constructive criticism--a report
The following exploration was spurred on by recent discussions of the state of fandom writing. Yes, some of it is scary, especially in recents weeks. No one should take that as an accusation. And no matter what stage you believe yourself to be in with writing, I think a discussion of feedback is important.
Anyway, we can lament bad writing of all degrees or we can attempt to fix it. Call me Jack: I like fixing things. I started out as a fairly scary writer: cliche-ridden, half-frightened to write sex but writing it anyway, tone uneven as all holy hell. I like to think I've improved, because I've had patient readers. But that required two things: my desire to make my writing more palatable and others' willingness to endure some problems. So know that I'm not trying to be high and mighty or preachy, just helpful. ETA: I am SO not trying to imply that I've reached the top of the fanfic writing ladder. Anyone who's read my writing knows, and probably better than I do, exactly where I stand in terms of still having innumerable bad habits.
A couple of weeks ago, I asked several people to respond to a poll about whether they wanted to receive constructive criticism on their stories. The response was overwhelmingly in favor.
Only one person told me to “shut the fuck up” when I asked about publishing names. (And she wasn’t serious.) Most were willing to accept reader feedback of the critical variety. Those that didn’t want concrit on published stories ALWAYS used a beta, so they would receive even better feedback while the work was in progress. So there is a collective idea among writers here that hearing other people’s responses to their work is helpful, both for the current story and for future ones. If you don’t want feedback about problems after a story is written, I’d highly suggest finding a beta to read your work in progress.
Someone who regularly uses a beta should make a post about that, since I don’t typically. But the times I’ve used a beta, I’ve found that not only can this person catch stupid errors, but they can offer new directions. It’s not always about telling you something sucks (to be honest, this is always my greatest and mostly unfounded fear about betas); more often, it’s telling you that something is adequate but could be SO much better.
My self-appointed task is to talk about concrit in story feedback, after publishing. It needs to be talked about because we’re all scared to give each other such feedback. There might be several reasons, but they all boil down to two:
1. We don’t want to look like assholes.
2. We don’t want to be assholes.
To perhaps make both of those reasons moot, I asked people if they’d be willing to let me publish their name as someone who would be willing to receive concrit without getting angry or having their feelings hurt. But almost unanimously, they said that they wouldn’t mind constructive criticism…if it was done in the right spirit.
So what is constructive criticism and in what spirit should you give/receive it?
(I have taken the following from comments left in this post, in some cases copying people’s words verbatim. If you don’t like me plagiarizing you-especially since I didn’t warn you I’d do it-comment or email and let me know. I’ll fix it, I swear.)
Bare bones definition: Constructive criticism is any sentence or paragraph that can be boiled down to "this aspect of the story works/doesn't work (because)." It can be mean or it can be friendly, but as long as it's addressing the story and not the author it counts as concrit.
Right off the bat, we know three things:
1. it can be BOTH positive and negative, in terms of its reception of different aspects of a story. We’re all pretty good at the positive. We need to work on the negative.
2. it should address the story and not personal issues with author and her (or his) theories/attitudes/OTPs.
3. there are a whole range of attitudes that people can take when responding to stories-from the nasty (flaming) to the apologetic (“well, I hate to be negative, but…”). Mean feedback is too hurtful to be helpful (and often doesn’t seem to want to help) while overly apologetic feedback is unconvincing (if you say you’re “totally not sure” if something’s a problem five times, either it will seem like you’re wrong or like you wasted words-hello! if you took the time to mention it, it’s a problem, at least for you in particular as a reader, so you might say that). The kind of concrit we actually all hope to give and receive is somewhere in the middle, maybe skewed closer to the conciliatory. This type of feedback is about helping, and about building better stories.... something that tells you what works well, and what doesn't, and most importantly why. Because we can learn from that and improve.
There is a way to be tactful in feedback, mentioning problems without a person feeling like you’re the writing guru and they’re idiots. It helps if you’re nice first before you launch into the more negative criticism. When you praise someone for doing good things, they’re more apt to want to swallow your ideas about their problems. And it’ll soften the blow. As a person who has taken her share of criticism on English papers for seemingly half her life, it works.
