I recently spent some time in a Ken Elkes online writing retreat. It was money well spent, even though I didn't get to participate as much as I would have liked. About a week into the thing, I was asked to edit a Ph.D. dissertation, which required a lot of my time for some reason. Working on these two things simultaneously got me thinking about how we, as authors, take criticism.
Well said! Fortunately, when I edit people's creative writing, they tend to view my criticism as positive. Probably because they asked for it. Maybe if it was unsolicited they would have flinched. I definitely flinch when I don't solicit critique.
Great post, and great analogy Geno! Personally, have never understood the motivation behind boxing/fighting, but this made so much sense. When I was 17, two writing instructors basically gave me a tag-team beat down in front of the entire class 10 seconds into the first round, and I ended up with writer's block for 30+ years, so there you go. O.o I suppose you could say that wasn't really boxing after all, it was an assassination. But here I am, back in the ring... ;)
Well said! Fortunately, when I edit people's creative writing, they tend to view my criticism as positive. Probably because they asked for it. Maybe if it was unsolicited they would have flinched. I definitely flinch when I don't solicit critique.
Great post, and great analogy Geno! Personally, have never understood the motivation behind boxing/fighting, but this made so much sense. When I was 17, two writing instructors basically gave me a tag-team beat down in front of the entire class 10 seconds into the first round, and I ended up with writer's block for 30+ years, so there you go. O.o I suppose you could say that wasn't really boxing after all, it was an assassination. But here I am, back in the ring... ;)
Janet J. Sept 24
Don't know that I am qualified to critique your writing but you can be sure I'm " in your corner"!