This is a quote from A.E. Plastic from the thread of EB's poem "The Grip of Marriage"
"So, which would you prefer  from someone (who as it happens is an admirer of your work) an  honest appraisal  or just staying shtum?"

I would like to open discussion on this topic if it is alright with EB and A.E. Plastic.
(Even though I do not know what shtum is)

I depend on honest appraisals from writers I admire and trust. I appreciate getting validation when something works. I like readers' responses to content and where-that-one-went kind of thing.  Responders all have different personalities, backgrounds, interests, AND bring different expertises. These are all things that I love about this site, that I am beginning to rely on about my fellow writers here. As a responder, I try to be honest and I think it is important in that honest response to make sure I validate (not in parenthesis) successes. There are all kinds of rewards to writing, and from what I gather by this site, most of those submitting here understand the intrinsic rewards, so the external ones, the audience, the feedback the community with people with similar sensibilities, those come from workshops like this one. Granted there are hard things to say sometimes. It is quite amazing to me that so much trust can be garnered from an online community, but it is working here. So I would say trust has lots of elements, honesty being the kind of umbrella one, good, thoughtful criticism, and support and validation being in there, too.

What do you guys think?

Jill. keeping shtum= sealing one's lips=shutting-up (not a forte of mine). I wouldn't dissent from anything you say.   To put the recent debate in context, EB is for me one of the very best writers in the forum and if you look back over some of her material, I think you will see why. I just find myself out of sympathy with the idiom she is currently working in, which to me does not play to her considerable strengths. Others will differ, because that particular style in the hands of other writers garners much reclame. So my views reflect, naturally enough, what I regard as the purpose and place of poetry; these views are far from universally shared. And a good thing too.

Ah, shtum. Obviously not a forte of mine either, albeit perhaps on another part of the spectrum! I appreciate the context info. And as far as style, it is always useful to hear viewpoints that the style that I am dabbling in doesn't seem to fit or that it is becoming part of a trend so popularized that meaning gets watered down or is seeming trite by the very form of it. I am all for that...

I have got much more from an honest opinion from readers than from shtumness, and if I am not getting any comments I feel a little out of it,  I'd rather be slated than ignored, big ego problem. 

I went to a workshop week once where the faciltator was passionate about physical feedback...reporting which lines brought tears or smiles or hair standing on end.  That helps to know what not to cut.

There are so many things to speak about in a piece...title, form, line breaks, Stanza breaks, voice, rhythm, rhyme, clarity, voice, technique, tightness, looseness, integrety, point of view, effect, sensuality, Yet sometimes I find I have nothing to say. I have been taught that no one should present their poem and get no response, and I agree.
The response should be honest.  There are enough of us here that we do not have to comment on every poem and sometimes I learn from just watching a thread develop and a poem change.

Thank you for reading and thank you to anyone who leaves feedback, but it's okay to just watch, just don't leave me on my own, please.

 

I am often remiss in leaving good feedback.  More than half the time I leave one-liners, even one-worders, to let the writer know I have stopped by, read their work, and had an initial reaction.  A smaller percentage of the time, I try to leave the sort of comments Jill mentions in the opening of this thread, some reasoning behind why what works, why "what" may fail for me as one reader.  Tastes differ to such a degree; experience, if it doesn't dictate, at least informs, how we take a poem in, or how we are taken in by it.  And it is with a little, what? trepidation I suppose, that I offer criticisms that may be particular to me.  If I fail to connect with a poem, is it the poem? or lynn? that is lacking one way or another . . . The same being true on the positive reaction side.  (I'm seeing that David and that God, their fingers reaching to touch on that ceiling in the Sistine, and wondering which of them will create the eternal spark as I write here.)

I also must confess that there are a great many other poems that I open to read, and close, leaving them without comment.  If the language is stale, or the topic, if there are misspellings right off the bat, typos and  general sloppiness - - I just let them pass, pretty much, without comment or action. 