What does constructive criticism actually address? The easiest kind for the reader to deal with, and the most likely to be offered, is help with embarrassing typos or factual information that slipped through (what? Kate’s eyes aren’t brown? Gosh, I’m a dope!). Other things that aren’t as easy to say include criticism of character portrayal and feedback about the person’s writing. I think the last one scares us the most, because it feels the most personal. Yes, sometimes you simply won’t be keyed in to someone’s style. But other times, letting a person know that a certain habit they have really impedes reading can be invaluable.
But that brings us back to questions of how, and also why. Constructive criticism is not designed to give you a way to vent, to tell someone how they failed. It’s to tell them how they might have done better. It’s a subtle difference. If you’re taking the time to give this sort of feedback, obviously you think there is room for improvement-the fic isn’t a lost cause, just a confused one. But there is a fine line between indicating problem areas and attempting to ghost-write someone’s fic after the fact. If you offer suggestions for change, couch them as suggestions: “You might have…” or “Another good way to handle X is…”
Feedback takes time and energy, picking out specifics and looking at the big picture. Good concrit should be written with care and with thinking and with tact. Good intentions for fixing problems is a must.
It takes more courage to speak up than it does to leave a simple and somewhat lame 'That was good'. Not that being told your fiction is good is a bad thing, but often you can't help but wonder exactly what would make it better.
Clarifications and additions to these guidelines are welcome, especially since I’m far from an expert on being a good feedbacker (I’m one of the “I don’t want to hurt feelings” sort).
I have decided that I’d rather not publish a list of people who are receptive to receiving concrit, for a few reasons:
1. I don’t have an expansive flist, so it’s not like my publishing this info will get it out there to everybody;
2. I don’t know that anyone would take me publishing another person’s name seriously
3. Nor would they remember my list when leaving feedback;
4. Also, I don’t wish to divide the sheep from the goats (biblical allusion, tongue in cheek-go ask Eko).
My advice is to make your desires known in your own LJ, either by way of a general announcement, a note on your info page, or-perhaps even more helpful-a note on each story you publish. Some people already regularly include such policies at the end of their author’s notes. If you do feel receptive to receiving constructive criticism, making your intentions known in your own way gives you a modicum of control and it also lets your readers known where you stand, so they don’t think they’ll be mean if they leave negative feedback It also takes the pressure off a reader who wants to leave feedback-because anybody can see that you’ll be okay with it, so the feedbacker won’t appear to be an asshole.
Anyway, we can lament bad writing of all degrees or we can attempt to fix it. Call me Jack: I like fixing things. I started out as a fairly scary writer: cliche-ridden, half-frightened to write sex but writing it anyway, tone uneven as all holy hell. I like to think I've improved, because I've had patient readers. But that required two things: my desire to make my writing more palatable and others' willingness to endure some problems. So know that I'm not trying to be high and mighty or preachy, just helpful. ETA: I am SO not trying to imply that I've reached the top of the fanfic writing ladder. Anyone who's read my writing knows, and probably better than I do, exactly where I stand in terms of still having innumerable bad habits.
A couple of weeks ago, I asked several people to respond to a poll about whether they wanted to receive constructive criticism on their stories. The response was overwhelmingly in favor.
Only one person told me to “shut the fuck up” when I asked about publishing names. (And she wasn’t serious.) Most were willing to accept reader feedback of the critical variety. Those that didn’t want concrit on published stories ALWAYS used a beta, so they would receive even better feedback while the work was in progress. So there is a collective idea among writers here that hearing other people’s responses to their work is helpful, both for the current story and for future ones. If you don’t want feedback about problems after a story is written, I’d highly suggest finding a beta to read your work in progress.
Someone who regularly uses a beta should make a post about that, since I don’t typically. But the times I’ve used a beta, I’ve found that not only can this person catch stupid errors, but they can offer new directions. It’s not always about telling you something sucks (to be honest, this is always my greatest and mostly unfounded fear about betas); more often, it’s telling you that something is adequate but could be SO much better.
My self-appointed task is to talk about concrit in story feedback, after publishing. It needs to be talked about because we’re all scared to give each other such feedback. There might be several reasons, but they all boil down to two:
1. We don’t want to look like assholes.
2. We don’t want to be assholes.
To perhaps make both of those reasons moot, I asked people if they’d be willing to let me publish their name as someone who would be willing to receive concrit without getting angry or having their feelings hurt. But almost unanimously, they said that they wouldn’t mind constructive criticism…if it was done in the right spirit.
