Does Your Writing Workshop Suck Shit??

Discussion:

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NYC XYZ

2005-11-11 18:50:55 UTC

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Apparently you haven't actually read Misc.writing.

I drop in every now and then. It's a slow group. =)

Which is it: a workshop or a college class?

It's a class billed as a workshop. De rigeur for writing programs, it
seems.

Why do you keep taking them, then?

I need the class for my degree. I also "feed off" the course
requirements -- "do an character study," "do a place description,"
"utilize 3rd person objective"...just not the same setting such for
myself. I think it has something to do with knowing that there's an
actualy flesh-and-blood audience, as opposed to the anonymous abstract
idea of some intern going through the daily slosh pile...and by
"audience" I really mean, in the end, the professor, as, as my rant
notes, my classmates have generally been uninspiring.

Not to sound like a teacher's pet, but all my four different professors
love my stuff. I don't mean "like," but "love" -- one is a Pushcart
Prize winner who was so impressed he said he showed it to his wife who
teaches poetry at Chapel Hill. Etc.

So I guess it's that "social element" which really makes it for
me...kinda like how I enjoy exercise well enough, but it's even better
when there's a regular crowd of "the fellas" to work out with. Except,
in this case of the workshops, it's basically just the professor and
maybe one or two students out of like up to twenty-four who have
actually have a "writer's sensibility."

Why don't you just write and submit
for publication?

I kept thinking that I'd want to put my best foot forward, and thought
to first build myself up to professional standards...but now I see that
the only place where "professional standards" might be applied is out
in the field, not in the padded safety of warm and fuzzy workshops, so
to speak....

How do I start? That's the other thing...none of these professors,
though they are actual writers ("current practioners"), offer concrete
advice beyond "pick up a copy of Writer's Digest [or whatever] and farm
it out"....

You conflate the state of literature with the quality of writing
workshops. The two are unrelated.

I thought these workshops turned out editors and students? I know
that's simplistic, but that also seems to be their stated goal.

Just where do editors and writers come from, then? =) Seriously, this
is the other thing I was wondering: seems like these folks are writing
for each other...all these reviewers are fellow writers, which kind of
makes sense, but it also has that "incestuous" feel to it.... =)

A writing workshop isn't about how famous published authors write
except as it affects the participants, what they can take from that for
their own writing.
Of course it's like that most of the time.

For example, in philosophy one investigates through Socratic debate.
In the sciences, there are experiments. In writing workshops, it seems
to be a bunch of people on edge who are really there for therapy,
approval, etc. I'm not saying that there shouldn't be any of that, but
that seems to be the unconscious point for many.

Like, my classmates have two weeks to turn in an assignment of roughly
1500 words. Quite modest, at worst! So what does 97% of them do?
Three or four pages of "dear diary" sort of stuff...run-ons, you know
(and not "aesthetic" "stream-of-consciousness"), just "What I Did This
Summer" kind of stuff...with bad grammar and poor spelling through-out!

But honestly, most of them seem to have no sense of "WHY THE HELL
SHOULD ANYONE CARE ABOUT THIS???" I think that's worst of all. They
don't seem to realize that as writers they're first duty is to
"entertain" -- or "interest," if you prefer.

The workshop stays in business by attracting paying participants.
Writers who are good enough to become stars aren't out there taking
endless workshops, so the workshop leaders are working with folks at a
lower level.

True, but presumably the professors (or, if outside academia, whatever
they're called) are operating at a higher level of craft and wish to
propound that.

Those folks want encouragement and a few tips. They
usually evaluate (and recommend to others) the course by how much they
like it, which usually translates to how good it makes them feel. A
workshop leader would be stupid to ignore that.

An advanced workshop should be beyond that. I only wonder if such a
thing exists, especially in academia, of all places.

It might also be possible that you don't recognize criticism unless
it's delivered with a sledghammer. You want to hear "that stinks." Good
workshop leaders need to explain why.

Of course I want explanations. That's my complaint, that we don't go
deep enough. All these workshops only seem to point out the obvious --
which makes me wonder how these people, whose pride seem so otherwise
strong, could ever submit something with common, obvious errors.

So if they said something like
"try writing that from a different point of view--that might help you
to 'tell' less and 'show' more," which is a more useful way to say
"sucks now, will still suck unless you do something DIFFERENT," can you
recognize it as criticism?

Of course -- that's not the problem I have.

Basically, it's as if we were in cooking school, and the assignment is
to bake apple pies, and people turn in half-baked stuff, stuff that
ain't even pies (and not due to postmodern experimentation with form,
might I add!)...now how can you meaningfully critique or workshop
anything half-baked? There rejoinder is always, hey, it's just a
draft; hey, this is just a class.

The professor's own declared goal for the course, on the syllabus, is
to have a piece of actual publishable quality. I'm sure by
"publishable quality" he didn't mean the church monthly newsletter.
Yet this seems to be the level of craft we're dealing with, and I guess
he's being that "wise" workshop leader you noted earlier in not pushing
people -- though surely he'd never put it that way.

Bottom line: take what you can from the workshop, ask for what you
want, be open to getting what you need instead (or not), buzz off if it
doesn't work for you.

I think workshops can be more intellectually vigorous, and should be in
order to actually produce people who write better at the end of it than
at the beginning (except merely as a consequence, important though it
is, of feeling better about themselves and thereby being more
creative). Especially for an advanced level one!

Consider that if you were in some kind of four month exercise program
and you're only doing marginally better than before -- and that's
basically 'cause you're moving more than you used to! Poor showing
from a "cost-benefit" POV...likewise, I don't see folks improving at
all, based on their submissions, and it's frustrating that I have to
read stuff which goes nowhere, which does not seem to have a sense of
how to tell a story, that a story should be interesting, that it should
be "legible" (intelligible) first of all -- and again, we're not
talking would-be postmodernists here, we're talking about folks that
don't know a run-on sentence from a long sentence, folks who think 3rd
person necessarily can't be as intimate as 1st person, folks who don't
know the plural from the possessive, blah blah blah....

