-----Original Message-----
From: "Jason R. Peters"
Sent: Oct 10,[masked]:17 PM
To: [address removed]
Subject: Re: [Durham-Writers-Group] The art of critiquing

Incidentals: Grammar, Spelling, Typos, Formatting

 

My approach to reviewing grammar/spelling is identical to my reviewing characterization, prose, descritiption, pacing, plausibility:

 

If it distracts, it gets noted.

 

Editors will throw a piece away if it has gratuitous spelling/grammar errors, and my first reason for joining a writer's group is path to publication. Ergo, if I have errors that will hinder publication, I want them remarked. "Do unto others" means I will note them for you.

 

I'm less interested in clearly typographical errors. A duplicated word or something that's clearly a typo (like "tyop") is more forgivable than misuse of they're/their/there. Everyone fat-fingers the keyboard occasionally, but a WRITER should not mix tense/number, whether by ignorance or carelessness.

 

There is a tendency to proclaim highly-and-mightily that "The art is what's important." Maybe at the end of your career. But try to stop a moviegoer from walking out because the picture was grainy and the speakers were blown; it hardly matters how good the movie is. Restaurant diners may await the greatest meal ever prepared, but will walk out if the service is slow or the place is filthy.

 

Such problems are the easiest to fix, so may be annoying to hear them. Anyone could have pointed it out, right? However, if it's the easiest thing to fix...why isn't it already fixed?

 

It's hard enough to get published. Don't give an editor (or your readers) one more distraction.

 

Essentials

 

It doesn't matter that you're "also a writer". Comments like "characterization is thin" or "pacing needs work" don't help; they're pompous and overwrought. This isn't a literary appreciation group; it's a writer's group. A writer's audience is readers.

 

So I try not to respond to work as a writer: I respond as a reader.

 

Did the story grab me? Bore me? Confuse me?  Impress me? Seem implausible? Contradict itself?

 

In this, the reasons aren't as important as the results. I can pontificate all day on what I think would "fix" a boring piece. Unfortunately, an author can take all of the advice and churn the next draft, and it will be just as boring. This is because he has internalized that something needed to change, but failed to understand the underlying reasons.

 

If told it's boring, you might change the plot. Suppose the problem wasn't with the plot, it was with the prose. One author can make a murder boring; another can make dialog with a plotted plant riveting. The reasons (as we believe we understand them) are not as important as the results.

 

Playwrites

 

Playwrites have an advantage over authors. They get to watch the audience. After the play, whether they praise or criticize, people lie or embellish or misremember or analyze. During the play, they're more honest: Whether they lean forward, rapt, laughing and sighing with the characters, or they're texting, trimming fingernails, looking around. The most important reaction you want is the reader's reaction as he reads. Analysis is fine, but what I want to know is: Did it bore you? Did it confuse you? Did it contradict itself?

 

Did it grip you?

That's all I really need to know. Dissecting "why" may seem important, but ultimately it's just for fun. Because your next draft may not make the same mistakes...it might make different mistakes.

 

With the same result.

 

Recommended Reading/Listening

 

The "Writing Excuses" podcast

The Odyssey SF/F Workshop podcast

THE FIRST FIVE PAGES by Noah Lukeman

 

 

On Mon, Oct 10, 2011 at 10:40 AM, James Maurice Alexander <[address removed]> wrote:

It can be grating to have your typing get more attention than your story. But you logically need both to be in order. My B in Copy Editing this semester means I can only detect 80% of typographical errors.

 

 

 

 

James' Sign

-----Original Message-----
From: Robert Engelbach <[address removed]>
To: durham-writers-group-list <[address removed]>

Sent: Mon, Oct 10,[masked]:40 am
Subject: Re: [Durham-Writers-Group] The art of critiquing

I agree from the writers perspective that having to knitpick on grammar, etc. is annoying at such an early stage. On the other hand, from the readers perspective, having too many typos etc.to negotiate through can knock the reader out from focussing on the deeper things,sort of  like having to slow down to avoid hitting an freak asteroid while warping through space. Not usually a big deal these days in WORD to hit spellcheck and get the grammar in one fell swoop. .  But definitely a waste of time to do grammar during  a meeting. For me, I naturally see the typos while reading through the first time.  Some people do that.  They see the zits on your face the first time they see you. Its a horrible habit.  These people do not deserve to live. 

 

Robert Engelbacha s
[address removed]
[masked]

From: Penelope L. Mace <[address removed]>
To: [address removed]
Sent: Monday, October 10,[masked]:50 AM
Subject: Re: [Durham-Writers-Group] The art of critiquing

I'd have to say I find it truly annoying when someone focuses on spelling, grammar etc in a piece I have submitted. I want to know if the charactetrs and story move you, interest you,

enrage you, make you like them, etc - I can sit with my Strunk and White later and dither over usage and semicolons.

The other thing is - don't try to make everyone write in your style. If one person is a stone cold carver-esque minimalist, fine, but maybe others like sentences with more than 5 words in them. Imagine Iris Murdoch and Joan Didion in the same writers' group.

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Robert Engelbach
Sent: Oct 9,[masked]:11 PM
To: [address removed]
Subject: [Durham-Writers-Group] The art of critiquing

Hi all,

I am new to writing groups. I am finding the DWG to be a wonderful experience. I never seriously critiqued anyone's work before. I am kind of catching on by listening to others.  But I was a structure freak in my last life.  All I am really confident about critiquing at this point is grammar and punctuation, which is necessary when submitting to a potential publisher, but so far below the creative level of the two writing groups that I'v embarrassed myself. So I found a good three-page article on "How to Give and Receive Critiques" that has given me a hint of how to go to the next level of critiquing.  I am guessing many people have their own guidelines.  Some of you may want to share yours. I posted this one on October 7th if anyone wants to look at it.   

Cheers,

Robert

 

Robert Engelbach
[address removed]
[masked]

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"A poet's work is to name the unnameable, to point at frauds, to take sides, start arguments, shape the world, and stop it going to sleep."
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