So what is constructive criticism and in what spirit should you give/receive it?
(I have taken the following from comments left in this post, in some cases copying people’s words verbatim. If you don’t like me plagiarizing you-especially since I didn’t warn you I’d do it-comment or email and let me know. I’ll fix it, I swear.)
Bare bones definition: Constructive criticism is any sentence or paragraph that can be boiled down to "this aspect of the story works/doesn't work (because)." It can be mean or it can be friendly, but as long as it's addressing the story and not the author it counts as concrit.
Right off the bat, we know three things:
1. it can be BOTH positive and negative, in terms of its reception of different aspects of a story. We’re all pretty good at the positive. We need to work on the negative.
2. it should address the story and not personal issues with author and her (or his) theories/attitudes/OTPs.
3. there are a whole range of attitudes that people can take when responding to stories-from the nasty (flaming) to the apologetic (“well, I hate to be negative, but…”). Mean feedback is too hurtful to be helpful (and often doesn’t seem to want to help) while overly apologetic feedback is unconvincing (if you say you’re “totally not sure” if something’s a problem five times, either it will seem like you’re wrong or like you wasted words-hello! if you took the time to mention it, it’s a problem, at least for you in particular as a reader, so you might say that). The kind of concrit we actually all hope to give and receive is somewhere in the middle, maybe skewed closer to the conciliatory. This type of feedback is about helping, and about building better stories.... something that tells you what works well, and what doesn't, and most importantly why. Because we can learn from that and improve.
There is a way to be tactful in feedback, mentioning problems without a person feeling like you’re the writing guru and they’re idiots. It helps if you’re nice first before you launch into the more negative criticism. When you praise someone for doing good things, they’re more apt to want to swallow your ideas about their problems. And it’ll soften the blow. As a person who has taken her share of criticism on English papers for seemingly half her life, it works.
What does constructive criticism actually address? The easiest kind for the reader to deal with, and the most likely to be offered, is help with embarrassing typos or factual information that slipped through (what? Kate’s eyes aren’t brown? Gosh, I’m a dope!). Other things that aren’t as easy to say include criticism of character portrayal and feedback about the person’s writing. I think the last one scares us the most, because it feels the most personal. Yes, sometimes you simply won’t be keyed in to someone’s style. But other times, letting a person know that a certain habit they have really impedes reading can be invaluable.
But that brings us back to questions of how, and also why. Constructive criticism is not designed to give you a way to vent, to tell someone how they failed. It’s to tell them how they might have done better. It’s a subtle difference. If you’re taking the time to give this sort of feedback, obviously you think there is room for improvement-the fic isn’t a lost cause, just a confused one. But there is a fine line between indicating problem areas and attempting to ghost-write someone’s fic after the fact. If you offer suggestions for change, couch them as suggestions: “You might have…” or “Another good way to handle X is…”
Feedback takes time and energy, picking out specifics and looking at the big picture. Good concrit should be written with care and with thinking and with tact. Good intentions for fixing problems is a must.
It takes more courage to speak up than it does to leave a simple and somewhat lame 'That was good'. Not that being told your fiction is good is a bad thing, but often you can't help but wonder exactly what would make it better.
Clarifications and additions to these guidelines are welcome, especially since I’m far from an expert on being a good feedbacker (I’m one of the “I don’t want to hurt feelings” sort).
I have decided that I’d rather not publish a list of people who are receptive to receiving concrit, for a few reasons:
1. I don’t have an expansive flist, so it’s not like my publishing this info will get it out there to everybody;
2. I don’t know that anyone would take me publishing another person’s name seriously
3. Nor would they remember my list when leaving feedback;
4. Also, I don’t wish to divide the sheep from the goats (biblical allusion, tongue in cheek-go ask Eko).
My advice is to make your desires known in your own LJ, either by way of a general announcement, a note on your info page, or-perhaps even more helpful-a note on each story you publish. Some people already regularly include such policies at the end of their author’s notes. If you do feel receptive to receiving constructive criticism, making your intentions known in your own way gives you a modicum of control and it also lets your readers known where you stand, so they don’t think they’ll be mean if they leave negative feedback It also takes the pressure off a reader who wants to leave feedback-because anybody can see that you’ll be okay with it, so the feedbacker won’t appear to be an asshole.