It's possible I just need to calm down, sometimes
I missed the last two writey meetings because I had a cold, so despite post-icy conditions, I went to this week's critique meeting. And got very, very annoyed.
I don't know what it is about group discussion that gets me all riled up, but it invariably does. I've noticed it in staff meetings and roller derby meetings too. I think maybe it's because not everyone recognizes the correct way of thinking, i.e., mine. I wait patiently for others to say what I'm thinking, and not only do they often not say what I'm thinking, they often say things that are contrary to my way of thinking. How lame!
At this meeting in particular I was disappointed with folks' seeming lack of familiarity with speculative fiction. One writer submitted a nice first chapter of a YA fantasy. It was fun and funny, and overall promising. In it, s/he made up a word for the name of the underworld. One guy said he'd read the word and said, 'what the hell is that?!?' Then others chimed in suggesting she use a real word, but just in a different language. I was irked. It's fiction, and furthermore it's FANTASY fiction, so you can MAKE THAT STUFF UP. You can invent an entire language if you want to.
Furthermore, if the author had used a different language, s/he'd inevitably run into the A Clockwork Orange conundrum: when you use a real language that readers don't recognize, they assume it's made up. The slang in A Clockwork Orange is just Russian, and yet even folks who should know better, like Orson Scott Card, refer to the amazing slang the author invented. This in turn pisses the Russians off. And you don't want to do that because then they'll sulk twice as hard. So I really hope s/he doesn't change the word.
Then another author wrote a post-apocalyptic retelling of a famous piece of literature. I sat and waited for someone to ask what kind of apocalypse had taken place, and how long before the start of the story had it taken place. Instead they talked about whether the author used too many 'and's'. Then I eventually asked what kind of apocalypse it was, and everyone was like, meh, who cares. (It totally matters. You have to choose your specific means of world-destruction, because it should inform just about everything. A post-nuclear wasteland is different from a plague-ridden one, and post-nuclear people are different from post-plague people. Unless they're zombies, which is possible in both scenarios.)
My enjoyment of the writer's group depends on who's leading the discussion, I've found. Some leaders start with small things and gently coax the group into bigger issues, which I'm perfectly comfortable with. Then it seems like we're starting off easy, which is good, considering how nerve-wracking it is to have your work critiqued. Others lead the group in a way that pisses me off - they focus only on one aspect of the story, or they suggest alternate dialogue for the characters right off the bat. I understand that you can take or leave advice, and oddly, I wasn't annoyed by anything anyone said about my story when I got it critiqued, but I do get defensive on behalf of other writers.
In other news, I'm going to try and finish up my current story this weekend, and then I'm going to put it through the shredder. Mmm, tasty kindling.
I don't know what it is about group discussion that gets me all riled up, but it invariably does. I've noticed it in staff meetings and roller derby meetings too. I think maybe it's because not everyone recognizes the correct way of thinking, i.e., mine. I wait patiently for others to say what I'm thinking, and not only do they often not say what I'm thinking, they often say things that are contrary to my way of thinking. How lame!
At this meeting in particular I was disappointed with folks' seeming lack of familiarity with speculative fiction. One writer submitted a nice first chapter of a YA fantasy. It was fun and funny, and overall promising. In it, s/he made up a word for the name of the underworld. One guy said he'd read the word and said, 'what the hell is that?!?' Then others chimed in suggesting she use a real word, but just in a different language. I was irked. It's fiction, and furthermore it's FANTASY fiction, so you can MAKE THAT STUFF UP. You can invent an entire language if you want to.
Furthermore, if the author had used a different language, s/he'd inevitably run into the A Clockwork Orange conundrum: when you use a real language that readers don't recognize, they assume it's made up. The slang in A Clockwork Orange is just Russian, and yet even folks who should know better, like Orson Scott Card, refer to the amazing slang the author invented. This in turn pisses the Russians off. And you don't want to do that because then they'll sulk twice as hard. So I really hope s/he doesn't change the word.
Then another author wrote a post-apocalyptic retelling of a famous piece of literature. I sat and waited for someone to ask what kind of apocalypse had taken place, and how long before the start of the story had it taken place. Instead they talked about whether the author used too many 'and's'. Then I eventually asked what kind of apocalypse it was, and everyone was like, meh, who cares. (It totally matters. You have to choose your specific means of world-destruction, because it should inform just about everything. A post-nuclear wasteland is different from a plague-ridden one, and post-nuclear people are different from post-plague people. Unless they're zombies, which is possible in both scenarios.)
My enjoyment of the writer's group depends on who's leading the discussion, I've found. Some leaders start with small things and gently coax the group into bigger issues, which I'm perfectly comfortable with. Then it seems like we're starting off easy, which is good, considering how nerve-wracking it is to have your work critiqued. Others lead the group in a way that pisses me off - they focus only on one aspect of the story, or they suggest alternate dialogue for the characters right off the bat. I understand that you can take or leave advice, and oddly, I wasn't annoyed by anything anyone said about my story when I got it critiqued, but I do get defensive on behalf of other writers.
In other news, I'm going to try and finish up my current story this weekend, and then I'm going to put it through the shredder. Mmm, tasty kindling.
posted by walkinhomefromthethriftstore at 11:42 AM
3 Comments:
i experience the same group-discussion fatigue, often. either i tune out, or if i actually care, i end up attempting to act as a translator between one unclear speaker and another.
i also find comments, like on internet stories, infuriating, because you can't talk back to an anonymous block of text, even just to tell it how stupid it is, without making your comment just as stupid.
and maybe you're defensive of others because you remember there's good and bad ways to take critiques, and you are afraid they only know the bad way, so you want to protect them.
we'll all be illiterate soon, anyway, so i wouldn't worry about it ;)
yes like my friend algernon well be no t so gud at reeding
lolspeak double plus good.
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