Sunday, April 17, 2011
Cold Reads
I always choose to remain silent while my work is being critiqued in a workshop. This has been instilled in me from other creative writing professors. I think the best advantage to this is that it allows me to get a "cold read" from readers. What I mean is that by remaining silent, I allow critiquers to tell me their initial and unbiased impressions. By interrupting them or revealing what I meant, their critique may change dramatically. I want to know these initial impressions, because it reveals flaws in areas of my work that I may not have noticed and that need to be reworded, better described, or made more concise/clear. I'd suggest others to try this out, as I think it is extremely helpful.
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I completely agree that remaining silent is the best way to get meaningful feedback (except for someone asking you a question). It can be easy at times to try to defend your work, but I think the only way to actually improve is to listen to what others have to say about it.
ReplyDeleteI can completely agree with this. Often it is uncomfortable for me to sit there while everyone is reading my work. For some reason I am self-conscious with the idea of people reading my own personal writing pieces. Part of me chooses to remain silent so I can hear everyone's advice, part of me chooses to because I am shy.
ReplyDeleteI can say that I agree with your way of listenting to critiques. I always defend my work because I am very proud of my work and sometimes ignorant to others critique. However, by just being silent while the critiques are being said will help me correct my work in a way that will benefit my overall writing.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree with remaining silent! At least until the initial thoughts are out. If before it could change what they thought... and I agree that could change their comments on their papers that they hand back to us. Work shop is supposed to help us and we don't really have to be defensive :)
ReplyDeleteIt is so hard to stay quiet when your work is being critiqued. I find that it is even harder when you have some sort of emotional attachment to your work. But yes, I agree that in order to see your own flaws in your work you must zip it and allow others to tell you how they read the poem. It is one of the hardest things I think I will ever have to do but we will all come out to be better writers for it.
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