Good topic, Jill. 

thanks and regards, lynn

p.s. There are also all of those wonderful writings that slip by while I am snoozing.  Or thinking about snoozing.  Or "offline" in one way or another.

This is an interesting topic. I assume if someone is posting in a forum such as this, that they want to know how readers respond to their poem or prose. The difficulty I find sometimes in offering feedback is that the medium does very little to convey the spirit in which the comments are made.

I am well aware that my response is limited to my own filter and perceptions (like Lynn, when I stumble with a piece, I wonder if it is the poem or myself as a reader) and that each person approaches poetry differently and that each poem wishes to exist at least partially differently than than the history of poems to which it is contributing. So my initial response is to stay mum.

Then I remind myself that the purpose is to provide the writer with my reaction and hope that s/he will take from it whatever is helpful, disregard the rest, and always know that I am just one reader who makes no claim to knowing anything other than my own personal response.

Sue, I also agree that sometimes much is to be learned by eavesdropping on the conversations of others. Already, I've reconsidered a few notions regarding poetry based on reading some of the interactions here.

One final thing and then I'll keep shtum for a moment or two! :)

An instructor once prefaced a poetry workshop by recommending to us that we meet each poem where it is and respond to it from that place. I have found that to be the most useful advice I've ever received in approaching poetry in a workshopping environment.

Very useful Yvonne.  I'm like Lynn sometimes...

"I also must confess that there are a great many other poems that I open to read, and close, leaving them without comment.  If the language is stale, or the topic, if there are misspellings right off the bat, typos and  general sloppiness - - I just let them pass, pretty much, without comment or action."

Startng with the typo's and  sloppiness is a start...If the work is from someone new to poetry circle we don't know whether they are even submitting in their first language, so beginning with the typo's is a start...if we can find one positive to say that's another, and then toughen them up when and if they return...People do learn and improve.

"If we aren't honest it's not worth a shit." - Milner Place

(Hope you don't mind Mil ;) )

B.

I didn't say be dishonest, I just meant don't nobody say nothing.  Is Stark negative honesty better than no response to a newbie? I don't think so, so I'll dredge something out of the poem to praise.  Most people don't come back if what they are looking for is 30 fulsome responses, to a Hallmark poem, but some stay and improve.  I'm especially uneasy about putting off writers whose first language is not English. 

Sorry Sue, I wasn't referring to your post directly. And of course I agree with what you say, as I hope has been proven in the way I respond to other people's work. Honesty, yes, absolutely. Rudeness, harshness, throw-away comments that criticise but don't explain -- none of that has any place, for me.

That's okay Brian, it's my...
 big ego problem. 
again.
 :)

 

When I'm out of sympathy with someone's idiom, I can still make what I've been told are useful comments by simply taking the idiom for granted and looking at the poem itself to see if there is anything in it that prevents it from fulfilling its drive to become. 

This is where empathy can replace sympathy, knowing can replace feeling.  I set aside my own biases to help a fellow writer with a problem in poetics.

Of course, there are always poems that gag me, and then I keep quiet.  ;-)

Though sometimes I'm quiet because I don't see anything wrong with a poem (in which I also don't see any flashes of brilliance).  The OK poems are hardest for me to crit.

Rick

Ditto.

Could I also add a point to this thread, that I personally welcome any and all comments on stuff posted in the journals section too. Often this work receives less criticism because it is perceived (I guess) as work-in-progress or whatever? Anyway, as far as my work is concerned, get stuck in (to quote Sue ;) )

B.

Over the years I have had hundreds of people comment on my work, almost always positive. Gradually, like most people, I have come to rely on a handful of trusted friends whose opinions I respect. I still enjoy all the other compliments though, it's nice to know the poems have had some effect. If I was to post one now and everybody remained schtum I would be very concerned.

Why don't you try and see?

Oh, and, welcome.

B.