When I was studying professional writing and editing at RMIT, we workshopped our writing in most classes. That meant preparing around 2,000 words every week or so and putting them in front of our classmates for feedback.
Invariably, we’d come out of those sessions with at least five different opinions about a word, a sentence, an idea or a character.
This led to a lot of head-scratching trying to work out what was relevant and useful, and what to ignore. It also left us questioning what to trust in our own writing.
Did we simply listen to the feedback that made us feel good? All those lovely, fluffy comments about how wonderful our story, character or idea was. What a great way to inflate the ego!
And the critical feedback? I suspect we sometimes listened to that as an act of self-flagellation. It joined the chorus of our inner critic, reminding us how terrible our idea, story, character or word choice was. Or how little we knew about grammar and punctuation.
I kept everything. I punched holes in the pages and filed them away in folders for each course. When feedback stung too much, I decided the person giving it simply hadn’t ‘got’ what I was trying to do. Perhaps they were reading a different kind of writing.
I’ve since learnt that putting feedback away for a while is a great tactic. Distance takes the sting out of it. It allows us to come back to the comments with fresh eyes, reading them for what they are rather than through our inital emotional lens.
Since then, I’ve run many writing groups. One of the first things I do with a new group is talk about feedback. It’s important to know what kind of feedback you want and how to articulate that to other writers. And, it’s important to know how to give feedback that is genuinely useful.
Back in the workshop
I’m working to a self-imposed deadline to finish revising my historical fiction, which is based on my convict ancestor. I recently sent the first four chapters back to the publisher, who was keen to read them again.
And then I slackened off.
With that step taken, some of the pressure lifted. I realised I’d been telling myself that because it took her ten months to get back to me the first time, I had plenty of time to finish the rest of the manuscript.
But time passes quickly, and I need to get this revision finished so I can return to another story that’s waiting for some attention. Besides, the publisher might surprise me and ask to see the rest sooner than I expect!
Around this time, I was chatting with another writer whose work I admire greatly. We talked about how good it would be to workshop our writing again. I also reached out to a writer who’s always given me fabulous feedback and had mentioned wanting to breathe some life into her own writing.
We decided to meet face-to-face once a month and workshop 1,000 to 2,000 words each.
It was so good to be back in that space: reading someone else’s work, offering feedback, and having my own writing read and discussed. There’s something valuable about sitting down with other writers who take your work seriously enough to engage with it thoughtfully. They can see things you’ve missed, ask questions you hadn’t considered and help you recognise what’s already working.
Their feedback has been genuinely useful, and I’m using it to help me stay on track with my self-imposed deadline of mid-December for this revision.
Now I’m sitting down with their feedback and working my way through it, considering what will strengthen the story and what I will leave as is. There’s still a revision to finish, and plenty of work ahead, but I feel re-energised and ready to keep pushing on. Mid-December is coming, after all!
The value of another perspective
Workshopping at RMIT taught me that feedback can be both a gift and a source of confusion. We need to learn how to receive it without automatically accepting or rejecting it. We need to know how to distinguish between someone’s personal preference and something that might genuinely strengthen our writing.
I’m finding that returning to workshopping is helping me do just that. It gives me fresh perspectives on my story, a reason to keep showing up to the work, and a deadline that feels a little more real when other writers know about it.
If you’ve been thinking it might be time to workshop your writing with others, you might like to start with my article, Get quality writing feedback. It explores how to seek out feedback that supports your writing, rather than leaving you wondering whether you should change every word.