So for any of you loyal readers who have been checking the blog in the past few weeks, you may have noticed that the standing post has been about my massive computer failure. And for anyone tuning in after our recent trip to the AWP conference in Chicago, or being redirected from whatever strange powers the Internet possesses, that is still the case.
I am at the moment confined to my Dell notebook, which if any of you saw the commercials which showed an assembly line of computers being presented like candy, that is what this computer is. For those who are interested the color is an apple green. This may seem like a completely workable situation, but for a comparison you have to understand the machine I was working on before.
My PC was a heavily upgraded Asus machine. Though really the bare bones could have been anything. Now I won't stand here and try to state that my machine is the Lamborghini of the compute world because I am at present an unemployed teacher, and prior to being unemployed I was a student living on student loans. In fact, the only reason my computer was the beautiful piece of machinery it was is because of a rather large tax rebate.
Bear with me, I'm about to get to the writing part.
My computer was, however, heavily upgraded. A top of the line graphics card, a monstrous power supply that could have run three computers simultaneously, enough RAM to ensure that any time something went wrong with that computer there were only two culprits. Myself or Microsoft. I'm not going to start a flame war because I still love windows and would never switch to a Mac as far as PC's are concerned, but I knew that computer inside and out. It was not a laptop built for ease, nor a run of the mill PC for desk work. It was a power machine meant for playing the most graphically demanding video games while watching HD movies at the same time. And then it failed.
So how does this relate to writing? Firstly that you have to know what you need when you set out to write. A standard computer user would have been overwhelmed by machine and doesn't need everything it could do anyways. Similarly, in this fast paced writing world, if you're writing novels don't bother reading up on current poetic theory on an academic level. Or if you're trying to become the next great literary figure, stop worrying about people like Stephanie Meyer and pay attention to where the literary scene is headed.
But more than that it's a technical thing on a few levels. Firstly in how we as writers approach our writing. There are writers who would never consider writing a first draft on the computer. First they do a physical rough copy and only then do they transfer it to computers. Some people prefer the old typewriter (there's some interesting Bukowski writing about his inability to switch from the typewriter to the computer.) Some people are fine on a laptop.
I preferred my two monitors, spreading my work between flashdrives and harddrives, and generally having either a movie or music on the second screen not as something to distract me, but rather something to keep me focused. Similar to how right now as I type this the news is on the TV as background noise to keep out more distracting sources.
One thing we have to understand as writers is what works best for us as we set out to write, because if you hate the computer but find it's the only thing you can write on, you'll either need to suck it up and adjust or simply write sub-par work.
Alternatively, if life throws you a curve-ball you may find yourself having to scramble to recover. I certainly had to, figuring out ways to transfer documents stuck on my now unpowered internal hard drives and trying to remember all the sites I had bookmarked. Luckily this all came a couple of weeks before the AWP conference, so I knew I had some time to figure things out.
However this massive failure on my computers part has also reminded me of a very important lesson, one that can be evidenced in the film industry all of the time. Adversity breeds ingenuity.
Jaws would have been nothing more than a large budget gore film if the mechanical shark hadn't been a pain to work with. Star Wars would have been...well probably what George Lucas turned the latest three movies into if it hadn't been for time and budget constraints. From the literary world Bukowski's Post Office is a testament to fast paced desperation, having been completed in two weeks with the promise that Bukowski would never have to work in the post office again.
I could go on and on, but sometimes it's not ideal conditions that create great art, but the work it takes to make it work. Which is what I found after that massive computer failure. Though I was able to get all of my documents recovered, I also had to prepare new work for my writers group which consequently involved trying to rewrite what I thought were unaccesible works. Now, I've never found a rewrite to be "better" than the original, but those rewrites contained some integral ideas that the original would have been lacking. Not to the levels of adversity faced by other writers, but even on the small scale, sometimes a little kick in the pants can be enough to get something new going.
So I'm back, and will be doing my best to keep a regular update schedule moving as I work on getting a job, and the magazine as a whole gets to work on our spring and subsequent summer issue. In the coming weeks you can look for me to write about the AWP conference we recently attended, but that usual eclectic mix of topics relating to my own, and others obsessions.