Yes, I've improved -- but only because of the Norton Anthology of
Postmodern American Fiction I'd bought on my own, which selections got
me to thinking! And that's what I want, wah wah wah! I want to know
what Donald Barthelme's "Sentence" and "Did You See the Moon?" is
supposed to "mean," I want to marvel and then learn the genius of John
Barth's "Dunyazade," I want us to examine and debate and attempt John
Gardner's noble sensibility in "Art of Fiction"...@#$%^&*!! I don't
want to spend semester after semester being bored by folks that confuse
"its" with "it's," folks who don't know the difference betwen "toe" and
"tow," COLLEGE STUDENTS GRAD AND UNDERGRAD who think fuck, piss, shit,
fart makes for raw humorous reading!

That would mean, though, that you'd have to blame yourself for your
writing lapses. . .

What do you mean by "writing lapses"?

Christine

I think writing workshops need to be brought up to speed...as it is, I
think it's probably even less rigorous than traditional academia
laughing stocks like ethnic studies and basket-weaving!

chris_tine49@hotmail.com

2005-11-11 21:07:24 UTC

Permalink

Post by NYC XYZ
It's a class billed as a workshop. De rigeur for writing programs, it
seems.
I need the class for my degree.

So you are getting a degree in writing or composition? And the others
in your class have the same major/degree in their sights?

Post by NYC XYZ
Not to sound like a teacher's pet, but all my four different professors
love my stuff.

I don't know if that will work for you or against you <g>.

Post by NYC XYZ
So I guess it's that "social element" which really makes it for
me...kinda like how I enjoy exercise well enough, but it's even better
when there's a regular crowd of "the fellas" to work out with. Except,
in this case of the workshops, it's basically just the professor and
maybe one or two students out of like up to twenty-four who have
actually have a "writer's sensibility."

Fuck a writer's sensibility. You can put on a beret and sit in a cafe
drinking absinthe or a double latte and talk writing to the death
anything you might have written while you were exercising your
sensibilities.

The problem is the students in your class don't take writing as
seriously as you do.

Post by NYC XYZ

Why don't you just write and submit
for publication?

Sounds like you've developed a sufficient level of skill to get out
there and hear what the editors and publishers have to say.

Post by NYC XYZ
How do I start? That's the other thing...none of these professors,
though they are actual writers ("current practioners"), offer concrete
advice beyond "pick up a copy of Writer's Digest [or whatever] and farm
it out"....

That's concrete. You find a journal that seems to publish stuff like
the stuff you write. You look at their guidelines. You make your piece
fit and submit it. Then you repeat the process. Again and again.

Post by NYC XYZ

You conflate the state of literature with the quality of writing
workshops. The two are unrelated.

I thought these workshops turned out editors and students? I know
that's simplistic, but that also seems to be their stated goal.

Only if you are doing the Iowa Writer's Workshop or something
comparable. Your experience suggests that you are not.

I do like the idea that workshops send out students. That's probably
what they do, if they are good. . .

But you want to be a writer, not a student. Yes? Or maybe not. Maybe
you want to be a writing workshop teacher. . .

Post by NYC XYZ
Just where do editors and writers come from, then? =) Seriously, this
is the other thing I was wondering: seems like these folks are writing
for each other...all these reviewers are fellow writers, which kind of
makes sense, but it also has that "incestuous" feel to it.... =)

You've got it. Now is that what you want to do? Do you want to write or
do you want to be a writer or do you want to critique writers and
writing workshops?

Post by NYC XYZ
But honestly, most of them seem to have no sense of "WHY THE HELL
SHOULD ANYONE CARE ABOUT THIS???" I think that's worst of all. They
don't seem to realize that as writers they're first duty is to
"entertain" -- or "interest," if you prefer.

Direct your attention to writing and sending stuff out to publishers,
not to lamenting your inferior classmates.

Post by NYC XYZ
True, but presumably the professors (or, if outside academia, whatever
they're called) are operating at a higher level of craft and wish to
propound that.

You don't propound writing. You do it. You model it. You get your
students excited and you set them in motion and step in to correct
their course now and then. The rest is up to the participants.

Post by NYC XYZ
An advanced workshop should be beyond that. I only wonder if such a
thing exists, especially in academia, of all places.

Of course it does. Could you be at the wrong school? Or just in a bad
class? Ask your professor to turn up the heat under you, if not the
others.

Post by NYC XYZ
Of course I want explanations. That's my complaint, that we don't go
deep enough.

Deep enough? You want theory? Then study rhetoric or linguistics.
Writing is a performance art, and workshops are explicitly about
hands-on creation.

Post by NYC XYZ
Basically, it's as if we were in cooking school, and the assignment is
to bake apple pies, and people turn in half-baked stuff, stuff that
ain't even pies (and not due to postmodern experimentation with form,
might I add!)...now how can you meaningfully critique or workshop
anything half-baked?

You can't be serious. It's totally easy to criticize the half-baked.
Cheap, easy labor.

There rejoinder is always, hey, it's just a

Post by NYC XYZ
draft; hey, this is just a class.

All the worse for them, then. Sow, reap.

Post by NYC XYZ
The professor's own declared goal for the course, on the syllabus, is
to have a piece of actual publishable quality. I'm sure by
"publishable quality" he didn't mean the church monthly newsletter.
Yet this seems to be the level of craft we're dealing with, and I guess
he's being that "wise" workshop leader you noted earlier in not pushing
people -- though surely he'd never put it that way.

You can only push people who want to be pushed. The rest need to be
pulled. So let him push you.

Post by NYC XYZ
I think workshops can be more intellectually vigorous, and should be in
order to actually produce people who write better at the end of it than
at the beginning (except merely as a consequence, important though it
is, of feeling better about themselves and thereby being more
creative). Especially for an advanced level one!

Intellect isn't really what writing is about. That's an element, a tool
you use, but writing's about the story connecting with the reader.
You can learn methods that work and the theories or evidence for them,
but that doesn't mean your application of them will get the desired
results. You need to muck around with writing, with doing it. Again,
that's what workshops are about. Doing, getting feedback of variable
quality, doing again until you get it right enough.

