Hi there,

Oh you know what? I took it off. The thing is I got some feedback, and I really appreciated it, but I was beginning to get bogged down in it. I don't know - I can see the point of a site like this but sometimes too much feedback can be confusing, and a bit dispiriting at times. And you can get to the point where you have forgotten it was that YOU were trying to say in the first place. I'd rather just try and push on, on my own. And if its crap its crap. I would just like to feel happy with my own work and, whilst I will look for opinions and advice now and again, I'm not going to live by it. After all, we are all just doing our own thing. Who's to say what's right and what's wrong. Right, now I've got that off my chest! How is your work going anyway? I'd like to have a read of your piece about the husband and wife.

Hi Marj
Thanks for reading my piece. Your comments are much appreciated. Thank you. I know what you mean by getting bogged down with comments and criticism. There are so many vast opinions how do you sort the wheat from the chaff (so to speak?)it can be quiet annoying having to trawl through reams of comments, however encouraging they tend to be.

Well, I'm here if you ever want to bypass something by me again. I'll try to be as helpful as I can.

Lois x

it can be quiet annoying having to trawl through reams of comments, however encouraging they tend to be.

Here's a comment: reading and commenting on other people's work takes concentration and time. After reading this remark from you, I'm so glad I haven't spent any of my own time 'trawling through' your work.

Incidentally, I decided to have a look at your home page and got this warning message ~

You are about to log into the site "netscape.net" with the username ... but the website does not require authentication. This may be an attempt to trick you.

Is there an error on your link?

Dee

Lois

Can I suggest that if you don't want to go to the trouble of trawling through comments on your work (which as Dee says, take time and commitment by their authors) then don't upload any work. Then we won't have to waste our time trawling through stuff that the author doesn't want us to comment on in the first place.

jumbo

Hi Dee,

I wanted to respond to your comment. I believe it was directed at Lois but I hope you'll allow me to butt in.

You commented on my work. I appreciated that you took the time to do this. But, in all honesty, you made me feel that by commenting on my work, you had been rudely distracted from your own. You also made me feel that my work was so full of errors that it would have taken you - the expert - an eternity to correct it:

'Marj, although I’ve read to the end, I stopped making comments at this point because I need to get on with my own writing.'

You said:

'I get the impression, from your forum posts that you are new to writing'

This made me feel like a total amateur. Thanks. You may say I am sensitive. But you knew that you were the first person to comment on my work. I would expect that as a writer you would have more of a way with words; a sensitivity. But maybe I caught you on a bad day, when you were keen to get on with your own work.

But what really brought a smile to my face was you stating that one sentence in particular was a 'cliche'. And you then went on to say:

'Having a book in your head is like having a tune in your head. You wouldn’t expect to be able to play it well without first learning a musical instrument. Writing needs to be practiced in the same way as any other skill.'

This is a cliche if EVER I have heard one. Not to mention highly patronising. But I had to laugh because it reminded me of Swiss Tony - 'Selling a car is like making love to a beautiful woman...' Ha ha.

Anyway. What I am trying to say is, there may be a lot of experienced writers on here who are prepared to pass on their knowledge. And this is appreciated. But I think you should be more wary of how you phrase things. Because many people, including myself, can come away feeling like we have been given a little pat on the head, with the advice to come back much, much later when we are worth your attention. I do not understand why you comment on work and, at the same time, make it clear that you are really going out of your way to do it. I have commented on lots of peoples work on another site - for what it is worth - and I like doing it. I wouldn't do it otherwise. If you don't enjoy doing it or don't have the precious time hey, DONT DO IT! No-one is forcing you!

But this attitude that some people have really gets on my nerves. Comment because you want to, not because you want the eternal appreciation of us poor, dumb amateurs.

I see Jumbo has now added his angry tuppence worth too. Don't you realise that Lois was showing some empathy? She wasn't slagging you off. Why is everyone so protective of their work, their knowledge, their comments? I think a few people need to lighten up and stop taking themselves so seriously.

Oh, and one last thing: Dee why did you mention Lois' web site and how you couldn't access it because of a supposed error? What was that all about? That was incredibly petty and childlike. Sort yourself out.

Marj.

I'm probably just sticking my nose in here, but I'm crawling up the walls due to having been stuck indoors all weekend, sweating and coughing with a horrible lurgy. So to hell with it, I'm going to play diplomat, anyway.

Marj, I can't really comment on what Dee said about your work (that's really for her to do and I didn't read her full comment), but it sounds fair enough you may have things to say about her critique. However, it's probably more appropriate to use the webmail facility on this site to raise the issues with Dee alone, rather than having this thread turn into a tit-for-tat thing!