Now for some shout outs. Obsession will be launching the spring issue on March 21st, but it's not too late to view the last issue at www.obsessionlitmag.com
Marathon literary review, a product of Arcadia University's new M.F.A. program recently put out its first issue which just happens to feature two works from your loyal author, and if you're looking for some good reads, or more importantly a good place to submit shorter works, check them out at http://blogs.arcadia.edu/marathon-literary-review/
My first round of AWP shout outs go out to two fantastic presses, one new to me and one who fascinated me last year as well.
Ghost Town Literary Magazine, who I encountered last year when I purchased a T-shirt featuring Kim Jong Ill holding a burning bush (just the type of strangeness I enjoy), once again were featured at AWP and I couldn't have been happier to see them. The issue of their journal I consumed from the last conference featured a varying mix of poetry and fiction, most of which was strange and experimental and all of which I found fascinating, to the point that if they hadn't given me a copy of their current issue for free at the conference, I would have bought it again. Check them out at http://ghosttownlitmag.wordpress.com/, and you can expect me to promote them again when they start taking submissions.
On the side of magazines I did purchase at the conference, Toad Suck Review drew me in with the Hypno Toad (all hail Hypno Toad) and went on to deliver a magazine that features just eclectic enough of a body of work, while never coming off as to snobby. Based out of Arkansas they have a section devoted entirely to work from Arkansas writers, but also featured a piece by Bukowski, interesting eco fiction, experimental fiction, and while I can't speak of the same obsession with each piece that I found in Ghost Town, it contained more home runs than it did pop outs. Check them out at http://toadsuckreview.org/ and again, expect more talk when they start taking submissions in the fall.
That's it for today, but I'll be delivering a new article on Friday going into detail what we experienced in Chicago, and how it differed from our experiences in D.C. the year before.
David is one of the co-founders and editors of Obsession Literary Magazine, as well as the head writer for the Obsession blog. His work has been featured in Marathon Literary magazine, and he has a forthcoming publication in Apiary magazine, both of which are based in the Philadelphia area.
Showing posts with label AWP. Show all posts
Showing posts with label AWP. Show all posts
January 23, 2012
Five Reasons Why You Should Join a Writers Group: Written by David
Last week I gave you a little history lesson, discussing some famous writers groups that changed the face of writing. This week I'm going to get a little more personal. I'm going to give you 5 reasons how a writing group can change the face of your writing.
Before I get into that I just want to clear one thing up. It's not necessarily that a writing group will do all of these things. As with any writing endeavor, part of what's going to help you succeed is your own drive. The other is the groups drive. If, however, you find a keeper, you'll find that your writing only improves due to your choice of committing to a group. But why even give a writering group a shot?
1. Fresh Eyes
I don't know what your process is like, but mine generally involves writing a poem, obsessing over it for a few weeks, and then I shelve the piece for a bit so I can approach it at a later date with fresh eyes. Now, this is not the most time effective approach to writing, so imagine my surprise at my discovery that presenting pieces to my writing group speeds the whole process up!
In a writering group, especially one consisting of multiple opinions and/or genres, your piece is immediately getting a fresh look which will often draw out discussions on parts of your writing that you wanted to discuss, and maybe even parts you didn't even notice. Ever written a really killer story but then had someone look at it and ask "Yeah but who's the main character?" only to realize you never defined them? It won't always be something as big as this, but you may find pieces of your story are missing that you didn't even notice because in your head they were always so clear!
My point is that having a group of writers critique you can give you that immediate feedback that you need to continue your writing process rather than having it sit around for a bit, or read it fifty times to notice those few details. But that seems a minor thing when compared to...
2. Fresh Ideas
When my writers group and I presented at the Montgomery Community College Writing Conference on the advantages and disadvantages of writing groups, we had a member of the audience who was very hesitant to let someone else view her work because she was afraid that it would tarnish her hand in the piece. As I discussed last week, this is definitely not the case, but it's not just editing that you can get from a writers group.
When you have several different types of minds looking at your piece you may find that they notice elements that you may not have been aware you put in (as a writing teacher of mine once said though, whether you are aware of it or not it's never just luck.) These elements may prove even more interesting than the ideas you were focusing on (your secondary character is more moving than the main character, that side story has the potential to add a whole different layer to your story, a simile that you didn't even notice would be stronger throughout the poem, etc.) If you're like my group it may come down to something as seemingly small as word choice (something I have a knack for helping my group out with.)