Post by NYC XYZ
Consider that if you were in some kind of four month exercise program
and you're only doing marginally better than before -- and that's
basically 'cause you're moving more than you used to! Poor showing
from a "cost-benefit" POV...likewise, I don't see folks improving at
all, based on their submissions, and it's frustrating that I have to
read stuff which goes nowhere, which does not seem to have a sense of
how to tell a story, that a story should be interesting, that it should
be "legible" (intelligible) first of all -- and again, we're not
talking would-be postmodernists here, we're talking about folks that
don't know a run-on sentence from a long sentence, folks who think 3rd
person necessarily can't be as intimate as 1st person, folks who don't
know the plural from the possessive, blah blah blah....

What you are learning is how to be an introductory composition teacher,
then. Complain. It's your money and the school's false advertising. It
won't do a bit of good unless you are prepared to vote with your feet,
of course, and probably not then. But you really need to put up or shut
up, eh?

Post by NYC XYZ
Yes, I've improved -- but only because of the Norton Anthology of
Postmodern American Fiction I'd bought on my own, which selections got
me to thinking! And that's what I want, wah wah wah! I want to know
what Donald Barthelme's "Sentence" and "Did You See the Moon?" is
supposed to "mean," I want to marvel and then learn the genius of John
Barth's "Dunyazade,"

Then you need to be in a lit or lit crit course.

I want us to examine and debate and attempt John
Who at your school can help you do something about that? If no one, why
are you there?

I don't

Post by NYC XYZ
want to spend semester after semester being bored by folks that confuse
"its" with "it's," folks who don't know the difference betwen "toe" and
"tow," COLLEGE STUDENTS GRAD AND UNDERGRAD who think fuck, piss, shit,
fart makes for raw humorous reading!

Then don't. Or you might find a more serious group outside of formal
academia to supplement your degree work. Ironic.

Post by NYC XYZ

That would mean, though, that you'd have to blame yourself for your
writing lapses. . .

What do you mean by "writing lapses"?

You say that like you think you don't have any <g>.

I'd have to see your writing. But as someone who happens to teach
writing workshops now and then, if you handed this rant in I would tell
you that you don't display critical thinking (there isn't any here,
really, though it's certainly critical) or imagination and you fail
to give the reader anything new. You know: WHY THE HELL SHOULD ANY
BUNCH OF CRANKY STRANGERS WHO FANCY THEMSELVES WRITERS CARE ABOUT THIS
whine of a college student who gets to take writing workshops and then
complain about them to cranky strangers while we are working or
idling?

Your writing seeks sympathy, even pity. Do you think it achieves its
end?

Post by NYC XYZ
I think writing workshops need to be brought up to speed...as it is, I
think it's probably even less rigorous than traditional academia
laughing stocks like ethnic studies and basket-weaving!

Oh. Somebody ought to go out and do that at your behest, eh? Then write
a COMPELLING, imaginative argument for that that doesn't hinge on self
pity and snobbery (or if it does, does it in an amusing way).

Or get the necessary degrees and reform academic writing workshops.

Christine (worth more than the tuition you've paid for your workshop)

NYC XYZ

2005-11-14 15:57:58 UTC

Permalink

Post by ***@hotmail.com
So you are getting a degree in writing or composition? And the others
in your class have the same major/degree in their sights?

Most, yes; some, no.

And that's my beef against writing programs: you wouldn't have someone
who's still struggling with high school algebra in a Calc I course,
even, but in these writing workshops you have 101 flunkies in 400-level
classes!

Does anyone believe in excellence anymore? I'm not talking style here,
one particular way of writing -- I'm talking folks who don't know their
grammar, orthography, and just the sense of what makes for a story!

Post by ***@hotmail.com
I don't know if that will work for you or against you <g>.

Indeed! I love how the Romans used to do it: apparently, at their
triumphs (military victory parades) there was a slave who was right
next to the conquering general, in his chariot, whose job it was to
periodically whisper in his ear "glory is fleeting."

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Fuck a writer's sensibility. You can put on a beret and sit in a cafe
drinking absinthe or a double latte and talk writing to the death
anything you might have written while you were exercising your
sensibilities.

That's soooo not a "writer's sensibility." That's no writer to begin
with, but a coffee conoisseur.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
The problem is the students in your class don't take writing as
seriously as you do.

Well, yeah. How did they get into the class, numbered 357? Supposed
to be advanced.

Why are writing programs like this? Can anyone actually FAIL a writing
course short of disappearing without a word??

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Sounds like you've developed a sufficient level of skill to get out
there and hear what the editors and publishers have to say.

Or maybe I haven't, and it's just that I'm a big fish in a very small
pond -- a real intellectual backwater, so to speak! That's the thing.
I want to be "prepared"...and it may well be the case that I'm no
"real" writer where it counts, out there in the great wide world of
literature. It's funny how these workshops so stress the "literary
genre" of fiction but they tolerate hack standards!

Post by ***@hotmail.com
That's concrete. You find a journal that seems to publish stuff like
the stuff you write. You look at their guidelines. You make your piece
fit and submit it. Then you repeat the process. Again and again.

Okay, I guess it's really that..."simple"....

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Only if you are doing the Iowa Writer's Workshop or something
comparable. Your experience suggests that you are not.
I do like the idea that workshops send out students. That's probably
what they do, if they are good. . .

OOPS!! A Freudian slip of sorts on my part -- I didn't mean
"students," I meant "writers!"

8-d

"Send out STUDENTS...of writing"...?? Hmm....

Post by ***@hotmail.com
But you want to be a writer, not a student. Yes? Or maybe not. Maybe
you want to be a writing workshop teacher. . .

LOL -- it's a delicate thing to talk to the Professors about, that's
for sure!

Post by ***@hotmail.com
You've got it. Now is that what you want to do? Do you want to write or
do you want to be a writer or do you want to critique writers and
writing workshops?

I guess I'll settle for trolling usenet. >=]

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Direct your attention to writing and sending stuff out to publishers,
not to lamenting your inferior classmates.

I know that sounds so silly of me to do, but my frustration is that I
want to be stimulated by something other than fiction anthologies! To
wit, my fellow writers! I really feel like I'm working in a
vaccuum...since even the anthologized "masters" are from years ago and,
though still important, aren't quite the same...you know...as going
over issues with people...who, even if their sensibilities are
different, at least share a committment to excellence, and who have a
certain level of "education" about the world and about literature (for
example, it's one thing to find postmodernism not to one's tastes, it's
another to have never even heard of it and not able to distinguish a
postmodernist attempt from poor writing/storytelling skills).

