My Writers Workshop Class
Workshops are breeding grounds for some of the worst shit that will ever be written. Ever. And I'm not excusing myself either. Not because I can't write something decent. I can. It's just hard to perform when you don't give a shit (see my grades). There's something about a writers workshop that just sucks every last ounce of fucking creative energy from your body. You don't even want to touch a coloring book after you're dismissed from one of these things.
Imagine a bunch of odd-looking wannabes sitting around with your latest piece of shit in their hands, trying to think of nice things to say about it regardless of whether they like it or not. They never say anything bad about your work, and if they have to say something negative, it's usually to the extent of "I really like this part, but I think here you could do this. But that's just my opinion. I mean you don't have to."
There's this one girl in my class with hairy forearms and the ugliest haircut on a girl I have ever seen (besides a bowlcut on an Asian chick). It looks like pubic hair tangled up in a shower drain. Anyway, she grew a set one day:
"I don't like how the lesbian character's last name is Hole. I think that's offensive. You might want to change it. I also don't like the part where you write, 'If he were Italian he'd be beating her [his wife] right now.' I'm part Italian and that offends me."
I guess she expected me to nod and respect her opinion. Wrong.
"I'm not going to change it. The name has no significance; it's as arbitrary as "bog" or "coffee." And I'm mostly-Italian so I'm not changing that either."
"Oh, well, I mean I was just saying. You don't have to..."
"I know."
At this point the professor chimed in: "Doesn't that bother you that she's offended?"
"You can't please everybody."
Nobody said anything after that. They all just kind of looked down and then passed me back my papers. The extent of their written comments was, "good job!" and "I like this part!" or "Funny!" And, I admit, this was some of the shittiest stuff I've ever written. Way to workshop, classmates!
These are comma-happy people who don't know when to use colons or hyphens. They shift tenses mid-paragraph. They have no grasp of voice or dialogue. And they love to talk shit about commercial writers like Stephen King and Danielle Steele. These people ALL think they're the next fucking Hemingway or Welty. Dog-arms, the girl that tried to call me out, started off her final essay (required for a grade) with, "I was so lucky to be born a writer." LOL funny if you read her story.
Which brings me to my next part:
These people have NEVER heard the old maxim "Write what you know."
In my class there's a dorky white guy with B.O. writing a love story set in ancient China. He thinks because his girlfriend is Asian (and not a hot Asian chick, but one of these immigrant Asians with hair growing out of their ears) he's an authority on the subject. The sad part is his story is probably the best. Definitely a step up from his original idea, "Yukon", which was about a man chasing down a bear who swallowed his wife's necklace. Nevermind this kid has never been to the Yukon; he didn't even stop to think that maybe the man should be digging through the bear's shit for the necklace.
Awww, man!
A middle-aged white woman is writing a story about a Mexican gangster just released from prison. One of her standout lines: "You're an OG now man." (verbatim)
Dog-arms is writing about this odd little girl named Wren. Obvious biographical allusions aside, this story is still shit. She thinks she's smart because she drew a comparison between Wren and a bird and a wren is a bird. Get it? Fuck.
The cute girl next to me (as cute as a girl can get for an upper level English course) decided to do a Winesburg, Ohio type thing and write multiple stories about Bowling Green townsfolk, some of which include a blue-collar worker and an eleven-year-old girl. The voices are mangled beyond repair and, somehow, these people have special powers because one second they're in a field or school bus and the next second they're in a truck or room.
Other people are experimenting with stream-of-consciousness and point-of-view and etc. I don't want to talk shit about them because they're the only halfway cool ones in the group. I keep catching this this redneck-ish kid stealing glances of my arms during class. I can't tell if he's gay or wants to arm wrestle.
Nobody in this class has tackled anything that they may actually be good at writing, myself included. Apathy's a bitch. I've been swamped with my script, other classes, masturbation, etc.
And I want to say this right now:
All of these people will get a better grade in this class than I will. Not because I haven't been doing the work or going to class. The professor, the infamous weasel I've clashed with on previous occasions, is teaching this piece of shit. It also doesn't help that my story is an allegory for my perception of his pathetic life. I think he just figured that out tonight. He was quiet.
He is going to grade my work as subjectively as he can. I'll be surprised if I make a C.
But then I'm out of here and I don't have to play copy editor to Wren and her bird-like manners anymore. I'm flapping my fucking wings over that.
Call me Howard the Duck.
posted by Jeff at 7:39 PM
20 Comments:
I'm sorry you get so much shit from that professor. But like you said, soon you won't have to put up with him anymore.
Oh, and it was cool meeting you yesterday by the way. It cracked me up how you clarified who I was through Lauren's story about the Norwegian girl. *hides in the shadows out of shame*
Seriously though man, love the blog. Do you think you'll keep it up after you graduate?
What's up, man?
Yeah, good to meet you too. Glad you like reading my shit. I definitely plan on keeping it up. I tend to go through spells where I'll write a ton and then not update for a few weeks. I try to stay pretty consistent.