Certainly editing can bring up some fresh thoughts, but I'm talking about so much more here. Being among a group of writers it is only inevitable that you are going to get ideas from their successes and failures. As the quote goes "Good artists copy, great artists steal." I'm not saying that you'll steal all of your colleagues ideas, but you will find inspiration from them. I'll give you two examples from my own group experiences.
First is my favorite poem that I've written. A fellow student back when I was in a group editing style class wrote two poems that didn't work within a week. One was about being awake at 3 am, which was supposed to be about being unable to sleep but didn't go far enough. The other was a poem about the Mariana trench. In those two failures though, I found that the second idea was meant to be combined with the first! I combined the two ideas, put them in my own language, and wrote a poem about how the it feels like you're descending into the Mariana trench when you're deeply tired but can't sleep.
The second example is the novel I'm writing. It began as a short story long ago that went into the folder of unsuccessful ideas and just stewed there. Up until one of the members in my writing groups started presenting chapters of the novel he was writing. Now, there was no similarity in the ideas. His is a satire on religion, mine is about a tree that defies the laws of reality. But in going to that group week after week and helping to edit one novel, I found my inspiration to write my own. And now, as it nears completion, I know I never would have gotten so far if not for the group.
3. Practice
Much as with any other art, practice makes perfect. However, we have few ways to practice our craft in the way that a musician can hear what doesn't fit in a composition or an artist may see where the colors don't blend. Sure, while writing you can see your spelling/grammatical errors, but how can you tell when stylistically you're off? How do you practice editing?
There's certainly some strange ways. Hunter S. Thompson retyped A Farewell to Arms (I believe) and The Great Gatsby before he set out to do his own writing. I'm not suggesting everyone do this, but a good exercise as writers is to think how we might change the books we read to satisfy our own style and expectations (steer clear of Twilight though, it'll make you hate yourself.) But this can only push you so much.
Part of being in a writing group is that you are also helping edit other peoples writing. After all, you can't expect other writers to give your writing the attention it deserves if you aren't willing to do the same (this is one of the things to watch out for when searching for a writing group and one I'll talk about next week.) By practicing our editing of other peoples work, we'll find that our critical eye for our own work will be better tuned to notice the finer details. This doesn't mean that you will eventually run through your need for a writing group. In fact, the opposite. If your group progresses the same as you, you'll find that your works begin improving all the better and you as a group are able to focus on fine tuning pieces instead of overhauling.
4. Motivation
I didn't start writing until I was in college and was in writing courses. I read a whole lot, but as far as writing goes, I never went past the terrible poetry that high schoolers are oft to write and oft to assume is the most poignant writing to grace the page (but is the type of melodrama that makes you gag years later when you read it again.) However when I entered into a poetry course that had me writing at least one poem every week I started producing dozens a week, forcing myself to write and write and write some more. Then I graduated.
And for a year...I wrote a poem or five.
Now, there were a lot of other reasons behind my ignoring my writing, but we won't get into that. Instead we'll focus on what happened after I happened to get invited into a writing group after presenting a poem to a Renaissance Literature class. I started writing again. I started producing on the level I had been in my college course. And I started doing something I'd never done before. Editing.
Whether you find a group that meets weekly, monthly, or however often they'd like, having that knowledge that you should have something for a specific day will push you to make sure you have something written for that day. It will push you to edit to present quality pieces to your group. If you're competitive like me, it will push you to try to go beyond your own levels so that you impress your colleagues.
You see what I'm getting at here. A writing group will drive you. If you already had the drive you may find that it pushes you in different directions. But it is far easier to be motivated with others than to motivate yourself.
5. Community
This one should be obvious but I find that it is often an overlooked element of the group. This part I can't talk technical truths because most of the advantages will depend on the composition of the group. I can only tell you what I've experienced in my own group.
The members of my writing group have become more than just fellow writers. They're business partners now, as we venture into running an E-zine. They're co-workers as we prepare for our trek to the AWP conference in March. They're the people that I trust to be references for me as I venture into getting a job. They're the people I trust to help edit my writing.
