Author: nbeverlygmailcom

In critique, recognizing (and acknowledging) the strengths of a piece of writing might be as necessary as pointing out what needs work. I firmly believe that a truly useful critique has to offer a balance of both encouraging words and helpful suggestions. Tempting as it may be to jump straight into problem-solving mode when approaching another person’s work, openly appreciating what’s working well can have benefits for everyone involved.

In recent weeks, I’ve found myself in a critique situation (outside of BACCA), where, beyond a vague comment or two about beautiful writing, very little mention was made about the good aspects of what I had written. Since the meeting was with freelance clients, this situation left me in a bind. Had nothing I wrote really resonated? I had thoroughly researched my subject. I had spent an extensive amount of time and energy honing voice, tone, themes, and dramatic arcs. I had done the work and delivered it all on time. My clients even seemed positive about my work—in the abstract. When it came to specifics, though, they only spoke of renovation, not preservation.

It wasn’t that anyone present was harsh or mean—not at all. In fact, many of the suggestions they made were fair and all were delivered kindly. Still, the experience felt lopsided. So, I left that meeting feeling disappointed, exhausted, and more than a little confused about my next steps forward. If I had a clearer idea about what parts they appreciated maybe the changes they wanted wouldn’t have seemed like such a daunting task.

While there’s little I can do now about that experience, it did inspire me to compile a list of arguments in favor of looking for the good in a writer’s work. Who knows? Maybe it can help a reader or a writer in the future…

So. Why should we tell a writer what’s working well?

1. FYI! Positive feedback lets the writer know that something good actually came across. Duh, Noelle. (I know.) But, seriously sometimes the writer doesn’t know for sure if something worked. We have ideas. We have a vision for what we’d like to convey. And, our big plans sometimes fail in the execution. Sometimes, a writer is too close to know for sure.
2. For the future! Identifying good elements in a manuscript helps a writer hone in on the successful formal strategies they used and maybe increases the chances that they’ll use them again to create more good moments next time.
3. For selfish reasons! Learning to recognize and articulate the particulars of fine writing helps the person doing the critiquing. At the very least, that person is perfecting important critical skills. If that person is creative, they may also identify something that could make their own work better.

4. For preservation purposes! Telling a writer which parts of her work you liked means that she will probably keep them in subsequent drafts.

5. For credibility! Warning: this one may polarize. In my view, if readers can’t come up with at least one positive, concrete comment about my work, I start to distrust their ability to analyze my work altogether. Either they didn’t put in the necessary time, or they don’t have the expertise to really offer a worthy critique, or (worst of all) they have an alternate agenda…usually one that’s based on boosting their own egos. I always think of that kid (we all knew one), who lurked around the classroom, waiting for someone to build a tower out of blocks so she could immediately knock it all to the ground. It’s important for readers to remember that it can take a very long time to build something—and mere seconds to tear it apart. Whatever the root reason might be, I grow suspicious when readers can’t see anything good. And, I usually decide that their opinions aren’t worth worrying about.

Likely, there are a hundred more reasons to let a writer know when she got it right…what do you think? Besides keeping writers off the ledge, are there other good arguments for offering words of encouragement in addition to our thoughtful suggestions in critique?

Noelle Beverly writes poetry and prose, supports local writers in the surrounding community, and is a member of the BACCA Literary group. Photo by author.

I’m still looking for the sparkle in December this year—the Christmas spirit, the glisten, the glow. Back in July, I anticipated all the shiny parts of the holidays—baking cookies, decorating the tree, piling up silver-papered packages with red velvet bows—with excitement. I forgot, like always, that obligations double or triple this time of year, that the work-rest balance goes awry, and that by the time I get to the doorstep of Christmas, I’m feeling worn out.

Expectations (internal and external) are high—energy and time are low.

It doesn’t help that, for weeks now, my inbox has been flooded with promotional emails warning me that I’ve already waited until the very last minute for gift shopping. It also doesn’t help that here in Virginia, we’ve endured days and days of rain. (A few degrees colder, and we’d have piles of snow!) And, it really doesn’t help that I’m also feeling lackluster about my creative work right now. Rejections and deadlines never take a holiday. Also, it’s time to wrap up one project and start another—a transition I always find difficult to navigate gracefully.

It’s no coincidence that they come together, these dual doldrums. That magic-holiday-feeling that I’m missing is directly connected to my desire to create. So many of the little pleasures of this time of year are creative: singing, decorating, wrapping presents—even coming up with good gift ideas. I can’t expect to do any of these well when my creative reserves are low. But, if I nurture the creative energy, the writing and the merriment should both flow a little better.

