My theory is that working at such a small scale really reveals problems with structure.
I think you're right. The concealed information in "Memorial" was definitely evidenc eof a structural problem -- there needed to be a full scene with the confrontation, but I didn't want to do it because I didn't have space, so instead I cut and concealed, and it made the story much more awkward.
[24]GoodDamon (usually) agrees with palimpsest.
[25]palimpsest (usually) agrees with GoodDamon.
Awww
I didn't do the numbery thing. I'll do the numbery thing.
[26] Much of what one learns in Creative Writing classes is non-intuitive. It's been sixish years for me since I began doing academic workshops, so I forget that it doesn't all slide effortlessly into receptive brains, like some kind of literature-from-air osmosis.
[27] Standards of polite criticism vary sharply in different communities.
[28] 1950s archetypes of gender, setting, relationships, etc. are a powerful default for our society, and difficult to move away from even after one is aware they're there.
[29] When editors talk about a weird slush zeitgeist - like how Ed Schubert says there were lots of clone stories in his last slush pile, or when (I think it was Gordon?) says he once received two stories about sentient garbage piles in one week - this is a real phenomenon.
[30] (related to 28, and stolen from haut) All those lists from editors of things to avoid, because really, no, they see them in the slush all the time, they promise, please please just don't, are based on things that show up with some regularity, even though one wouldn't know it from reading the magazines (where they're screened out, in large part).
[31] (also stolen from haut) Research matters! Even on silly little details you think you got right.
[32] Anonymous critiques are fascinating... I began trying to react rather than critique, until it became clear this was an author-centered event (somewhere around group 12 for me; I was slow). I was much harder on "Those Girls Nowadays" than I would have been if I'd known it was Maria, because -- granted, based on very little data -- I like Maria and understand she's still in process, so I would probably have tried to spare her feelings rather than make a blunt critique. In contrast, there are probably stories I would have given more vigorous critique if I'd known who their authors were, because I know their authors are interested in polishing. It's hard to tell which stories were in formulation and needed to be treated as works in progress, which stories could be critiqued the way I'd critique anything that gets handed to me, which stories the author is looking at as done and just wants to shut off feedback for... and those are all perfectly natural stages of writing, I think. Anonymity prevents one from getting that feedback from the author, with mixed results, I think.