Post by ***@hotmail.com
You don't propound writing. You do it. You model it. You get your
students excited and you set them in motion and step in to correct
their course now and then. The rest is up to the participants.

I don't mean "propound" in the sense of propaganda, but I chose such a
heavy word because there is a sense of the fluff about these
programs...the familiar equivalent in a math class would be "you don't
propound/explain/place in a historical/cultural/theoretical/pratical
context mathematics...you do it...you model it..." -- and we all
remember how that went!

These kids are lost and clueless...and unfortunately, the professor
seems to be -- you don't know something unless you're able to explain
it to yourself, and it seems that these folks follow that
anti-intellectual "no-nothing" attitude of
I-don't-know-how-I-do-it-I-just mystical mumbo-jumbo....

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Of course it does. Could you be at the wrong school? Or just in a bad
class? Ask your professor to turn up the heat under you, if not the
others.

I'm turning the heat up on myself, believe me! I'm easily putting
forth stuff that by any conceievable "measure" would be the work of
five or six of my fellows -- most obviously in terms of sheer number of
pages, but, honestly, also in terms of "sensibility," the thing that
comes off the page which gives you a sense of the author being someone
trustworthy, like watching a tight-rope act and not fearing for the
performers' competence.

So anyway, I'm certainly pushing myself pretty hard (I'd say at about
85% effort) by writing student standards (as opposed to "pro" 12 hrs. a
day chained in front of the keyboard) -- I just wish to work with
others in exploring new ways of doing things, not just for effect and
novelty, but to present a new way of seeing things by doing things in a
new way....

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Deep enough? You want theory? Then study rhetoric or linguistics.
Writing is a performance art, and workshops are explicitly about
hands-on creation.

Aw, c'mon, even the best stand-up comics will tell you how much
planning and so forth goes into each act. It only looks spontaneous
and "hands-on"...it's like a pick-up artist at the bar -- he is
successful precisely because he seems so natural and innocent!

There is quite a logical -- "mathematical" -- structure to it
all...timing...sense of proportion...these can be taught, discussed,
debates, rejected -- though of course that final ingredient of "magic"
is up to the individual (etc.), at the outset there's so much that goes
on which could be made explicit...remember, human beings only master
something when they're conscious of it...it's the difference between
being healthy due to physical activity coincidental with your lifestyle
and being a world-class athlete because your lifestyle explicitly
exploits the latest knowledge of the human body....

Post by ***@hotmail.com
You can't be serious. It's totally easy to criticize the half-baked.
Cheap, easy labor.

EXACTLY!!!!! SO WHY DO WRITING PROGRAMS ACCEPT HALF-BAKED CRAP FROM
THEIR STUDENTS????

Two whole weeks results in four pages of double-spaced non sequitors
and such??

How can you honestly workshop a piece that's rushed -- by the authors'
own admissions, no less! -- and half-baked? What the hell is the point
of such a course????

Post by ***@hotmail.com
All the worse for them, then. Sow, reap.

Right -- but I'm supposed to participate! Bad enough to have to sit
there, feeling lonely. But I'm supposed to give my comments! How
often can I point out the misspellings, the poor grammar, the "where is
this going," the "what is your point," the "where is the story," the
"who are these characters" -- how often can I go on like this without
alienating people?

It's crazy 'cause the writing program at Hunter College is headed by
some in, hip big-name prize-winning best-selling author! Now I haven't
been fortunate enough to study with him -- I work for a living, as Army
sergeants like to quip -- and superstars like this work only 9-5, you
know, like banks and post offices who are only open when you can't be
there!

Post by ***@hotmail.com
You can only push people who want to be pushed. The rest need to be
pulled. So let him push you.

Ultimately, I've come to the depressing conclusion that this guy is
just "technically" better than my classmates -- but he seems to have no
better "vision"...you know, the difference between a "bureaucrat" and
the political leader...he knows his "mechanics," like an engineer, but
no architect....

Else he would have done the course differently. Those who want to tune
out can always tune out. He needn't "push" them, in the final
analysis. But he could "turn on" or set in motion the creativity of
those who are just waiting for their muse, so to speak...except he is
no such "poet," not the man for the job.

That's the thing...when you realize that you're probably better than
the leader himself! Feels like a stereotypical Army situation of the
lieutenant in charge not being as competent as the grunts....

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Intellect isn't really what writing is about. That's an element, a tool
you use, but writing's about the story connecting with the reader.

I'm sure we're stumbling over semantics here. But honestly, everything
relates to the mind, the brain -- however we like to use words like
"soul" and "spirit" and so forth.

There really is a theory of fiction, a method to the madness. You
don't like the word, but you cannot deny the reality (though, of
course, the word defines the reality for us who stumble over
semantics!). The reality is that there is a philosophy or theory, an
aesthetic sensibility (aesthetics was one of the three main branches of
ancient Greek thought), to everything we do, whether we can articulate
it, and however we choose to...whether we're even aware of it, there's
a rhyme and reason which can be made explicit, spelled-out (even if not
"perfectly"), and brought out/up/in....

Post by ***@hotmail.com
You can learn methods that work and the theories or evidence for them,
but that doesn't mean your application of them will get the desired
results.

Indeed, "reader response theory" of literary criticism. =)

One is more likely to hit the bull's eye by aiming for it, you agree?

At this preliminary level, one needs to know windage, breathing, etc.
Technical aspects. You don't just put a rifle in your hand and start
blasting away, learning through sheer trial and error (I mean, of
course you can, but unless a natural, it's grossly inefficient).

Post by ***@hotmail.com
You need to muck around with writing, with doing it. Again,
that's what workshops are about. Doing, getting feedback of variable
quality, doing again until you get it right enough.

And that's different from being an Emily Dickenson in your own little
room -- how? When the advice you get is "oh, I like this;" "oh, I
don't like this"...it's meaningless.

Just like you need a common language to communicate -- English, etc. --
you need a common theoretical framework from which to critique -- POV,
tone, style, etc. Now I am ****NOT**** saying that we need to all
think alike; I am saying that there is a common framework, like a
language, to which we all refer, and, one hopes, from which we can all
jump off into new territory.

