know what the rules are, and break them deliberately for effect, not just because you don't know any better.) 

I've seen people go from unpublished to published by the simple application of those two fixes. That said, there's much more to the craft of writing, and it would be helpful to have some constructive way to pass it on. The common or garden variety writing workshop, in my experience, is very nearly the worst possible way to do the thing -- but what would work? That's what I'm brooding about now. 

Comments

Too late?

[(Anonymous)]

Hi John Michael and everyone else,

I hope I'm not too late to slip a comment and question in here. If I am there's always the next ask-me-anything.

I also did a creative writing post-grad, about 10 years ago, and it pretty much did nothing for me (except that I happened to meet my long term partner that way, with whom I have two kids, but that's a separate issue!). However I don't think I can blame my confidence lack just on the course.

I think my mother subtly pressured me into the idea of being a writer (I have a theory that she wanted to herself but never tried due to her own chronic confidence issues, but I don't know for sure). She also not so subtly poured scorn on some of my genre reading choices as a young teenager such as Philip K Dick and some fantasy interests. She only wanted me reading classic and literary fiction. I also think there are other general life confidence issues there in the background.

The result is that I haven't really produced anything and I am in my mid thirties, but the desire to really clear the decks and make a proper try never quite leaves me. I have recently been pushing myself to write again, sometimes getting up at 5.30 to do so as there does not seem to be time otherwise. It is exciting when I manage, but also hard on my psyche, like a steel tight rope walk.

My question is...I seem to have always been capable of flashes of inspiration that take the form of phrases, single scenes, glowing glimmers of ideas and echoes of ideas, rather than concrete plots and characters. What comes to me is more akin to poetry or the makings of poetry perhaps, except I don't really read or want to write poetry. It is often very abstract and disparate, yet I feel there is meaning packed into it, but I don't know how to turn that into enough narrative for a story. I read conversations like this and I just envy you all that seem to be so full of actual STORIES, lots and lots of them, genre or literary or otherwise. Do you think this signifies that I'm just not cut out, or is it possible to learn to generate stories, characters and driving narrative which would give flesh to the sort of inspiration that naturally come to me? I could use some elements of style type-advice as I have writing flaws for sure, but what about elements of story and story-ideas advice?

Thank you so much for touching on yet another subject of great import to me!

Re: Too late?

[ecosophia]

Creating stories is very much a learned skill; it certainly wasn't innate in me. I'm currently brooding over a project here on Dreamwidth that might help teach that, but we'll see. In the meantime, do you read stories nowadays? If so, what kind?

Re: Too late?

[(Anonymous)]

Thanks so much for the reply JMG. That's good to hear you think it is a learned skill; I find learning new things hard, but I suppose most folk do to one extent or another and it's about having an ethic. I'd love it if you started a project here on that theme!

I do read a lot more fiction now, sytematically, after a lengthy period where I felt I had so much non-fiction to get through. For the reasons stated before I'm not really a genre reader, but have no problem with reading genre fiction if it's good (I've always loved the Dune series for instance). Recently I have been trying to plug some of the enormous gaps in the category of classic-novels-not-yet-read, and decided to narrow it down, rather arbitrarily it must be said, by nation, starting with Scotland (my own). So I'm reading Sunset Song now, to be followed shortly by Voyage to Arcturus which I think I got to via yourself (you've turned me on to some interesting fiction over the years...Glass Bead Game, Algernon Blackwood's John Silence stories...), then I'd like to read some German and Russian classic stuff (never read any Dostoyevsky for instance).

So I'm kind of casting the net wide...too wide from a craft learning point of view?

Re: Too late?

[ecosophia]

Not at all. As you read fiction -- especially when you reread the stories you enjoy -- pay close attention to the story: what happens when, how one event leads to another, what motivates the characters to do this and that. It's very much a matter of learning to think in the language of story; as you do that, you'll find that stories come very easily.