In The Artist’s Way, Julia Cameron calls this process “filling the well.” She points out that all of us who want to create “must learn to be self-nourishing,” and to “consciously replenish our creative resources as we draw on them.” The process isn’t about duty, though, so populating a to-do list might not help. “In filling the well, think magic,” Cameron says. “Think delight. Think fun…think mystery, not mastery.”

I start small at first. Maybe I make something. Anything.

One good line. A cup of tea. A decent lunch.

Then I go outside, even in the rain. Gloomy light is better than no light.

This week, I found:

A glossy-brown leaf that looked like polished wood

A sprig of green moss

A slice of sunlight between banks of gray clouds

I found beauty, in other words. Seeing beauty helps and writing it down helps a little more.

Also, I try small steps forward, but with an attitude of delight. Today, I wrapped one gift as beautifully as I could. Progress.

I’ve landed somewhere between Holly Jolly and Blue this Christmas. I’m okay with it. There’s a song for that, too.

Noelle Beverly writes poetry and prose, supports local writers in the surrounding community, and is a member of the BACCA Literary group. Photos by author.

Death is useful. The knowledge of our own end—and the end of all things—can be a catalyst for action. Writers like to make use of everything. Triumphs and setbacks, blows and banalities—almost all of the detritus of life can be used to make art. Everything is fertilizer and furniture for story. Even death. Maybe, especially death. If we let it help us to live.

The patterns and rituals of the day tend to sweep us along, and life, so much of the time, feels ordinary or even dull. To remind us that our lives are not endless even when they feel like it, we have the memento mori—a symbol that impels us to face death, to acknowledge and accept our mortality. From the Latin, memento mori literally means remember that you must die. Often represented as a skull, the memento mori can be a rendering of anything ephemeral; any image or object that evokes the passage of time can serve the same purpose: a candle, a flower, a sunset, an hourglass.

The origin of the memento mori has been traced back to ancient Rome. When a triumphant general embarked on a parade of victory, so the story goes, a slave would accompany him all the while whispering, memento mori, remember that you must die. A preventative measure, this was meant to guard against excessive pride so the victorious leader would not begin to believe that he was a god. In the centuries since, zealots and visionaries have used the memento mori, incorporating images of death into their art and sacred spaces, often as a hedge against vanity, greed, or idleness. (For a more thorough treatment of this history, visit here.)

Modern usage of the memento mori is more typically as a driver for action, a gentle reminder that we have a fixed number of minutes to finish a few things while we are here. “Remember, you must die,” then, is only half of the message. The unspoken conclusion, it could be argued, is “…so, remember to live.” In this light, knowledge of our mortality becomes a crowbar, or a portal into a better life. Sam Harris, in a bittersweet meditation entitled “The Last Time You’ll Do Something,” asserts that “everything represents a finite opportunity to savor your life.”

Besides the pen, the memento mori may then be the most transformative and useful tool that a writer can have, serving as a marker for our ultimate deadline—the day we run out of time entirely. Since a death date can’t be marked on a calendar for most of us, the memento mori teaches that death looms in every minute. Every day can and could be our last. So, if there’s something you’d like to try, do, make, write, or be…don’t wait.

Perhaps, as a sensitive and creative person, you are already acutely aware, thanks very much, of the impending doom and gloom. Maybe death is a constant obsession or fear. Maybe every time you face a Boggart, like Molly Weasley, you see a parade of your most cherished loved ones in deep peril. I get it. On a weekly basis, I struggle through that fear of loss, that terror of the unknown. The what-if, wide-awake-at-3-am panic usually leads to a deep sense of loneliness for me, and also inaction. Wheel spinning. Maybe the practice of the memento mori offers an alternative approach. Maybe it asks that we step back and view death from a different angle, one a bit more removed from the harrowing fear that the thought of death usually provokes.

For one, I think the memento mori connects us all as living things. The images themselves, the skull and the hourglass, point to the universal. We are the same at the bone level. We are all at the mercy of time. In that sense, we are not alone. Also, the memento mori is not meant to be a siren, screaming emergency, causing our hearts to bound. It’s more stately than that, a cordial invitation, of sorts, to an inevitable event that we’ll all attend at some point. We are invited to prepare and respond—to channel our gnawing fear into useful action—to survey and then to narrow in on what is most important. To work toward the priority we’ve assigned in our lives and to infuse the time we have with deep meaning and purpose.

