[Alan Sullivan]

I had promised myself to give this a rest, but I lied. I will be briefer this time. Promise.

IMO, IMO is an excellent device. I use it often---not the acronym, but some qualifying, softening language. I should promise to do this even more.

Wendy, the light variety of critique is widely available, while the heavy is scarce. And talk about subjectivity! How would you define the boundary?

Finally, Sharon, every honest posting is a judgement call, with the risk of error and offense ever-present. Surely you have seen that I often give detailed comments on the smallest points in a poem. I did not do this on your thread.

I also risk being less than brief if I start explaining my criteria for such decisions. Occasionally I am curt when recommending a large change, such as ditching half a poem, to someone whom I believe capable of profiting from such sharp advice. As I have previously said, I hoped you would think through the reasons for yourself. Charles later explained those reasons exactly as I would have done, had I taken the workshop route.

My recommendation of a title, which you may have taken as sarcastic, was meant in all seriousness. You wanted your poem to refer to a transient event that is no doubt already fading from the memory of most people. I wanted you to give your poem a wider context, make it worth reading next year, or ten years from now. That is the whole point of what we do here.

Can we have that handshake now?

Alan Sullivan

[Carol Taylor]

Let me get my two cents into the pot. Lots of interesting points made here, a learning experience for us all. Which is what often happens when folks take the time to explain themselves.

Richard, you nailed the s.o.b.'s, good job. That workshop you describe is why I used to avoid contemporary poetry.

And Wendy, I do understand the distinction you make, but I don't think you can make that kind of distinction between forums. Critique is part and parcel of workshopping, and workshopping per se isn't the evil Richard depicts in his poem. Had those instructors taken a different approach to the art of poetry, the workshop would have had a different character and Richard wouldn't have had a poem.

Sharon, as you are passionately arguing, you don't want a subjective reaction. You want a lot of feedback from your critic. However, may I suggest that if the subjective reaction were "This is fantastic!" you wouldn't likely have felt cheated by lack of specifics. You would have supplied the specifics yourself. Recently Alan did a critique for me that I appreciated very much. He didn't fill in all the blanks, but when I internalized what he said and thought about how I would go about rewriting according to those suggestions, I got some ideas for a revision. I asked him whether I was on the right track, and he said Bingo (or words to that effect). I still haven't succeeded in rewriting that poem because it's taking me in a direction I never intended to go, and I simply lack the inspiration. But I know that what he said is right.

I've frequently stated that I believe "I hate it" or "I like it" is the sincerest form of feedback, because it lets you know what is working for a particular reader or what is definitely not working for him. But it's important to add "because" so that the writer can evaluate the critic's reaction (in so far as the critic is able to "objectively" define his reasons for liking or hating it). Maybe he likes everything. Maybe he likes nothing. Maybe he has some personal persuasion or criteria you don't know about. Maybe neither does he. Perhaps his reaction is based on normative judgement he's not sharing with you because he assumes you already know. Seldom do 100% of readers like or dislike a poem. Your chances are much improved if you get to know how a critic thinks. Sometimes you can trust a critic's instincts because he's usually right; sometimes you just have to write your own poem.

Even if you receive a rejection letter from a publisher or your poem is eliminated in a contest, it helps if you know why they didn't want your poem. Doubly so if they choose something you personally feel is worse than your own.

But about this objective vs. subjective stuff. Tell me what opinion is objective? Normative judgement itself is highly subjective--just look how it changes. I can tell you that the word pretty is an adjective. That's objective. But if I tell you that pretty is an overworked, trite, unimaginative adjective and that adjectives are to be largely avoided in poetry in the first place, that is subjective. Richard described an attempt by workshop leaders to pass their collective subjectivity (normative judgement) off as an objective standard in his wonderful satire.

A board that limits itself to "I like" and "I don't like" is hardly going to help any of us. Publishers can tell us that much. If we only hear from the critics who like our poem and think it's redeemable, we won't get the full story. Critique will be distorted. And if they simply point out that it's blather, does that mean that we should put it through the shredder? You could take a poll, but polls are worse than useless. Not good enough to know that 20% loved it, 27% hated it, and 53% didn't vote.

All that said, I believe in courtesy. Frankness can be the sincerest form of courtesy when it's well-intentioned. It pays the writer the compliment of assuming he is up to hearing the truth. But the truth isn't 100% objective. I'd love to think so, but no.