Thanks again.
oh. my. god. i am so sorry. 0_o
i fucking hate workshops. they're just like said... completely counter productive
Man, this post reminds me of a paper I wrote on Konigsburg's The View From Saturday, a book which she won the Newbery Medal for. I ripped into it, and now regret that. But after I finished that book, I can vividly recall feeling so pissed off, I wanted to murder the entire fucking panel who thought this work, about kids who talk like Harvard English professors and a teacher who couldn't possibly exist in real life, along with a number of other assorted fantastic characters, deserved the Newbery distinction. I believed that it was probably comparable to giving a Peabody to the writing staff of 3rd Rock From the Sun. Now, I've mellowed out much (as you can see), but part of me still feels there were writers more deserving of the prize that year.
That was rambling and tangential. Sorry. But yeah, the experience that you had with the writers in your workshop is not at all exclusive or alien--I have not a doubt in my mind that it occurs at the highest echelons of the literary culture.
I feel ya, Enoch.
It frustrates me when everybody's always so sure of themselves, especially when they have no reason to feel that way.
They try to say they're confident, but what the fuck should they be confident about?
Confidence leads to disappointment. I'm all for believing in yourself, but I feel that a bit of self-doubt leads to self improvement.
Insecurity makes for a better final product.
haha damn it. some of the shit you say fuckin cracks me up. lemme read that shit about ur professor.
i'm waiting for a new update, btw
You really ought to do something more productive with your time then sit around and make fun of other people. Working on that piece of shit story of yours would be a start. By the way are you juicin'? Enjoy the bitch tits someday when your balls shrivel up. But wait, you really don't care do you?
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Uh-oh! Anonymous is angry!
I just finished my piece of shit story, actually. It's due tomorrow.
Its so funny when former fat kids discover a new life in steroids and make fun of people around them to get even for all the times they got beat up by other kids and by Mommy when they were little. I'd like to see some poetry about that.
Judging by the other writing on your site, and your embarrassing story, it seems like your story is more autobiography than allegory. And the only thing you could play copy-editor to is a bunch of angst-ridden high schoolers, which it seems you still are.
John
Not so much angst-ridden as opinionated motherfucker writing for an audience.
But I appreciate your comment. Thanks for reading. :)
If you don't care about the story you wrote, then why should you care that the workshop was a waste of time? Why should you care about what everyone else wrote? Just do the assignment and get back to working on your screenplay. Instead of pretending to be nice to everyone in class and then slinking away to your computer to rail against them. If you're so opinionated, and if you don't care to speak your mind, then why not have the balls to say all those negative things to our faces? What I really want to know though is not why you would say those things. They are your opinions and you like expressing them. But why do you have those opinions? No one in that class did anything to you (with the possible exception of the teacher, which I don't know anything about), so why be so hateful? And it wasn't just shock literary criticism. You slammed me personally, and my girlfriend, who you have never even met. The only thing you have to say about my story is that it was the best one. Oh and it was set in modern China. They didn't have automobiles in ancient China. So get your facts straight too. You also didn't sit next to the "cute girl"--you sat next to me and the teacher. So why do you have such hateful opinions against us?
Oh, and that commetn was from John. I don't like anonymous comments either.
"And I'm mostly-Italian so I'm not changing that either."
This is from your post. You don't need a hyphen between mostly and Italian. So I guess you don't know when to use hyphens either.
John
Shit happens, John. I churn out posts like this one in less than ten minutes, most of the time without a proofread. Appreciate the correction though.
As for my comments, I call them like I see them. Your girlfriend is a foreign Asian chick, is she not? You had bad B.O., did you not? Now tell me this: do you prefer Mountain Dew or SoBe?
These comments are hardly hateful. More like accurate in a negative way. But why the negativity? Because one thing I can't stand, John, is complacency, and that's what the class was to me. And who are we to act complacent, John, but a class of nobody students? There was this whole masturbatory subtext to the class I couldn't ignore and that's why I had to write about it.
You're not a dumb guy, John. Why would I come up to you guys and say these things to your faces? This isn't a matter of me not having balls (the most tired argument on the internet) but a matter of me creatively channeling my negative energy into a negative blog post for myself and a small audience that enjoys reading the "hateful" things I have to say, things that they know to take with a grain of salt.
I didn't post your name or anybody else's names and it's not like I e-mailed you a link to this site. You found me. And I'm okay with that.
Now the question is are you going to let me, the asshole from class, get to you? Perhaps you'd better understand how I tick if you knew the shit I've been put through at Western.
Until you do, lose my link or keep reading.
Thanks,
Jeff
You call it as you see it. Okay. You know my girlfriend is from Asia, but you've never seen her. So how do you know if she's attractive or not? That's just your assumption, perhaps becuase you choose to see everything negatively. Perhaps not. You said that I think I am an expert on Asian culture just because I have an Asian girlfriend. How can you know that? I don't think I'm an authority, but how do you know that I'm not? And because I have an Asian girlfriend I think I know everything about Asia? Why should you assume that? That's rather simple thinking. Doesn't seem like calling it as you see it either.