And they're my friends.
I know some groups will meet for dinner and editing. However the group I'm a part of has tried that and realized it's better not to mix business and pleasure. It is my advice that you edit first and then eat. Otherwise you're generally more focused on eating than editing.
But if you find a truly great group of writers than the best advice I can give you is to sometimes meet and don't discuss writing at all! Myself and the members of my group meet for lunch. We go to each others parties. We're honored guests at each others weddings. We are a group but we are also extremely close friends. Which helps us in the writing aspect of our group because we are comfortable enough with each other to propose radical changes, put forward extreme ideas, and argue until our faces turn blue. And I don't mean with the person who wrote the piece!
If you payed attention last week, the friendship aspect of the group shouldn't be that surprising. Those great writing groups of the past I talked about? They were more than just writing groups. They were circles of friends.
So there you have it. There's certainly more reasons that you could think of for why to join a writing group, but those are my five most important. But it's not all sunshine and rainbows. Next week I'll discuss some of the reasons why a writing group might not be working out and how you can help yourself solve those issues.
David is one of the founders and editors of Obsession Literary Magazine and the maintainer of Obsession's blog.
Before I get into that I just want to clear one thing up. It's not necessarily that a writing group will do all of these things. As with any writing endeavor, part of what's going to help you succeed is your own drive. The other is the groups drive. If, however, you find a keeper, you'll find that your writing only improves due to your choice of committing to a group. But why even give a writering group a shot?
1. Fresh Eyes
I don't know what your process is like, but mine generally involves writing a poem, obsessing over it for a few weeks, and then I shelve the piece for a bit so I can approach it at a later date with fresh eyes. Now, this is not the most time effective approach to writing, so imagine my surprise at my discovery that presenting pieces to my writing group speeds the whole process up!
In a writering group, especially one consisting of multiple opinions and/or genres, your piece is immediately getting a fresh look which will often draw out discussions on parts of your writing that you wanted to discuss, and maybe even parts you didn't even notice. Ever written a really killer story but then had someone look at it and ask "Yeah but who's the main character?" only to realize you never defined them? It won't always be something as big as this, but you may find pieces of your story are missing that you didn't even notice because in your head they were always so clear!
My point is that having a group of writers critique you can give you that immediate feedback that you need to continue your writing process rather than having it sit around for a bit, or read it fifty times to notice those few details. But that seems a minor thing when compared to...
2. Fresh Ideas
When my writers group and I presented at the Montgomery Community College Writing Conference on the advantages and disadvantages of writing groups, we had a member of the audience who was very hesitant to let someone else view her work because she was afraid that it would tarnish her hand in the piece. As I discussed last week, this is definitely not the case, but it's not just editing that you can get from a writers group.
When you have several different types of minds looking at your piece you may find that they notice elements that you may not have been aware you put in (as a writing teacher of mine once said though, whether you are aware of it or not it's never just luck.) These elements may prove even more interesting than the ideas you were focusing on (your secondary character is more moving than the main character, that side story has the potential to add a whole different layer to your story, a simile that you didn't even notice would be stronger throughout the poem, etc.) If you're like my group it may come down to something as seemingly small as word choice (something I have a knack for helping my group out with.)
Certainly editing can bring up some fresh thoughts, but I'm talking about so much more here. Being among a group of writers it is only inevitable that you are going to get ideas from their successes and failures. As the quote goes "Good artists copy, great artists steal." I'm not saying that you'll steal all of your colleagues ideas, but you will find inspiration from them. I'll give you two examples from my own group experiences.
First is my favorite poem that I've written. A fellow student back when I was in a group editing style class wrote two poems that didn't work within a week. One was about being awake at 3 am, which was supposed to be about being unable to sleep but didn't go far enough. The other was a poem about the Mariana trench. In those two failures though, I found that the second idea was meant to be combined with the first! I combined the two ideas, put them in my own language, and wrote a poem about how the it feels like you're descending into the Mariana trench when you're deeply tired but can't sleep.