Rudeness, unlike frankness, simply obscures the truth, because it throws up defensive barriers in the mind of the recipient. Who is willing to accept that his work is blather? When a critic calls a spade a pitchfork he provides the writer with a valid reason for disregarding his (probably accurate) evaluation on the basis of lack of objectivity. I've often written such critiques, but I've usually edited them before I hit the submit button. Sometimes I simply hit the back button and leave a whole comment unposted, because I don't have enough confidence in the writer's ability to believe he will be helped by my crit. But I am not endlessly patient, and sometimes a remark gets through that is more a measure of my own frustration and disgust and a statement to the board in general than an attempt to help the perpetrator, especially when critique has been ignored repeatedly and the same kind of blather is posted all over again by the same writer.

Carol

[Nigel Holt]

I think Carol has got to the nub of the argument here, when she talks of "...barriers in the mind...".

In essence, there seems to be a culture of unwillingness to give or accept criticism. Unless we can give an honest and naturally, purely subjective evaluation, then little is served except for minor tinkering with meter.

Unless we can appreciate that someone's comments, however unpalatable they may be, serve to focus our views through the dialectic process. Unless we can take in and rationalise the other's view, we have no scope of understanding outside of the subjective blinkers through which we see the world.

The first rule of rhetoric is to know one's audience, and as we write poetry with a view to audience, then we cannot safely ignore other people's views of our output.

One of Nietzsche's aphorisms has always struck me with its appositeness - that of the snake that cannot slough its skin and so dies. If we didn't take notice of criticism, no matter how caustic, then we would be writing as we did when we were teenagers.


Nigel

[Alan Sullivan]

Great discussion, Carol, and I'm glad to know that I gave you something to ponder in that critique.

The boundary of rudeness will inevitably differ for different people. You are quite right, Carol, that when the threshold is crossed, minds tend to close, and no understanding results. However, a jolt of rudeness can sometimes resolve an impasse and move people forward, as it seems to have done in this instance.

When I engage Porridgeface in dialogue on a poem, I feel free to jolt him. We have worked together repeatedly, and he knows my style. With a newcomer, I must be more cautious, but sometimes I am not cautious enough.

Occasionally I am provocative on purpose. Some days ago, a poem on Charon, the ferryman of the underworld, was posted by a fellow who signs himself Shane. I forget the exact spelling of his monicker. Kerrin something-or-other. He typed with his posting, in capital letters, the exhortation "be gentle dammit."

I wasn't, and we subsequently had a rather testy private exchange. But really, I think anyone who issues such a demand is better off elsewhere. I have no desire to make such individuals feel more welcome by keeping silent.

Ideally, the Sphere is a community of craft. But a community that feels tempted to impose a speech code, in the name of politeness or any other virtue, might easily evolve into a tyranny. Here we see the insinuation of a larger issue from our society, which threatens to politicize even our abstruse pursuit.

Alan Sullivan

[wendy v]

"Wendy, the light variety of critique is widely available, while the heavy is scarce."

No kidding. I think it's only going to get scarcer with the traffic we've been getting. More rarely means better. It usually equates to a tacit acceptance of mediocrity. And lots more hurt feelings and fighting. I hope to hell I'm wrong. I'll eat my hat if I am. Let's check back in six months and see where we stand.

"Sometimes I simply hit the back button and leave a whole comment unposted, because I don't have enough confidence in the writer's ability to believe he will be helped by my crit."

Me, too, Carol. And this is what I mean by tip-toeing. Events like yesterday only make me more reluctant to comment frankly. I'm not advocating rudeness, (do you really think I am ?); I'm advocating the inclusion of a board where thick-skinned, nose-in-the-dirt, vigorously opinionated poets/critics don't have to worry about tip-toeing. I'm all for keeping one Metrical Board if Frankness continues to play out there. I have serious doubts it can happen that way. It's jut not the nature of the beast, or of large communities.

Mark my words !

The sky is falling, the sky is falling !




[This message has been edited by wendy v (edited March 16, 2001).]