But saying you like/dislike something without being able to explain
why/why not in a meaningful way is a waste of time. That's the level
of discourse..."I'd like to see more of this character"...WHY????
That's a minor character of no consequence, why do you think the writer
should devote more time to it???? "Because it's the most interesting
person for me"...WHY???? What about this minor character so interests
you? "I don't know...I guess it's 'cause I'm a single mom, too"...JFC!

Post by ***@hotmail.com
What you are learning is how to be an introductory composition teacher,
then.

It certainly feels that way.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Complain. It's your money and the school's false advertising. It
won't do a bit of good unless you are prepared to vote with your feet,
of course, and probably not then. But you really need to put up or shut
up, eh?

Right. And I guess I should move to France since I'm against the Iraq
war, huh?

You're right it won't do any good in the here and now. Hopefully some
writing teachers trolling these NGs -- chuckle! -- might pick up on
this bit of wisdom: WE NEED INTELLECTUAL RIGOR! THIS IS NOT ARTS AND
CRAFTS AT SUMMER CAMP!

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Then you need to be in a lit or lit crit course.

What is this stupid conceit among writers that it's an either/or
proposition, that one either practices or one philosophizes, when the
reality is so clearly different?

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Who at your school can help you do something about that? If no one, why
are you there?

See (all of the) above.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Then don't. Or you might find a more serious group outside of formal
academia to supplement your degree work. Ironic.

Yeah, sure.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
You say that like you think you don't have any <g>.

Not as such, no. I may "nod" occasionally, but how would one know one
has any "lapses"? For the awareness of such means its elimination --
if I know, for (an easy but useful) example, that a word is misspelled,
then I no longer misspell it. But if I didn't know it's misspelled,
why would I ever think it were?

No, unless you have a different definition of "writing lapses"...for
me, that doesn't mean typos and such -- it means, if I were to use the
term, serious problems in thought, as John Gardner observed: all
writing problems are problems of the writer's personality, his
understanding of things, etc.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
I'd have to see your writing. But as someone who happens to teach
writing workshops now and then, if you handed this rant in I would tell
you that you don't display critical thinking

Now this is interesting. What is "critical thinking" for you? I don't
have any syllogisms here, that's true, but what I argue you've yet to
refute. You beg the question, actually. Instead of answering the
problem, you suggest try a different school. An Alexandrian "Gordian
Knot" solution, to be sure -- except it isn't, when you yourself have
implicitly agreed that this is just the state of things everywhere.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
(there isn't any here,
really, though it's certainly critical) or imagination and you fail
to give the reader anything new.

If this is an old complaint of writing workshops, then it seems that
the complaint accrues even more validity!

Post by ***@hotmail.com
You know: WHY THE HELL SHOULD ANY
BUNCH OF CRANKY STRANGERS WHO FANCY THEMSELVES WRITERS CARE ABOUT THIS
whine of a college student who gets to take writing workshops and then
complain about them to cranky strangers while we are working or
idling?

'Cause one cares about writing and its teaching. What's your excuse?

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Your writing seeks sympathy, even pity. Do you think it achieves its
end?

Show where you infer that.

If you debated the merits of the issues, I think you'd find the
conversation more interesting.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Oh. Somebody ought to go out and do that at your behest, eh?

Why make this personal? Feeling a little too hot in the kitchen?

Discuss ideas if you will. That's what I'm here for.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Then write
a COMPELLING,

Judging by the amount of time you've spent, I'd say this is compelling.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
imaginative argument

Give an example of an "imaginative" argument. I bet you can't.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
for that that doesn't hinge on self
pity and snobbery (or if it does, does it in an amusing way).

You're reading the self-pity in yourself. Snobbery is an inevitable
charge when one claims that something isn't good enough, and it's like
arguing about the existence of God -- a non-issue, really.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Or get the necessary degrees and reform academic writing workshops.

And you can run for President yourself or shut up, right?

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Christine (worth more than the tuition you've paid for your workshop)

Funny, did you think you were one of these talentless writing workshop
hacks?

chris_tine49@hotmail.com

2005-11-14 17:58:17 UTC

Permalink

NYC XYZ wrote:

I'll reiterate the points you seem to have missed:

1. A writing WORKSHOP is a particular kind of class, the main emphasis
of which is on the doing, not the theory.

2. A writer's "sensibility," in my opinion, is that it's imperative to
write and keep writing, regardless of any external circumstances.

3. Yes, it's really that simple. Not easy, but simple.

4. Despite your disappointment with your officially vetted university
classes, you continue to expect the student writers you encounter
there to be superior to hardworking writers in the community, a number
of whom are in very demanding, challenging writing groups. What's that
about, do you suppose?

5. It's not only not necessary to discuss postmodernism to write a hell
of a story; doing so is likely to interfere..

6. There's a body of theory and knowledge about writing but writing is
not math.

7. Writing workshops are not about "I don't know how to do it I just do
it mystical mumbo jumbo." They are about taking the text and pinning
it, dead or alive, on the dissection board, and figuring out what's not
working. And then creating something that does work based on that
knowledge or taking a different approach.

Post by NYC XYZ
I just wish to work with
others in exploring new ways of doing things, not just for effect and
novelty, but to present a new way of seeing things by doing things in a
new way....

8. Then do so.

9. If you want to avoid alienating people, writing is not the best
career path, and criticism is even worse..

10. If you are getting scraps from the Hunter College table and they
aren't sustaining you, find a different table. You may have to unchain
yourself from the snobbery/jpoor me thing that's got you wrapped around
the table leg, though.

11. It's not different from being Emily Dickenson in your own little
room. What's different is that you are unlikely to achieve anything
remotely approaching her quality no matter how many lifetimes you'd
spend in your cloister..

12. What you need is workshop writing rigor, not intellectual rigor
alone. Like it or not, it's about the craft.

13. Critical thinking means that you question yourself and your
preconceptions as well as others and theirs. It means you look for new
points of view and solutions.

14. Writing is not about debate. It's about writing.

15. Writing criticism IS personal, for you as well as for those you
criticize.

16. An imaginative argument is one that I haven't heard before and that
makes me think and see something new, maybe even consider changing my
mind. It requires me to do more than say, yeah, damn straight: what he
said--or here we go: schools sucks, I'm too good for this, pity me,
admire me.