If you look back on what you've posted here, you initially posted a comment in a thread about something else asking for criticism - so obviously you really did want criticism at that time. It seems that once you received some you changed your mind. That's fair enough. Maybe you're new to receiving criticism (I'm guessing here, and not being patronising in saying that) and you've discovered that at this point in what you're writing you're not finding it beneficial. Plenty of writers prefer to leave all criticismm and editing until the end when they re-draft.

Lois, I'm imagining your post about trawling through comments was a bit flippant. The thing is, you have to be careful how you phrase things on here because once a comment is up you can't delete it and it's not hard to see why people have been offended. Knowing how to receive criticism can be as important as knowing how to write, in my opinion. Writing is such a personal thing that it can be hard not to take some criticism to heart. In addition, it is just one person's subjective opinion, so like you say, how do you know what's worth taking on board and what isn't? Personally, I think you just have to take on board what feels right to take on board, and if a number of people have said the same comment, then that may be worth considering too (there have been debates about receiving criticism on this site before - you might want to have a look).

Also, yes, there are a lot of very good and experienced writers on this site, but generally most people agree it's a friendly place and not hostile to writers who are just starting out.

Cath

No, don't use WW mail. This stuff is great. But aside from the arguments, I think it's quite important that someone has brought this subject up.

When you post work there are a number of options to ask for comments, from "Be Gentle with me" to an intermediate one and then the biggie: "go on, I can take it."

The last one asks for quite strong, even vicious, very, very critical reviews. If you want to get published, ie get an agent, then you have to go through this process (multiple times) to get your work to the highest possible standard. I'm not defending anyone's comments because I haven't read them, I just thought I should make it clear about the comment request box.

No one, no matter how experienced they are, no one writes great stuff straight off. Banging out a story is just the beginning, it's the revision and editing and redrafting that improves it. That isn't easy and it takes a long time to learn the disciplines involved, but this site can take you there. That's why many of us are here.

Revision takes many steps, and usually a few drafts. If you think the comments you have received are overwhelming then try to figure out which ones to tackle first. My advice would be to ignore grammatical comments, typos, that kind of thing and concentrate on the big picture; get the layout and order of the story right, then repost, then look at the next comments, the repost and so on.

But most of all, all comments are just opinions, and it's up to you to take on board what you want and write the story you want.

Keep at it.

Colin M



<Added>

just wanted to add something: I sent a WWmail to a member just a couple of days ago saying that their link to their website wasn't working. This isn't unusual, and really, more considerate than picky. It's the cyber equivalent of telling a friend they've got something stuck in their teeth.

Hi Marj and Lois

I just wanted to urge you both to stick with this site, post your work, leave it up there and appreciate the comments for what they are - people's opinions based on their own taste and experiences.

But most importantly people comment because they want to and, in your case Marj, because you have asked them to.

If somebody has left a long detailed comment it is because they have strong views they want to share with you. How you use this feedback is completely up to you, but please don't dismiss the process if you find some of the feedback disheartening at times.

Another thing I think is important is that you must jump straight in and look at other people's work and comment. Writers on this website really appreciate it when you comment and they are then more likely to reciprocate.

It is also a great way to increase your exposure to different types of writing styles and the way writer’s approach their work. I’ve had comments along the lines of ‘what if you did this…’ giving me an insight in to my work I would never had gotten any other way.

It is this kind of interaction that builds up a community and creates supportive relationships that help writers question their own work, develop and improve their writing.

I honestly feel that the people on this site contribute because they want to and because they care about writing. They want to have a healthy debate and discussion about it with likeminded people.

This does mean that occasionally there will be differences of opinion, breakdowns in communication and points of view that upset.

But even so, this is still a good place to be. Please stick with it.

Beadle

Hi again, wow this thread has livened up a bit.

Ok, I'll keep this as a brief as I can.

Firstly, no, I'd rather discuss this on here - not in private. Is anyone else a bit freaked out by that? As if we are all this little street of neighbours who shouldn't air their dirty laundry in public? This is a website. Do not worry - your little online community will not descend into chaos. I am trying to make a valid comment here about discussing peoples work, and it is relevant to everyone.

Secondly, for anyone who thinks that my nose is simply out of joint because of a few criticisms that I couldn't take - you are wrong. I received feedback from several people, including site experts and they said similar things to Dee. But it was they way she phrased her comments that made the difference. If you choose - repeat CHOOSE - to comment on a persons work, please do not make that person feel like a nuisance. You are not a teacher correcting a persons school work after the bell has gone. And, as a reviewer, if your knowledge and experince is vast - great! But do you really have to make us feel like we should be grateful to recive a slagging at your hands, or so lucky that we didn't in fact have to pay for your cruelly worded feedback?

