Writing Craft #2 Critique

reposted from 12/31/13 from Donna O'Donnell Figurski's Blog

     It is scary to put your work out there for critical eyes. It leaves you wide open. It leaves you vulnerable. Of course you’ve done your best and you love every word, phrase, sentence, and paragraph. You’ve worked hard. You’ve crafted each word until your eyes seem to turn inward. You think that you can make your article, essay, story, or book no better and you hope that your reviewer will feel the same. After all, if you did not think it was your best, you would not have released it for other eyes – right?

     It’s hard to hear critiques – even the positive ones. Those words you dragged out of your head and arranged into neat little lines on the paper to tell your story are your babies. As a mother is protective of her child, you too, are the keeper of your words – their protector, their proud creator. So you don your armor, harden your shell, stiffen your upper lip, hold your breath, and … hope for the best.

     If you have chosen a reviewer, someone who you respect and who you can trust, then trust you must! Don’t fear the red pen. Listen with eager mind but remember too, that her opinion is only one view and not necessarily better than yours. Although she, no doubt, will look at your work with fresher, more neutral eyes, you must still pick and choose and determine what you think will move your writing further – what will make your story the best it can be.

     Then go back to the keyboard … and tackle your work with a new outlook until your piece shines – brighter than before.

  As I say after each post:

     If you enjoy Bookity Blog, please pass it on to all your friends and they to theirs. (I’d like to drive up the readership. Sometimes it feels like I am writing in a vacuum. So go ahead. Send it to 10 of your friends.)

If you hate my blog, go ahead and send it to your enemies. (10 enemies would be good.) I won’t mind.

(Clip Art compliments of Bing.)

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