Post by NYC XYZ
Funny, did you think you were one of these talentless writing workshop
hacks?

No, I'm a TALENTED writing workshop hack. It's a small part of what I
do, though.

My measures of success probably are different from yours. My aim is to
help people write something that' s publishable, and measures of my
success are whether they a) submit something for publication and b)
get it published. Participants from each of the last four workshops on
narrative writing have published essays they worked on in the
workshops in national publications.

In some workshops, 100% of participants submit their products, but
that's because it's a requirement for getting credit for having
completed those particular workshops. Those are specialized medical
research. Of submitted manuscripts last year, 8/12 were published in
journals and the rest ended up taking on a different form (web-based
education modules, for instance.)

Gittin' er done requires being extremely hard-nosed and assed. Not for
the faint of heart.

Christine

NYC XYZ

2005-11-14 19:43:09 UTC

Permalink

Post by ***@hotmail.com
1. A writing WORKSHOP is a particular kind of class, the main emphasis
of which is on the doing, not the theory.

And my thesis has been that it needs theory to inform the doing,
otherwise it's the blind leading the blind.

Kinda like relationships where the two parties have different notions
of "love"....

Post by ***@hotmail.com
2. A writer's "sensibility," in my opinion, is that it's imperative to
write and keep writing, regardless of any external circumstances.

Sure, as you're defining the term in a context you've brought up.

I brought up the term in the context of the feeling one gets from a
piece of writing -- voice, atmosphere, etc. A lot of these pieces do
not demonstrate even an awareness of them, much less a concern or
attempt at them!

Again, it seems that theory was sorely lacking in their 101 classes....

Post by ***@hotmail.com
3. Yes, it's really that simple. Not easy, but simple.

Thanks -- that's New Year Resolution Number One!

Post by ***@hotmail.com
4. Despite your disappointment with your officially vetted university
classes, you continue to expect the student writers you encounter
there to be superior to hardworking writers in the community, a number
of whom are in very demanding, challenging writing groups. What's that
about, do you suppose?

As per our discussion, I was thinking that a sense of mission needs to
be imparted in these workshops, a la John Gardner's "Art of Fiction" --
that sense that we're not just here for therapy, group hugs, and an
easy A. Pursuant to that new attitude, more "intellectual rigor" --
deeply thinking about a piece, as opposed to shooting in the dark and
asking for comments -- needs to be applied.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
5. It's not only not necessary to discuss postmodernism to write a hell
of a story; doing so is likely to interfere..

That was one example. And of all that you infer, you may certainly
infer that I didn't mean "discuss" in the sense of a literature course.
But an understanding of what has gone before, as well as what's
happening now, cannot be injurous to a writer's education. Again, the
individual may tune out, as desired -- but it ought to be on the menu.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
6. There's a body of theory and knowledge about writing but writing is
not math.

Fiction is a language -- "a mode of thought," to use Gardner's
insightful term -- and like mathematics, music, dance, and fashion, it
is a system of signs and symbols with an underlying logic. Again, to
borrow Gardner -- "grasp the trunk and you have the branches"...at a
higher level, there isn't anything so distinct as
philosophy/art/science/athletics...there is only humanity, and what it
means to be human. Insofar as writing is taught with such a "bird's
eye view" it broadens horizons.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
7. Writing workshops are not about "I don't know how to do it I just do
it mystical mumbo jumbo." They are about taking the text and pinning
it, dead or alive, on the dissection board, and figuring out what's not
working. And then creating something that does work based on that
knowledge or taking a different approach.

And, as I've said, the "approach" is the "theory" or philosophy,
however implicit and unconscious, even. Why not bring it out? So that
we're not the proverbial blind men with different parts of the
elephant...when someone thinks a piece needs to be "fleshed out," say,
what does that really mean? A minimalist piece is necessarily
"skeletal," so to speak, in comparison to something written in the
naturalistic style, say. It makes no sense to advise that one add
seafood to chicken soup!

Post by ***@hotmail.com
8. Then do so.

But writing workshops have just that blind spot! It may sound very
clever to quip like you are, but believe me you are merely
side-stepping the question.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
9. If you want to avoid alienating people, writing is not the best
career path, and criticism is even worse..

I've long accepted Socrates fate for myself...the ignorant always get
personal.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
10. If you are getting scraps from the Hunter College table and they
aren't sustaining you, find a different table. You may have to unchain
yourself from the snobbery/jpoor me thing that's got you wrapped around
the table leg, though.

Are you still beating your wife?

Post by ***@hotmail.com
11. It's not different from being Emily Dickenson in your own little
room. What's different is that you are unlikely to achieve anything
remotely approaching her quality no matter how many lifetimes you'd
spend in your cloister..

Are you still beating your wife?

Post by ***@hotmail.com
12. What you need is workshop writing rigor, not intellectual rigor
alone. Like it or not, it's about the craft.

That's what I've been arguing for. But for your bizzare ax to grind,
we're actually not in disagreement here.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
13. Critical thinking means that you question yourself and your
preconceptions as well as others and theirs. It means you look for new
points of view and solutions.

Exactly. You cannot claim these writing workshops are conducive to new
POVs and so forth if they're doing the same old pedagogy.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
14. Writing is not about debate. It's about writing.

"There's no such thing as writing, only rewriting."

Of course you debate -- you debate with yourself, you debate with
others.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
15. Writing criticism IS personal, for you as well as for those you
criticize.

That you fail to distinguish between the person and the idea is a
really sad misfortune for the state of writing education. Or do you
believe Democrats should be lined up against the wall?

Post by ***@hotmail.com
16. An imaginative argument is one that I haven't heard before and that
makes me think and see something new, maybe even consider changing my
mind. It requires me to do more than say, yeah, damn straight: what he
said--or here we go: schools sucks, I'm too good for this, pity me,
admire me.

Me, me, me, me, me...no wonder!

You have yet to point out where I've engaged in self-pitying, of
course.

Do you write speeches for Bush? "Intelligence" reports, even?

Post by ***@hotmail.com
No, I'm a TALENTED writing workshop hack. It's a small part of what I
do, though.

So why are you offended?