The second example is the novel I'm writing. It began as a short story long ago that went into the folder of unsuccessful ideas and just stewed there. Up until one of the members in my writing groups started presenting chapters of the novel he was writing. Now, there was no similarity in the ideas. His is a satire on religion, mine is about a tree that defies the laws of reality. But in going to that group week after week and helping to edit one novel, I found my inspiration to write my own. And now, as it nears completion, I know I never would have gotten so far if not for the group.
3. Practice
Much as with any other art, practice makes perfect. However, we have few ways to practice our craft in the way that a musician can hear what doesn't fit in a composition or an artist may see where the colors don't blend. Sure, while writing you can see your spelling/grammatical errors, but how can you tell when stylistically you're off? How do you practice editing?
There's certainly some strange ways. Hunter S. Thompson retyped A Farewell to Arms (I believe) and The Great Gatsby before he set out to do his own writing. I'm not suggesting everyone do this, but a good exercise as writers is to think how we might change the books we read to satisfy our own style and expectations (steer clear of Twilight though, it'll make you hate yourself.) But this can only push you so much.
Part of being in a writing group is that you are also helping edit other peoples writing. After all, you can't expect other writers to give your writing the attention it deserves if you aren't willing to do the same (this is one of the things to watch out for when searching for a writing group and one I'll talk about next week.) By practicing our editing of other peoples work, we'll find that our critical eye for our own work will be better tuned to notice the finer details. This doesn't mean that you will eventually run through your need for a writing group. In fact, the opposite. If your group progresses the same as you, you'll find that your works begin improving all the better and you as a group are able to focus on fine tuning pieces instead of overhauling.
4. Motivation
I didn't start writing until I was in college and was in writing courses. I read a whole lot, but as far as writing goes, I never went past the terrible poetry that high schoolers are oft to write and oft to assume is the most poignant writing to grace the page (but is the type of melodrama that makes you gag years later when you read it again.) However when I entered into a poetry course that had me writing at least one poem every week I started producing dozens a week, forcing myself to write and write and write some more. Then I graduated.
And for a year...I wrote a poem or five.
Now, there were a lot of other reasons behind my ignoring my writing, but we won't get into that. Instead we'll focus on what happened after I happened to get invited into a writing group after presenting a poem to a Renaissance Literature class. I started writing again. I started producing on the level I had been in my college course. And I started doing something I'd never done before. Editing.
Whether you find a group that meets weekly, monthly, or however often they'd like, having that knowledge that you should have something for a specific day will push you to make sure you have something written for that day. It will push you to edit to present quality pieces to your group. If you're competitive like me, it will push you to try to go beyond your own levels so that you impress your colleagues.
You see what I'm getting at here. A writing group will drive you. If you already had the drive you may find that it pushes you in different directions. But it is far easier to be motivated with others than to motivate yourself.
5. Community
This one should be obvious but I find that it is often an overlooked element of the group. This part I can't talk technical truths because most of the advantages will depend on the composition of the group. I can only tell you what I've experienced in my own group.
The members of my writing group have become more than just fellow writers. They're business partners now, as we venture into running an E-zine. They're co-workers as we prepare for our trek to the AWP conference in March. They're the people that I trust to be references for me as I venture into getting a job. They're the people I trust to help edit my writing.
And they're my friends.
I know some groups will meet for dinner and editing. However the group I'm a part of has tried that and realized it's better not to mix business and pleasure. It is my advice that you edit first and then eat. Otherwise you're generally more focused on eating than editing.
But if you find a truly great group of writers than the best advice I can give you is to sometimes meet and don't discuss writing at all! Myself and the members of my group meet for lunch. We go to each others parties. We're honored guests at each others weddings. We are a group but we are also extremely close friends. Which helps us in the writing aspect of our group because we are comfortable enough with each other to propose radical changes, put forward extreme ideas, and argue until our faces turn blue. And I don't mean with the person who wrote the piece!
If you payed attention last week, the friendship aspect of the group shouldn't be that surprising. Those great writing groups of the past I talked about? They were more than just writing groups. They were circles of friends.
So there you have it. There's certainly more reasons that you could think of for why to join a writing group, but those are my five most important. But it's not all sunshine and rainbows. Next week I'll discuss some of the reasons why a writing group might not be working out and how you can help yourself solve those issues.
David is one of the founders and editors of Obsession Literary Magazine and the maintainer of Obsession's blog.
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