We, writers, tend to be too hard on our writing. Sure, our work can always be improved, but they’re not always as terrible as we tend to think they are. Just recently, I had to write a short story for one of my classes. I had what I thought was a fantastic idea for the story in my head, so I sat down, typed it out on my computer, and thought it was absolute garbage by the time I turned it in the next day. But I was later told by my peers that they really enjoyed it.
Without my peers, and without that class itself, I would never have known my piece was any good. The class I wrote that story for was a workshop. Workshops can be a fantastic way to gain confidence, make friends, and start editing your work. That’s because, from my experience, these workshops are typically filled with creative and friendly writers willing to help you improve.
Another cool thing about workshops: they provide you with the chance to read other pieces of writing you might never have been exposed to before. You’ll read over these works and think about what you like and what you think could be improved in each piece.
You’ll discuss each piece one by one, giving each your full, undivided attention, until finally your piece is brought to the board. Depending on the workshop, you may or may not be given a chance to read a small excerpt from your work, or the entire thing if your work is a poem. But once the discussion begins, you generally won’t be allowed to speak. This keeps you from defending your work when the group critiques it because the purpose of a workshop is to point out both what is and is not working. Rather than talking, you should be taking note of these things.
The group often begins by discussing what they think works in your piece. This discussion will boost your confidence, make you smile, and give you an idea of what you probably don’t want to change in the final draft. Then, the group will start talking about what they think isn’t working in your piece and how they think it can be improved. Stay quiet here. It’ll be hard, I know, but your peers aren’t critiquing your piece out of malice. They’re doing it to help you improve it, and they might even provide you with examples of how they think you can do just that. And their opinions will differ. One person may like that one bit of dialogue you wrote, while someone else may think it doesn’t sound natural. Your job is to take everyone’s opinions and suggestions into account, then decide what you think will help improve your piece.
Once the discussion is over, you’ll finally have a chance to speak. You can use this chance to explain what everyone misunderstood (there will likely be misunderstandings), give your thoughts on some of the suggestions provided to you, or whatever else you want to say. Then you’ll continue the workshop, helping someone else. And at the end of the day, you’ll go home ready to start improving your work.
Workshops can be an immensely helpful tool for improving your work so that you can look at it with pride and say, “You know, maybe, just maybe, it’s not garbage after all.”
–Josh Stadelman
Photo Credit: Ireland Headrick