Thanks for this essay, Radha. I too struggle to stay motivated in workshops where I'm not getting useful feedback. You are reminding us that "useful feedback" comes from sources who have inherent limitations and preferences, not always aligned or compatible with our own. It's easy to feel discouraged in that case. I think this parallels submitting to noncompatible publications/editors/judges.
Maybe identifying certain "zones" (i.e., tone, theme, style, etc) in others' poetry could help identify which poets are more likely to understand how and what I write. Something to think about...
I think one trick to get a class talking is to ask, what do you notice? I had a workshop facilitator who only ever asked us to call out objective comments, at the most basic level if nothing else—I notice no punctuation, short lines—which inevitably led into more subjective comments. There aren’t many “how to give feedback” classes offered; and I think especially beginning poets don’t want to spend money to learn how to read poetry instead of learning how to write/ improve their own, not realizing that learning to give effective feedback is an amazing way to grow your own work. Facilitators need to recognize that many of us don’t have MFA’s, haven’t had formal training in reading a poem or giving feedback, and providing resources on how to do that, even if it doesn’t taste up class time, can be invaluable for the poets they are teaching. It’s also hard, early on, to have the confidence to say what we think, we are afraid of sounding stupid if we don’t get something—especially in work that is atypical, appears personal/ trauma based; we aren’t taught to look at the craft of the poem so focus on the content. If a writer is saying, I don’t think I did the prompt right, they certainly don’t understand their perceptions of a poem they read can’t really be right or wrong.
Thanks for this essay, Radha. I too struggle to stay motivated in workshops where I'm not getting useful feedback. You are reminding us that "useful feedback" comes from sources who have inherent limitations and preferences, not always aligned or compatible with our own. It's easy to feel discouraged in that case. I think this parallels submitting to noncompatible publications/editors/judges.
Maybe identifying certain "zones" (i.e., tone, theme, style, etc) in others' poetry could help identify which poets are more likely to understand how and what I write. Something to think about...
I think one trick to get a class talking is to ask, what do you notice? I had a workshop facilitator who only ever asked us to call out objective comments, at the most basic level if nothing else—I notice no punctuation, short lines—which inevitably led into more subjective comments. There aren’t many “how to give feedback” classes offered; and I think especially beginning poets don’t want to spend money to learn how to read poetry instead of learning how to write/ improve their own, not realizing that learning to give effective feedback is an amazing way to grow your own work. Facilitators need to recognize that many of us don’t have MFA’s, haven’t had formal training in reading a poem or giving feedback, and providing resources on how to do that, even if it doesn’t taste up class time, can be invaluable for the poets they are teaching. It’s also hard, early on, to have the confidence to say what we think, we are afraid of sounding stupid if we don’t get something—especially in work that is atypical, appears personal/ trauma based; we aren’t taught to look at the craft of the poem so focus on the content. If a writer is saying, I don’t think I did the prompt right, they certainly don’t understand their perceptions of a poem they read can’t really be right or wrong.
As a highly, highly sensitive poet 😅 I found this very helpful. Thank you
As every, valuable advice.
Well said!