Sometimes this site scares me a little. (Bugger off then Marj, I can hear you say). We have the big guns who have ten gazillion points each, who have posted entire libraries of work. And I keep reading posts from people who ask others to tone it down, keep their comments to themselves and discuss issues privately.'Everyone here is so nice.' Come on people, lets be a little more open about stuff here. It could help us all enormously. And, in case you think I am simply a trouble maker, I only chose to post my response last night, because Dee's comment to Lois made me angry. Lois was making a perfectly valid point but, oh shock horror, a couple of peoples eyes picked up on the word 'trawling' and they flew to the reply button as fast as lightning. 'How dare you not appreciate our comments'

Should we accept all reviews without question? Don't we have a right to think, 'Yes I can see what this person was trying to say about my work, but actually I think they are talking crap'? Like I said, review stuff because you want to. I think some people here think they are online lecturers, whos word cannot be questioned. I think it's high time we had an online students union - with a bar.

Right. That's me. I'm sure thats not the end of this

Marj.

Point made Marj. I'm sure others will have a response to your views...

But are you going to put your stuff back up again now?

Beadle

Nice one, Marj, especially the bar suggestion. I'll have a spicey Bloody Mary please .

However, on a more serious note, I think we all know by now that communication on the internet has huge potential for misunderstandings. The message people think they're sending is not always the one that's received. Face to face, in the bar, it's much easier to tell if people are genuinely trying to help you or not. But even then, the none-mindreaders amongst us can never really know.

Think of TS Eliot's poor old J. Alfred Prufrock:
"That's not it at all,
That is not what I meant at all."

Btw, back to the original point of this thread, I find a bit of scrapping is an excellent cure for writer's block.

Adele.

<Added>

PS IMO Dee is normally pretty helpful - but she also does an icy cold shoulder.

I reckon Dee's gonna knack Adele for saying that

Colin M

can someone ask David for an online bar and a cyber-kebab shop

Colin

A bar is a bad idea. We must promote responsible surfing.

Kebabs are just bad full stop.

Beadle

Yes, I've made my point. I'm going to put my own gas at a peep now

And I took my work down cos I got some feedback. On the whole it was positive and encouraging. I decided that I knew how to go about redrafting it, and that if I kept getting feedback it might conflict with what I already had and that I'd get too bogged down and confused.

I would put it back up, but I think I have had my one free posting. I'm just a part member and totally skint!

I'll read what you lot put up instead.

Marj

Marj,

You complain - at length - about being patronised, and then you make phenomenally patronising comments like "Do not worry - your little online community will not descend into chaos." Like we all quiver at the idea of a little honesty, unlike you ...

There is a big difference between honesty and the kind of personal attack you made on Dee. Swiss Tony? Not witty, but definitely cheap.

You don't like the way someone responded to your piece? They still took the time to read and comment on your work. By all means, mutter to yourself about what wankers they are, stab a voodoo doll, then get over it. People start lashing out on forums at members who've commented on their work, other people will hold back on what they honestly think of work in future. And then where's your honesty? And as we're here to receive critique on our work so we can improve as writers, it's in the critique that honesty counts - not in honestly broadcasting to the site our feelings that we've been patronised.

"cruelly worded feedback?" Oh grow up. Dee didn't phrase her feedback to be cruel: unlike your comments about her on this forum. You want "sensitivity", but you also want us to be less "nice". Which is it? (On the strength of your postings so far, seems to me what you want is for people to be more "sensitive" about your feelings, but for you to be able to be more "open" so you can slag people off.) As you said to Dee, sort yourself out.

"Don't we have a right to think, 'Yes I can see what this person was trying to say about my work, but actually I think they are talking crap'?" Yup, of course we do (with the proviso that, as you plead for sensitivity towards your feelings, perhaps you should show the same sensitivity to others and not use words like "crap" in your discussions with them). What you don't have the right to do is target members in the nasty way that you have.

"shock horror, a couple of peoples eyes picked up on the word 'trawling' and they flew to the reply button as fast as lightning. 'How dare you not appreciate our comments'" How patronising of you to characterise those who were irritated by that comment as the writerly Mary Whitehouses of this site.

Actually, I think it was the phrase "annoying" that wound people up - and yeah, it's bloody irritating when someone asks for critique by posting work here, and then whinges it's "annoying" having to trawl through it.

Andrea