Love it or not, the season of the skull is upon us. Halloween looms and visions of skeletons will dance before our eyes. Perhaps this year they can escort us back to the work we most want to do.

Phoebe Bridgers says (sings) it well…

“Baby, it’s Halloween
There’s a last time for everything
Oh, come on, man
We can be anything…”

…don’t miss the full song and video, featuring lovely vintage Halloween costumes, even a skeleton or two.

Noelle Beverly writes poetry and prose, supports local writers in the surrounding community, and is a member of the BACCA Literary group.

Writers need help to be our best. We need careful readers with sharp, unwearied eyes looking at our work, shining the light of what they know on what we’ve written. We might prefer to avoid it, but in the quest for excellence, a little aid is absolutely necessary. So…

How do you find (and give) helpful help?

How do you create an environment where respectful and rigorous critique is possible?

What are the essential elements of a beneficial critique?

The members of BACCA have been thinking and talking about this lately. We’ve put our heads together and gathered some of our thoughts here. In my own thinking about these questions, I’ve uncovered a point of origin—an opening strategy I use when I approach the work of another writer.

Assume it’s there for a reason…

I begin with this: everything is intentional. I assume the writer has something in mind and figuring that out is my first job. Simple enough—but it goes against the grain. A book feels finished, complete, but it’s natural when handling a manuscript to assume that it’s flawed—it’s a draft, after all. But if I assume from the start that every surprise, every unfamiliar turn is a flaw and not a carefully chosen move, I miss an opportunity—a chance to learn something, to see from a new perspective.

After enduring disappointing critique experiences of my own, I’ve learned that it’s best to identify a writer’s project before I do anything else. This summary becomes my north star as I spend time and get to know a manuscript, mapping out its tendencies, its borders, and its open ends.

Believing that every part of a manuscript is intentional, included for a specific purpose, doesn’t mean that there is nothing more for me to do and no way I can help. Useful comments are in conversation with the project summary I’ve identified. Positive comments highlight parts of the writing that support and enhance the goals of the project. Questions I have may indicate places could undermine or conflict with what I believe the writer is trying to do.

If you find yourself in unfamiliar territory…

It’s human nature to privilege the familiar. We like to know where we are and what kind of story we’re in. Roughly knowing what to expect—a series of predictable surprises—makes us comfortable. But, assuming that a draft needs to be remade to look familiar can cause real damage. I know this first hand.

In one graduate-level workshop, my writing was chewed up and spit out, over and over. Criticism is never fun, but some of the feedback I received in that class was legitimate and some of it was not. Some of it made me a better writer and some of it threw me off track. It took me a long time to sort out the constructive comments from the lazy, arrogant ones.

One student (I’ll call him Mark) indulged in what I now regard as a careless, irresponsible style of critique. Every time I submitted work, Mark would speak first, but he would always say the same thing:

I just don’t know where I am in this poem.

The comment itself seemed innocent enough. As a jumping off place for discussion, it might have been. But Mark, once lost, dismissed my poems entirely and refused to go further. If he didn’t know where he was in the poem, he assumed it must not be good. Inevitably, the rest of the class would follow his lead, even though I knew from their written comments that they’d had different reactions. Unfortunately, the facilitator of the class allowed him to dominate discussions of my work with this same comment, over and over. The indulgence helped no one in that room.

The problem with his comment, which he never realized and (to be fair) I never revealed to him, was that it was based on a false assumption: if he got lost in my poem, I had failed. But, it was never my project to locate him in a known place and time. If he had known where he was, I realized later, that would have been a failure. Mark’s poetry was full of trains and clocks and suburban sprawl—things I wanted to escape. I wanted to explore wildness, myth, and emotional rawness; I wanted to illuminate the edges between civilization and uncultivated territory.

Of course Mark didn’t know where he was!

Sadly, he was unwilling to push past the shock of being in unfamiliar terrain to discover the qualities of the world I was trying to create. So, we both missed a chance to learn from each other. If he had stretched his imagination past comfortable, if he’d thought to identify my project instead of just pointing out what it wasn’t, there might have been meaningful critique—which could have helped us both.

The best first gift…

Several artists I know—writers and painters and musicians—have told me that the most thrilling moment is to have someone encounter their work and really see it, to spend enough time with it to know it and really get it. Maybe this is the best first gift we can give each other in a meaningful critique. To say, yep, I see what you’re doing…

At the very least, it seems a decent place to start.

Noelle Beverly writes poetry and prose, promotes local writers in the surrounding community, and is a member of the BACCA Literary group. Photos by author.