[A. E. Stallings]

This is a very interesting discussion. I particularly was intrigued with the idea of the dichotomy between "workshop" and "feedback." (I too prefer the latter.) There is always a danger in "workshopping" that the group tends to pressure a piece towards "perfection"--often negatively defined as a lack of flaws (and perhaps individual voice), a sterile virtue. But a strong poet should be able to pick and choose among reactions, which are or are not in line with his/her vision. (I know with me I find particularly helpful "suggestions" that echo niggling concerns I myself may have had but rationalized away.) But I do sometimes worry about beginning poets. I often see revisions posted in very rapid succession, incorporating every suggestion offered, without regard to their relative merit or applicability.

Perhaps poets should express in their posts what sort of reactions they would find most helpful... Thumbs up or down, for instance, or "I am wondering if this is working because..." I think it is helpful to critiquers to know what the poet's concerns are.

Alicia

[Carol Taylor]

Alan, of course one size doesn't fit all and perhaps some people like being battered. Maybe rudeness motivates them when nothing else will. But I think you are missing the distinction between rudeness and frankness that I labored to establish. You and Porridge have developed a climate in which you can be painfully frank. That's not the same as being rude.

I recently told a poet here that I didn't think her work was salvageable. I gave my reasons for thinking so. That's being painfully frank. If I'd called it "garbage" (as my husband did my writing) I would have been unnecessarily rude.

Whether my writing is garbage or not, I rejected his criticism outright on the basis that it was neither objective nor informed. He doesn't like poets and he hasn't read a poem in 40 years, his English degree notwithstanding. So I simply don't show him my work. But he is a tell-it-like-it-is person, extremely self-assured and brutally frank, and he homes in on the bottom line of any subject (based on his own perception of it). Unfortunately, he's usually right.

Carol

[Alan Sullivan]

Hmmm. If wendy gets her way, maybe I'll have to assume a new identity. Call me Frank Ness. At least on one board.

Carol, I understand the distinction you're trying to make. And I can imagine the shock for a newcomer visiting a discussion between me and Porridge.

On the other hand, wendy may be too alarmist, since such discussions ought to warn the unwary before they ever post anything of their own.

A.S.

[Richard Wakefield]

I want to refer back a few exchanges to something Sharon said, asking if I could post guidelines for critiques. I think the only useful guideline, as Sharon and others have already pointed out, is that the critique be useful. I suppose a subpoint would be that the one offering the critique should be able to take criticism at least as blunt as that which he or she offers. To my mind the whole point is to make poetry better, and that will happens in part through an endless exchange: poem-critique-reply-clarification...
I try in all my writing and all my comments on writing to use language that bridges the gap between us. In writing a poem, I want to find the words, the patterns of words that will evoke the same feeling in the reader that I had and that gave rise to the poem. Merely naming the feeling rarely does that. (That's why I was inordinately proud of my famous prize winning Valentine poem that never uses the word "love.") Same thing with a critique. I want to point at the word or pattern of words that evoked a feeling in me -- or that failed to do so. Then the writer can take my response as utterly idiosyncratic or as somewhat representative of the people she or he wants to speak to and hear from.
I don't see any way to codify this, even if it were something that should be imposed on people who may prefer to come at poetry and criticism in a different way. As William James, my favorite philosopher, put it: All we can do is ask ourselves continually, "Does it work?"

[Julie]

I think the feedback/workshop dichotomy is not particularly workable, especially for more inexperienced poets.

The more experienced the poet, the more he or she can extrapolate from "I like this," or "I hate this." The question "why" can be answered by the poet. After all, the poet probably knows, before he or she posts/submits what reactions are likely, and why. Being a poet is about predicting the responses of others to our words, and shaping our words to elicit those responses we desire. The critic's "why" is internalized. A word to the wise is sufficient, though I'll substitute "experienced" for wise.

For less experienced poets, feedback is not enough. The point of any workshop/critique forum is not just to learn to write a poem, but to learn how to manipulate the reader through language. Someone new to poetry cannot be expected to provide their own translation of the critic's "why" if he or she has never before been exposed to a critic. That's like throwing an adult in the water and, as they drown, screaming "Swim! Swim!" If they knew how to swim, they wouldn't be drowning. You would at the very least want to say, "Kick your feet! Paddle with your arms!"

No one should be chastized for failing to swim until they are told to kick and paddle yet refuse to do so.

We cannot bleat about how poetry is a craft like knitting and then, when asked about about a dropped stitch act as if the new knitter should automatically know what to do. Once they've knitted for a while, saying "You've dropped a stitch" is enough.

Julie