Workshop Reflection

I had a positive experience with workshopping. I enjoyed it. It’s always constructive to give and receive feedback during a creative process. Usually, however, i give and receive feedback as notes on a paper and this was the first time it ever became confrontational. I haven’t had much exposure to poems throughout my life-it’s probably the one style I don’t read much of-so it was hard to nit pick what worked and what didn’t. Some things that I found bothersome and unnecessary others claimed were these powerful techniques that only the greatest poetic writers used. This process gave me a better understanding of poetry as I could see it working right before my eyes. I enjoyed the way workshop was run as well. I found it easier to become comfortable with giving constructive feedback if the author knew what worked in their poem first. In the beginning, it was hard for me to criticize another person’s work. I felt like I was being mean. However, after my own revision process for my poem “Michael” I began to become unafraid of sharing my opinion. The editing of my own work was probably my favorite part of workshop. I actually liked hearing how others interpreted my piece. It’s interesting to me how different people will view the same thing. One person will see things in someone’s work that may be completely hidden to others. I thought I was being clear about what the “ivory curves” were, but the class had trouble understanding it. This goes to show how any art or expression of creativity is entirely subjective, and once it is exposed to the world, the artist has no control over how it will be received. 

Reflection on Workshopping (benefits/drawbacks)

Having experienced workshopping in class for several weeks now I am able to thoughtfully recognize the benefits and drawbacks of it. With that I am able to conclude that there are more benefits than drawbacks from workshopping. The intentions of workshopping are nothing like the intentions of critiquing. The point of workshopping is finding ways of improvement for the piece not to criticize it. Now the drawbacks of workshopping lie at this thin line of criticizing. The point of workshopping is not to discourage the writer to the point where they no longer want to continue improving their piece however, it is suppose to inspire the writer to do better. Similar to the way Burroway states in the text book - refrain yourself from using "I like", "I don't like", "this works", "this doesn't work"... The drawbacks of workshopping arise when these certain words are used in a workshop. Whenever I am workshopping a piece I always like to look back on page 11 of Burroway and use the helpful tips on how to workshop a piece properly. The outcomes of a workshop are intended to be beneficial which is why I view them in this sense. After a workshop I would hope to see improvement in my piece because I have been able to thoughtfully listen to the advisement of my piers. As times passes I am able to use the time to apply the advisement to my writing in order to improve it. However, a beneficial outcome may not arise from a workshop if the advice given from my piers does not aid in improving my piece. If the act if workshopping is done correctly and the tips from Burroway are applied then I believe that workshops benefit rather than drawback.

Workshop reflection

I'm going to be honest, I have always been pretty bad about analyzing poetry because many of the nuances in it tend to fly over my head when I read. But this workshopping experience has helped me understand this a little better. It was a combination of having to do it for a couple of weeks plus listening to my classmates and what grabbed their attention that really made stuff click. Also I was finally able to understand some poetry terminology by connecting them to actual examples used by my classmates and I can't thank them enough for that. Granted, I still have some issues and I tend to focus more on the surface level of meaning rather than trying to find deeper levels of meaning, but this experience has helped me be more confident at my skills in analysis and critiquing. As far as the experience of getting workshopped by my peers, it was nothing new. I'm a musician and so I'm pretty used to my teachers and peers critiquing my works.

At The Columns With Jesmn (yes, first name basis)

So Jesmyn Ward happened along with Joseph Gehringer and two other Tulane students. It was a lovely reading that was greatly supplemented with the lunch that I attended with Jesmyn earlier that day where a group of students got to talk with her. She likes rap music a lot and it was awesome hearing her talk about her new favorite artists and about the publishing process and her journey as an author. 

At the reading for 1718, she read our of her newest book, The Men We Reaped. They were passages mostly about her father. There were great words that she wrote about her first time eating an oyster, that was my favorite. After the reading was over, a bunch of people talked to her and got her to sign their books and then bought some books. Then some of us took a picture with her (see below) and we look like a great big happy family!

                   

Lorrie Moore - "Thank You For Having Me"

          After hearing Lorrie Moore’s speech, I felt that her writing and way of talking were calm, collected and had an interesting tempo to her language that matched the rhythm of her writing.  Upon going, I had never read any of her work or pieces of writing before, but now I definitely have another author added to my favorite writing list.  When she first came out to read to the crowd, she came up upon the podium with such a nonchalant aura that what she was about to read was certainly unexpected – her writing was composed of these wonderful and perfected “one-liner” sort of sentences, whereas her voice complimented the lines in order to draw them out with a witty joke from ordinary day to day experiences.  

          Much of what she read from her story Thank You for Having Me was full of unexpected truths and humor that I feel up to this point, only Lorrie Moore can really pull off.  For instance, she read us a part in her story where her daughter, Nikki, like the typical fifteen-year old teenager would state that she really did not care what she wore – rather, as the speaker and her daughter were driving off to their babysitter’s wedding she stated the reality of the matter – “the person that needed to be careful about what she wore was me.”  It was not in it so much that younger people, or the younger generation should really worry what they wore, but that as they got older, would need to consider.  

