[Janet Kenny]

Elders who praise what they don't admire are certainly to be mistrusted.
I am glad that those who are initiated set an example by speaking as themselves and not as grade school teachers. I wonder what the uninitiated would make of Allen Tice's Sonnet 155? Should Allen explain it to them? One of the most important lessons in all of the arts is to trust instinct. Instinct grows by reading what others do. Not by tedious explanations of nuts and bolts. These can help but are no use at all without the more important experience. Art must be felt.

[David Landrum]

I've been in some workshops where my poems were ridiculed and attacked. Occasionally that has happened on Eratosphere. But I find it does not happen here a lot--though it's happened enough that I don't post poems here very often anymore.

"Negative" criticism can be constructive. If I know a person is making a observation about an inadequacy in a poem with the aim to help me make it a better poem, okay. That's different from someone attacking me personally--saying my poem is stupid and that proves I am too; or resorting to sarcasm to try to make a point.

Amis seems to be suggesting that a writer is a genius and writing cannot be learned. I've heard people at the school where I once taught say of writing, "Either you have it you don't. It can't be learned." The idea is a neo-romantic idea that the poet is "possessed with more than common sensibility" (Wordsworth), is simply a cut above everyone else, and the plebians had better not even try.

Maryann qualified Amis' statement well and gave it a context. That modifies it a bit. But, of course, Lucky Jim is about the only thing Amis wrote that's worth reading and he went on the reputation of that book for most of his career. Maybe he should have gone to a workshop.

[FOsen]

Originally Posted by David Landrum

But, of course, Lucky Jim is about the only thing Amis wrote that's worth reading and he went on the reputation of that book for most of his career. Maybe he should have gone to a workshop.

I couldn't disagree more, David.

Frank

[Rory Waterman]

I couldn't disagree more either, David. But that is, certainly, what he is most remembered for and I think it's probably his funniest book. I feel fairly sure he might have agreed, in a tongue-in-cheek fashion, with Jake (let's not forget that this comment is said through the periscope of a character; he didn't necessarily think of Mozart as 'filthy', either): most poets of the Movement in the 1950s (and Amis was a fine poet) would surely have had little time for workshopping - or the term itself which is, frankly, vile. But it is interesting that Lucky Jim was heavily influenced by Larkin, who wrote all over tss, demanded more of this and less of that, etc. The difference is that Larkin was one respected peer and friend with a considerable emerging literary talent of his own.

I don't workshop poems, even here, though I respect the decision to do so and I can see what the considered thoughts of John, Janet, Susan, Janice, Mike, Clive and a great many others can do for a poem and its author's inspiration. I do, occasionally, show my nearly finished poems to respected peers, and of course I submit poems to magazines, etc: there's no point in hiding them in a drawer like dirty postcards (who said that? About Housman?). Whenever I have been in a workshop environment in the real, non-internet, flesh-and-faces world I've found myself in a back-patting set. Eratosphere differs because there is no social awkwardness about not patting backs and it is much, much more than just a workshop.

[David Landrum]

I had forgotten about Amis' poetry. What I've read of that I have liked. I did not know the connection with Larkin, though I'm sure there was this kind of cammeraderie in English literary circles. I imagine I'm being too harsh on him and using just the kind of hyperbole and overstatement he used when he made the remark about workshops.

[A. E. Stallings]

Unfounded praise is to be avoided, of course, but there is also a place for encouragement of promise. Some of our posters here are as young as 17--though this is not always announced. And a lot of folks here have come a long way since they first joined. Sometimes it seems there is an attitude of "scare them off" or trial by fire to new members who haven't yet got their footing, without giving people much of a fair shake. (Sorry for the three or four mixed metaphors there...)

[Steve Bucknell]

I agree with Rory that most face-to-face writing workshops inevitably(at least in England) involve a lot of enjoyable ego-stroking and networking. Real frankness can be tricky to achieve. I think Eratosphere offers us the chance to give and receive straightforward opinions and critiques buffered by the distance that the net provides. Of course hackles can still be raised and our sensitive egos can be bruised; but, in my short time here, I have seen people mostly treat each other with consideration.

I think the moderators do a thankless job really well. I agree with Alicia that new and less experienced members need encouragement, and I've seen them get this at Non-Met.(I don't vist Met as often.)On the other hand, I sometimes think that people post rudimentary-looking first drafts which don't even look spell-checked. I find this irritating and disrespectful to other members. I feel relieved when moderators -or someone- has the cojones to point this out to the poster. Steve.

[Mike Todd]

This is a very interesting thread.

Originally Posted by Janet Kenny

Art must be felt.

I agree wholeheartedly, though I think I'd preface it with "at the very least".

[David Landrum]

I agree with Janet that "art must be felt"--but to say that is not to say that art, especially poetic art, cannot be learned. There is technique and craft to poetry. Also there is the trap of falling into laziness with poetic lines, doing fill-in's for the sake of meter, rhyme for rhyme's sake, and so on (things I often do). These can be improved. And I also think that ability to "feel" art comes not from any in-born capacity but from familiarity with art. Hopefuly a workshop will cause people to read and study so that art can be felt.

The danger to the belief that art must be felt is a kind of elitism that leads to the idea of poets being some kind of prophetic club and not everyone has the prophetic gift and so are automatically excluded. When we see a poorly done poem we think, and often say, "This person just doesn't have it." Whatever "it" is, they can acquire it, to some degree, by work and exposure to good poetry. This is what we should encourage in workshops.

[David Landrum]

Also, I often see what Alicia pointed to. Many people here have taken the "drill sergeant" approach to new people posting. "This is a recruit and we're going to show him or her the necessity of having 'the right stuff' and so we'll be rough and yell a little," they seem to reason. This scares a lot of people off. I remember it happening to me when I first posted several years ago. People made brusque, dismissive comments about my poems, were conscending in their remarks, and generally rude. I stuck with it and things eased up but I still remember those things. A workshop calls for tact and good manners.