Post by ***@hotmail.com
My measures of success probably are different from yours. My aim is to
help people write something that' s publishable, and measures of my
success are whether they a) submit something for publication and b)
get it published. Participants from each of the last four workshops on
narrative writing have published essays they worked on in the
workshops in national publications.

Indeed we measure success differently.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
In some workshops, 100% of participants submit their products, but
that's because it's a requirement for getting credit for having
completed those particular workshops. Those are specialized medical
research. Of submitted manuscripts last year, 8/12 were published in
journals and the rest ended up taking on a different form (web-based
education modules, for instance.)

Of course, I've been talking about creative writing workshops all
along.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Gittin' er done requires being extremely hard-nosed and assed. Not for
the faint of heart.
Christine

Nor for the touchy of ego.

chris_tine49@hotmail.com

2005-11-14 21:30:48 UTC

Permalink

Post by NYC XYZ
So why are you offended?

I'm not offended. At first I was amused. Now I'm bored.

For a long time, scientists thought that expert performers got to a
point of expertise and stayed there by virtue of doing the same
successful thing over a longer time. Then Ericksson and Smith (Toward
a General Theory of Expertise) and others actually tested those
assumptions. They found that unless expert performers continued in
focused, deliberate practice, seeking out challenging training
situations, their measurable performance would decline.

It seems quite likely that your teacher, who you say is an expert
creative writer (and doesn't that mean published, a measure of success
that doesn't interest you?) and with whom you share a sense of scorn
and disdain for the others, has failed to do that.

Instead of improving his writing by deliberate practice, he is
purporting to improve his students' writing. (I'll guess that's in
order to improve his standard of living.) That might be admirable,
except that if there is any truth in your narcissistic rendering, he is
also failing to improve his teaching expertise, if he ever had any.

He is in a state of arrested, perhaps declining, development and
coasting along on ennui.

You, meanwhile, lament that to us, you fickle self-satisfied sycophant,
but you continue to lap at his teat and blame your fellow students.
While you are in this state of symbiotic superiority, you support each
other--him in his adjunct or tenured mediocrity and you in your own
undergrad version thereof.

Good luck exploring those writerly sensibilities. Not writing: that
takes courage.

Chris (sounds like a workshop opportunity) tine

NYC XYZ

2005-11-16 05:49:37 UTC

Permalink

Post by ***@hotmail.com
I'm not offended.

Wow, I'd hate to see your prissy-ness when you are!

Post by ***@hotmail.com
At first I was amused.

Ah, so it was "compelling" after all, eh?

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Now I'm bored.

Indeed, you bore me too.

See what happens when you go off-topic?

Post by ***@hotmail.com
<SNIP>

Glad you agreed with me that my complaints are nothing new. I love
happy endings!

Good-bye, and good riddance!

chris_tine49@hotmail.com

2005-11-16 14:58:54 UTC

Permalink

Post by NYC XYZ
Good-bye, and good riddance!

It was my pleasure.

Christine

Stan (the Man)

2005-11-16 15:12:11 UTC

Permalink

Post by ***@hotmail.com

Post by NYC XYZ
Good-bye, and good riddance!

It was my pleasure.

Cigarette?

--
Stan

NYC XYZ

2005-11-16 16:25:08 UTC

Permalink

Next time you're "bored," try ALT+CTRL+DEL and see what happens!

chris_tine49@hotmail.com

2005-11-16 16:58:17 UTC

Permalink

"Another bowl of stupid" is a cliche. Did you learn that in your
reprehensible workshop?

See if you can find something more novel..

Or if you are ready for intermediate level work, attempt to demolish me
using some other method besides name-calling.

Show us what you got, writer.

Christine

NYC XYZ

2005-11-16 17:36:29 UTC

Permalink

Post by ***@hotmail.com
"Another bowl of stupid" is a cliche. Did you learn that in your
reprehensible workshop?

Personal attacks without supporting evidence such as you've been
practicing are the real cliches.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
See if you can find something more novel..

Here's something new for you: try discussing IDEAS!

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Or if you are ready for intermediate level work, attempt to demolish me
using some other method besides name-calling.

What's the matter, you can dish it but you can't take it?

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Show us what you got, writer.

Why, what have you got?

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Christine

Such a cliche!

chris_tine49@hotmail.com

2005-11-16 20:04:22 UTC

Permalink

Post by NYC XYZ
Here's something new for you: try discussing IDEAS!

I thought you wanted to learn how to write.

Christine

NYC XYZ

2005-11-17 14:47:01 UTC

Permalink

OMG, are you still at it?

You need to learn how to read -- what's in front of you.

For others: it seems that my unease isn't isolated, for there is
dissatisfaction across academe, which almost mirrors point-for-point
some of my views!

http://www.slate.com/id/2130322/?nav=tap3

Post by ***@hotmail.com
I thought you wanted to learn how to write.
Christine

chris_tine49@hotmail.com

2005-11-17 16:23:38 UTC

Permalink

Post by NYC XYZ
OMG, are you still at it?

Oh yeah. As are you.

You know the old saw, I'm sure: old editors don't die, they just
rewrite the text. And old writing workshop leaders don't die, either;
they just spawn a new generation of writing workshop leaders.

Post by NYC XYZ
You need to learn how to read -- what's in front of you.

<g> My comment was sarcastic. I'd like to call it ironic but it wasn't
that lofty.

You obviously don't want to improve your writing here. You want to win
debates and, maybe, display the talent that you feel is not being fed
in your workshop.

Although you claim to seek more pointed feedback, you fail to consider
the validity of any remarks that violate your own preconceptions.You
have dismissed as stupid reactions to your "work" or ideas about
writing workshops and the person who made them (me).

It's reasonable to think that you just come here to reinforce your
opinion that writing workshops suck and their leaders are douche bags.
What you want is mom's unconditional approval, a
tape-it-on-the-fridge-door and show-it-to-your-neighbor-beaming
response. I'm hanging that hunch on your reactions to challenges and
your initial post that frames your remarks as coming from an
acknowledged superior writer.

Post by NYC XYZ
For others: it seems that my unease isn't isolated, for there is
dissatisfaction across academe, which almost mirrors point-for-point
some of my views!