          Although many of the parts in her writing are covered in a tint of lament, she still finds the humor is these small moments, such as when she read,  “You were alone when you were born, alone when you die – really absolutely alone when you are dead.  I learned to be alone in-between, and if you quickly forgot it would come back to you.  Aloneness was like riding a bike…at gunpoint…with a gun in your own hand.  Aloneness was the air in your own tires, the wind in your hair – you didn’t have to go looking for it with open arms – with open arms you fell off the bike.”  The entire way that she read this – the entire tone of sorts was read with such a lyrical rhythm to it that, although the tone and language were full of lament, you absolutely had to love every bit and piece of it.     

Lorrie Moore

The way a story is told can vary from person to person. It is subjective. The way the characters come alive depends solely on the author’s writing. Lorrie Moore has a magical way of storytelling. This became apparent during her reading at Tulane on monday, March 2nd. Moore shared her piece “Thank You For Having Me”, a story found in her upcoming novel. This was the first time I had ever attended a reading, and I found it interesting how subjective tone and flow are to the reader. She uses her airy, dry tone to flutter above her words, which is not the way I had imagined the flow to be when I first read a short story by Moore. I imagined the writer’s voice to be gritty, and forceful, with a fast-paced undertone to it. However, once hearing Lorrie Moore read her own work, I understood why it was better to read her piece in a slower pace. It almost seemed like Moore was indifferent to what was going on around her, which brought an interesting contrast. Obviously Moore had felt passionate enough about the event of her child’s former babysitter’s second wedding taking place during the weekend of Michael Jackson’s death enough to write a story about it and include it in her book, however you would never know when you heard her read the story. It gave the punchlines more importance and set the time frame, meaning that it expressed the fact that the story was occurring over a day, and not just a few fast moments. 

I also enjoyed how Lorrie Moore discussed incorporating her political opinions into her work. She often brings her thoughts on current events into her work. I found this incredibly valuable. Not only does it teach young writers that a news story is not the only way to express opinion on a political subject or  tell a historical story, but it also teaches young female writers that their political opinions are not to be hushed and can be published and acclaimed just as much as the next guy’s. 

Double Double Toil and Trouble Fire Burn and Cauldron Bubble

Lorrie Moore is a writer. No doubt about it. Writers are a special breed of human. They know how to use words. Some people say writers are just born with the ability to use words to create the "spells" that I call stories. Some say that writers are born when humans get bitten by a radioactive spider or dabble in witchcraft. However the breed of human called the "writer" came to be, they are forever remembered as the humans who entrance with words. They are known as the humans whose words are written and when are read, garner attention and evoke emotion. Writers are the ones who understand the magic of words and at 7:35 pm on March 2nd on the second floor of the LBC Center above a Panda Express, I realized I had listened to Lori Moore read her words out loud for half an hour straight without getting distracted.

Instead of siting in an auditorium daydreaming about all the pets I could own when I have a steady job and an apartment off campus, my thoughts were nestled exactly where Ms. Moore wanted them to be: in her story. I sat with her in the kitchen listening to a song to commemorate Michael Jackson's death about a rat while the chicken she was cooking became "unclean." I was there when she suppressed the urge to torment strangers in the buffet line at a wedding for fun. I laughed at her musical choices for her funeral and the motivation behind them only being "to fuck with people." I learned that a threesome of squirrels is menacing, rain can smell like old silver jewelry, and you're practically harmless if you're too stoned (especially even if you're in a biker gang). She used details wonderfully. There was something about each detail she said, and how she said it, made you realize its significance. She made the details significant to me.

It wasn't only her details that swept me in, but her voice. Her voice was like that of a person who knows. They know the ignorant confidence of youth. They know the complexities and predictability of heart break. They know the foolishness of the hurting pride. She read her words slowly when she wanted me to pay attention and quickly when she wanted me to laugh. Her voice mirrored the exasperated, yet slightly whimsical, tone of her daughter's voice when she talked about wanting a reality t.v. show so people could see the kind of mother the daughter had to deal with. There were times when she spoke that made me feel as if my head rested on her lap while she told me about her cheetah print shawl and love for the natural camouflage animals use. There even were moments where I felt she was drinking wine and was jokingly telling me that a man would rather look constantly petrified than 56 years old. Her voice and tone made it feel like she was talking to me. It was so personal. Her voice entranced me and cast a spell. It replicated the feeling of when I read a book alone in my room and loose myself in the story. I am a reader who has lived many lives and tonight, I lived a snippet of Lori Moore's. I have to admit, it's one of the best lives I've ever lived.


P.s. How do biker gangs even still exist?