Workshopping: The Sound and the Fury

I’m a big fan of workshopping, even though my experiences doing so have been decidedly mixed. Starting at age fourteen, and for close to forty years, I’ve participated in several workshops, which include university classes, an online group, and two of which I was a member for multiple years. Workshopping is a great way, not just to get feedback on one’s own work, but to learn critiquing skills that help one’s own writing, and to gain motivation for working at all. That last reason is critical; it’s hard to keep up motivation in a complete vacuum.

My first experience at fourteen couldn’t have been more positive. I was welcomed into an adult group of professional writers and university students who were very gentle with my absolutely terrible fourteen-year-old work; I think my positivity toward workshops in general probably stems from this experience. Had I experienced one of more negative environments, I’m not sure I would have continued with the process.

A few things that I consider important to evaluate while thinking of joining a workshop:

Does the workshop motivate you to write? Then you may be in a good place. Most situations that spark creative ideas or motivate you are good ones. The interplay of ideas, the desire to work on projects, those are tremendously valuable for an author.

One size does not necessarily fit all. If you join a workshop where there is emphasis on only one style, you need to decide whether or not you’re willing to accept this mindset. This type of workshop, however, can teach you a lot about writing, and even if it’s not something you want to stick with permanently, might be useful to your learning curve.

I was an early member of one of the last types, one started by a person who is now a famous author, but at the time was not published. This author knows their stuff; their career seems to thrive on that style of workshopping. And that’s fine. I learned a lot about the craft. But my style is sufficiently different that eventually the workshop began to demotivate me; I didn’t want to be writing that style of fiction, and I needed to learn how to step into my own individual style. I began to write less, and to have anxiety about submitting work, and that’s not a place I wanted to be. Leaving that situation was a good move for me, and has proven fruitful, as I am now more confident about my writing decisions.

Genre writers might want to join a genre workshop. This isn’t a hard and fast rule; there is a good deal about writing that applies across all genres. But quite a few conventions in writing genre fiction really are genre specific, and if you want to get good feedback, those things need to be understood or at least explainable. If the other workshop members don’t know these conventions, they need to be open-minded enough to take delivery, and to be willing to critique with the conventions in mind.

One of those college classes. Oh, my. I was criticized for my fantasy characters not having easily identifiable male and female names. Note: one other person in the class wrote a story set in Japan with Japanese names that were no more easily identifiable as male/female to most of us steeped in Western culture than my names were. But those were all right, because the names were “real”. I realized a short way into this class that it wasn’t actually going to improve my writing if even that very basic fact about fantasy literature wasn’t understood.

It is not necessary to have a hide like a rhinoceros. If you don’t mind how people express your opinion as long as it’s truthful, that’s great. Since one size does not fit all, there’s plenty of room for you in any manner of workshops. But I’m a sensitive person and I find that quality assists my writing. People being harsh with me doesn’t always help me with either my technique or motivation. I am not a proponent of “only say nice things about the work” because it doesn’t actually help anyone improve. The purpose of a critique is to help the author refine and polish their work. But that doesn’t mean that all critiques have to be said in the harshest way possible, or that the good things should be ignored. It’s very important to know this about any workshop you join, and to understand what helps or hurts your work. If it helps, you’re in a good place. If it hurts, you’re probably not. Which leads into my next point:

Know the group you’re joining. Understand what the rules are, and what the technique is. Does this group prefer harsh criticism? Is it a genre specific group? Are you expected to submit regularly, or just when the mood strikes you? Is there a method of writing that is expected? Is anyone allowed to participate, or is it by invitation or agreement only? Do one or more members have dislike for the type of writing you do? If you’re starting a workshop up, discuss with the other members what your needs are. Decide whether this is likely to be a fruitful experience. Sure, you can wing it; many do. But if you don’t ask these questions ahead of time, you’ll have to deal with them sooner or later, and that later may include getting burned.

I have now been a member of a private writer’s group for the last dozen years or so, and it has been tremendously helpful to my development as a writer, and to my publication history as well. We’re a very small group, open by unanimous agreement only, and our intent is to help each member write exactly the kind of fiction that each of us wish to be writing. With this experience under my belt, I expect that I will scrutinize any future workshop I participate in, though I hope to be in this one for a long, long time.