By "published," I mean reasonably renowned and not for YA/fantasy/romance etc. (although I am not currently published by any standards :S)
Sigh. I had the "ignore" off so I could follow the conversation. My mistake. Still, nice to know the "ignore" is still completely warranted. I'll go back to it.
I too am most definitely willing to listen to anything that anyone who has had more success than I have had has to say. That's mainly because I'm not an asshole. And by asshole I mean someone who's dismissive of the efforts of others.
Like I said, being unpublished myself, i will listen to advice from anyone. As for my personal definitiom of published, surely you world agree we are all entitled to our own standards?
Now I'm even more confused by what you are trying to say. So you do consider JK Rowling a published author then? I can understand some disagreement with cookie cutter sequels trying to catch the latest wave of popularity, but to dismiss whole genres? I'm pretty sure Whuthering Heights would have been considered a romance novel of the day. Kiely regards Wuthering Heights as a model of romantic fiction; it contains these romantic/Gothic elements which charterize [sic] the romantic novel: ... Beyond Relevance to Literary Merit: Young Adult Literature as “Literature” I rest my case and it only took a 2 minute Google surf.
I don't think that he's trying to "say" anything, in the sense of a coherent thought. I think that he had a craving to insult someone, a stomach-rumbling of unfulfilled malice, and that post was the quickest way to satisfy that hunger. Now he's stuck with defending it, because the only alternative is to apologize.
I have nothing to hide. I was trapped in IKEA, when I saw Bayview had, for the 2nd or 3rd time, quoted one of my "I'm unpublished, so I don't know anything (which by the way, should demonstrate my own capability for humility)" to remark that she is published and that she too doesn't know anything. Her type of published was not what really what I meant, so, I clarified. It was wrong. Publishing is a feat, no matter the genre, and it was wrong and mean-spirited of me to minimize her accomplishments. It was also somewhat mean-spirited of Wreybies to insinuate that I was an ***hole, and probably more mean-spirited of ChickenFreak (but not unexpected) to jump on the bandwagon and try to explain my posts, when, as you can see, I am more than capable of doing it myself . @BayView, I apologize.
Writers have to get their feet wet sometime. First impressions are always the scariest, but you'll get more confident each time. It's like climbing the very top of a pole. Many try, but few ever venture further than that.
It's very hard to venture higher than the top of the pole. How is it done? Anti-gravity? Hot air balloons? Jet packs? In any case, probably a lot of preparation is required.
Hehe, that's cute. I think we all need someone like that though. Their constant faith - whether we believe it's based on anything at all - is invaluable. As for the OP - showing your writing to people. Oh it's always daunting lol, but you get used to it. I've never shown my parents my work until I self-pubbed my debut - to show their support, they bought a paperback copy each, bless them. Dad's read about 100 pages, mum's not read any of it lol. I don't think mum will ever read it cus she doesn't really read much to begin with. Dad, however, has impressively read the entire LOTR trilogy and all the Potter books, so I think there's actually a chance of him finishing my book! I think it's important to remember that just because one piece of writing didn't work out, that doesn't make you a crap writer. And even if you were a crap writer right now, as long as you keep learning, you're not gonna stay crap. You're gonna improve. And as long as you're improving, you'll be fine Keeping all this in mind helps you swallow negative critique. Always remember why you're showing your work to someone - not only to see if they might enjoy it, but also to improve. What's best for the story? It makes it a little less personal - less about your overall skill as a writer and more about that specific piece.
I've had my first chapter reviewed now by 3 critique groups, the last one being last night. First chapter is so critical and so hard to write and I want it to be perfect. First, I loved the opening chapter, but much as I loved my darling, the first group thought it was a prologue and that wasn't its intent. So I took it out. I loved the re-write. Then I took that to my regular critique group and the advice was, it didn't start with the key elements. I looked at the opening couple paragraphs of a half dozen books I'd already read and sure enough, something key to the story was in the beginning of each one of them. So I rearranged the order of events in the chapter and added a different opening. I loved the re-write. Last night I took it to my new YA class and they suggested I tweak the opening to add more setting to orient the reader. I'm in the process of rewriting the chapter yet again. In each case I wasn't hurt or embarrassed at all that the chapter wasn't right yet. I'm excited because each change I've made has taken the chapter to another level. I have had the most positive experience getting feedback (from the right people, you have to learn to recognize and ignore the bad critics). I'm going to have a publishable quality novel by the time I finish. My opinion: You have to go into a critique (be it a formal group or just letting someone read your work) with the attitude that, it is good enough you have no reason to be embarrassed, but with the attitude that it's not there yet and you want to share the piece with someone because you know it isn't there yet. You want their feedback because you need it to make improvements. If you believe your writing is great, or you want the reader to think it's great from the start rather than help you make it great, you risk disappointment. But if you recognize a writer is always in the process of improving a piece, and not at the point of having a perfect best seller, you have nothing to be embarrassed about regardless of the level your skills are at.
I find this thread rather intriguing to say the least. I have been around for many years and most of those years have been involved in the world of writing and working with authors of all ages and genres. With that being said, I have also known many writers who write just for the joy of writing, even if it be for their own record keeping. We had a young lady who worked for National Geographic who was an fervent writer and wrote at an incredibly advanced level. She was one of our field editors; however, she had no ambition or wish to write to be published. Over the years, I have also been acquainted with a number of lay people who wrote inconceivably well but faced that centuries old syndrome; lack of confidence. I suppose the latter is why I am such an advocate of writers groups or clubs. Getting over that hurdle of having one’s first works presented publicly is a massive step for many future writers. If the group has knowledge of the writer’s experience, they will usually approach the response levels to the writer’s experience.