Maybe I'll understand you better if I knew what you've been through. And I don't know what you've been through, or who you are. And you don't know a thing about me either. The story about a Mexican gangster; how do you know she didn't grow up around them? That's not calling it as you see it either. I agree that line is a little silly, but how do you know the people she knows don't talk like that?
You reacted that way to channel your negative energy. You're expressing yourself. That's rather tired too. Of course, you've said that blogs are tired, but here you have one.
How was the class complacent? Because everyone seemed to know what they wanted from their story? You told everybody up front that you were writing a story with no purpose, a story with a character who has no redeeming qualities. Seems you're pretty sure of yourself too. Or do you mean complacent as in unconcerned? That just doesn't seem to fit with the class.
You do of course have a right to write whatever you want in your blog. But you are also responsible for your words. It's easy to make fun of people when they don't know about it. But your comments so far have been rather conciliatory. It is a bit different when the people you make fun of defend themselves, isn't it?
As far as what you've went through, that's your business. It is my business that I also had a tiff with that teacher. But you wouldn't know that would you? But I will say that free speech in the classroom is a bit different than in the free world.
If your screenplay were picked up, made nto a movie, and then banned because it was deemed offensive, than that would surely be a violation of free speech. But when a teacher gives an assignment, you have the right to say whatever you want, but that teacher also has a right to fail you for it. Because you didn't meet the requirement. Don't you see? It doesn't matter now if the teacher grades you subjectively or not. There's no way to prove it, because he can twist it into a legitimate reason, because your story can be construed as offending others, which is cause for a lower grade according to his syllabus. So write whatever poems you want, but complaining about getting a bad grade because of it doesn't make a lot of sense. He gave me a low grade because he didn't like my response to a question he asked me outside of class, on the steps of Cherry Hall. It seems that's the reason, anyway, judging by the emails we exchanged. Was that right?
Expressing yourself is fine, but don't be surprised when people express themselves back. I have let you get to me. Because you insulted me. Surely you can understand. You get offended just by people not acting the way you like. Isn't that censorship too?
oh yeah, John again. But I figure you know who it is anyway.
You make good points, John, and I'm truly sorry that you were penalized for saying/writing something he didn't like. Imagine that happening in every writing class you took for the past three years. Imagine being flunked for it. Imagine having to talk to the police because of it.
Imagine being accused of a major crime because of it.
You imply that I'm at fault for being myself, for writing poems or stories that can potentially hurt my grade. And while your methods (write for the grade) are definitely practical, I cannot make that compromise. I'm twenty-two-years old and I have to curb words, which are therapeutic for me. If I were getting paid for those words, I could understand to an extent.
But I'm paying to write those words. Because of that, I refuse to concede.
You may know a lot about Asian culture, perhaps because you have an Asian girlfriend, perhaps not. If not, I'm willing to bet that you were attracted to her because of your infatuation with the Asian culture. And I could understand your ire if I knew what she looked like and dogged on her, but I don't know what she looks like. And so I based her on 95% of the foreign Asian chicks on campus.
Kind of like how everybody thinks I'm a typical, meathead bodybuilder. But I don't mind it. I enjoy it, actually, because that gives me a chance to prove everybody wrong (my next blog entry is on the subject).
In my experience, the guys I've known who remind me of you have fit a mold. You don't outwardly portray yourself as any different than them nor should you have to. That's how you came across to me and so I speculated in my over-the-top, e-persona way. If that's how you are then what's so bad about it?
I don't know much about whatshername's background either, but I would think if she, this middle-aged white woman, were attuned with Latino gang culture she wouldn't have written a story that reeked of inauthenticity. The dialogue sounded exactly like a middle-aged white woman wrote it. If she were as serious as she acted about her story then she would've done some fucking research.
And that brings me to complacency. The whole class had an I'm-such-a-fucking-clever-writer feel to it. I think most of it emanted from Dog-Arms (just to keep names out of this) which, if you had heard her speak of her self-perceived talents outside of class, you would have wanted to vomit.
Humbleness (at least outwardly) is next to Godliness, I think, and I didn't get that from this class, which was marked by self-importance. But maybe that's what all advanced workshop classes feel like.
Now I don't have a problem with you, John. You're a smart guy, you wrote the best story in class, and you've had your shit twisted for saying something somebody didn't like. Good.
I'm a nice guy but I can afford to be an over-the-top dick on the internet. It's fun. Basically I take everything that bothers me on some level, magnify it, and tear the shit out of it. It can be both therapeutic and entertaining. As much as I refuse to compromise my words, I still have to actively watch what I write, which is bullshit.
Can you blame me for creating my own, no-holds-barred arena?
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