Yes - excellent question - will look forward to reading the replies.

Caro

Some of us are still waiting for an answer. How were you treated before and after you were published, by friends, co-workers, etc.

Azel

I've had short stories and articles published and yes, being published does make people take you more seriously as a writer and gives you a certain cache/street-cred/etc.

On the other hand I wish I'd kept quiet about writing a novel. I've written three and, despite interest from agents, have not managed to get one published. My friends and family have stopped asking me about my novels now and I do get a sense that they see me as having failed in that quarter.

But this thread started out about feedback. I've never really asked for any from anyone, apart from when on a couple of Arvon-type writing courses. On the whole I just wrote my stuff and sent it out. Getting things accepted or receiving personalised 'positive' feedback from agents and editors is, I think, the best feedback you can get.

Nowadays I have a few published writers as friends and I'm happy to ask for their opinion, but I'm always aware that whatever they say will be their opinion and it's my call as to whether I accept what they say or not. To be honest I'm very cautious about feedback from anyone not expert in the field of publishing as whatever they say has to be highly subjective.

I'm sorry you feel your subsequent question has been neglected, Azel. Perhaps you'd get more responses if you started another thread.

I didn't tell anyone I was writing for years. When I did, I was very lucky, in that the people whose opinions I care about were all immensely supportive but also accepting of my reticence about the details of working and submitting - they took their cue from me as to whether I wanted to talk about it. Not many of them know much about the book trade, but they're all huge and very discriminating readers, and understand creativity, so they had some real understanding of what I was up to.

Once I was admitting to it - hard not to, when the children were at school, and I didn't have another 'proper' job - there was party-questioning, as in, 'What have you published?' which I had to work out adequately honest but confidence-asserting answers for. Occasionally there was a veiled or not so veiled version of, 'So what makes you think you ever will be published?' which really tests your good manners and your self-esteem.

Now, as you can imagine, the party-questioning is different, but from friends and family it's actually much the same: they love hearing the news, and lend an ear - or a shoulder - when asked, but take their cue from me as to whether I want to talk about it.

To this day very few people read my work in progress, and that's always been the case: like Daisy I relied on feedback from rejections. I didn't meet any companions in the affliction of writing until I did the MPhil and (not long afterwards) discovered WW, which was a shame: I could have done with a writers' circle or something, but didn't know they existed for novelists.

Emma

Reading your post, Emma, has made me realise something. To most people, someone who calls themselves a writer must be a published writer, in that writing is how they earn their living. Say you're a writer and the next question is always about what you write and where it's published. So when you're at the unpublished stage, it's probably a good idea to keep quiet about it or talk about it as if it's a hobby. That way you're not subject to potentially hurtful attitudes and comments.

I have a full-time non-writing job so if anyone asks me what I do, 'a writer' is not my answer. I do sometimes say 'I also write ...', but only if I feel I'm in sympathetic company.

Daisy, this is an interesting point - there's another thread, I think in Technique, about 'Talking About Your Writing'. It's a really hard one, this. If writing is a huge part of one's life, it's really hard NOT to talk about it, particularly if someone is asking you 'what you do'. I have given up conventional work in order to write (and paint). I consider myself to be a writer, not an author, since I've not had a novel published. Writing is the biggest part of my life, so I do tell people that I write if they ask, but inevitably they then ask if I've had anything published. It's a bit of a bind. I guess different people handle it in different ways. And I guess I always hope that I may be talking to someone who is also interested in writing, though that's rare...
Susiex

For quite a long time when I got asked I used the formula, 'Well, I work part-time round the children, but what I'm really trying to do is write fiction.' That worked quite well, because it transmitted the seriousness of it, and at least the inevitable following question was the less painful 'Have you had anything published?' rather than 'Where would I have seen your name?' I think I only started saying brazenly (and it did feel brazen) 'I'm a writer' once I was on the MPhil.

Emma

what I'm really trying to do is write fiction.

That's a great way of putting it. Can I use it?
Sx

Help yourself!

Emma