Of course "there is dissatisfaction across academe. . ." Do you think
your own is the first of something new? And all that dissatisfaction,
centuries of it, has the theme that academia is for advancing
academics, not for educating students. Still people sweat and scrape to
buy/earn what might be mainly a brand: "college educated."

So far, you have proposed increased rigor for college writing workshops
but you've been vague about exactly how that would look.

You've further confused your audience by advocating extensive discourse
on linguistic and other theory in a writing workshop, the purpose of
which usually is to write a lot, give and receive peer feedback, and
improve your writing. It seems unlikely that you can do both deeply and
well in one course,

If you want to make a point about the poor quality of college writing
workshops, you need to support your contentions with more evidence than
your own experience (Slate's a start, I suppose), and you need to make
your own experience irrefutable and compelling. "They can't even
SPELL!!" (yes, that's a paraphrase intended to show you at
disadvantage, not a quote) meets neither of those standards. As John
Ashby implied, "show, don't tell" is still one of the most important
principles of writing.

What you have shown here besides your peacock's tail is
contentiousness. Use that: it can take you where you want to go. But
apply some rigor to it--right now there's none.

Sounds like everyone in the workshop could do with a bit of the archaic
virtue humility. A good workshop gives everyone a small dose of that,
along with a bigger dose of justifiable pride from improved skills.

Every workshop has some good along with the bad, if only "here's
something that doesn't work." What have you learned from your workshop
(and this exchange) besides scorn? Have you gotten anything from it but
more people to despise?

If not, I'll say what I said before: get the hell out before you lose
your soul.

Christine

Ivor Longhorn

2005-11-17 21:50:33 UTC

Permalink

Shazam! No reason, it's just magic. So "NYC XYZ"

Post by NYC XYZ
OMG, are you still at it?
You need to learn how to read -- what's in front of you.
For others: it seems that my unease isn't isolated, for there is
dissatisfaction across academe, which almost mirrors point-for-point
some of my views!

You need a writing workshop, squire. That paragraph would be illegal
in most states.

Dr Zen
Excruciatingly embarrasing signature contents go here.
http://gollyg.blogspot.com

NYC XYZ

2005-11-17 22:01:42 UTC

Permalink

Post by Ivor Longhorn
You need a writing workshop, squire. That paragraph would be illegal
in most states.

Uh, right -- all depends on your state of mind.

Post by Ivor Longhorn
Dr Zen
Excruciatingly embarrasing signature contents go here.
http://gollyg.blogspot.com

chris_tine49@hotmail.com

2005-11-18 02:03:40 UTC

Permalink

Post by NYC XYZ

Post by Ivor Longhorn
You need a writing workshop, squire. That paragraph would be illegal
in most states.

Uh, right -- all depends on your state of mind.

Darlin', you have been arguing all along that the quality of
composition is knowable, even measurable, not just a matter of whim and
personal taste.

Zen is quite right. "For others: it seems that my unease isn't
isolated, for there is dissatisfaction across academe, which almost
mirrors point-for-point some of my views!" has lots of weaknesses.

First, the Salon article does not mirror your views, it lends support
to them. Hard as it is to believe, a) the author was unaware of your
viewpoints and b) they are unremarkably commonplace in the first place.

(That's a lot of words to say "see, all these other guys think so to.")

Second, there's that weird mix of exaggeration and over-qualification,
"ALMOST mirrors POINT-FOR-POINT SOME of my views!" There's probably a
term for this and if there is Zen will knock me upside the head with it
shortly.

Finally, your tone, diction, and voice are strained and false. You are
trying to sound all lofty and academic, giving more weight to your
small point, but you come across pompous and an impostor.

(It's true that pomposity is one of the hallmarks of academic writing
but most academics displaying it wouldn't misuse which for that or
commit that comma flaw.)

I can almost see you, white leggings and red jacket, one leg bent as
you face the wind square on a bluff, your hand under your jacket
placket, your nose high and proud as the foot soldiers for academic
excellence do battle below, obscured by the smoke of the heavy academic
canon.

A stirring image, but as Geno would say, "wot's this thread about
anyway?"

Christine

NYC XYZ

2005-11-18 20:11:30 UTC

Permalink

Those are not vitamin tablets!

Post by ***@hotmail.com
<SNIP>

Gary Schnabl

2005-11-18 04:23:31 UTC

Permalink

BTW, might today's post on misc.fitness.weights be yours? (not my
misspelling)
header follows...

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Newsgroups: misc.fitness.weights
Subject: Re: Trolls Questionaiire
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*Do you lift weights or are you simply a loser?

I lift weights and like it.

*Have you chosen this group for any particular reason?

It says "weights."

*Have you or do you still molest children?

Hmm...do you consider these bubble-butt fat-tittied latinitas in
g-strings and hot pants children? I don't.

*Do you have more than a grade school education?

Didn't you know that was mandatory?

*Do you look like a piece of shit?

Not at all:

http://newyork.craigslist.org/brx/rnr/108673833.html

*Have you been introduced to this group or did you just stumble into it?

Google introduced us.

*Are you on drugs - if so please itemize.

GNC Mega Whey.

*Do you have regular bowel movements?

Every day -- which is weird to me. Does that mean I eat too much?

*Have you ever held a job for at least 3 months consecutively? If so,
please
list your former employers.

X, Y, and Z -- not necessarily in that order.

*Do you really think that the crap you post is funny?

It amuses me.

All replies in strictest confidence.

Let me know what your research demonstrates.

Post by Ivor Longhorn
You need a writing workshop, squire. That paragraph would be illegal
in most states.

Uh, right -- all depends on your state of mind.

Post by Ivor Longhorn
Dr Zen
Excruciatingly embarrasing signature contents go here.
http://gollyg.blogspot.com

Ivor Longhorn

2005-11-18 04:49:24 UTC

Permalink

Shazam! No reason, it's just magic. So "Gary Schnabl"

Post by Gary Schnabl
BTW, might today's post on misc.fitness.weights be yours? (not my
misspelling)
header follows...
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Newsgroups: misc.fitness.weights
Subject: Re: Trolls Questionaiire
Date: 17 Nov 2005 11:59:54 -0800
Organization: http://groups.google.com
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*Do you lift weights or are you simply a loser?

I lift weights and like it.

*Have you chosen this group for any particular reason?

It says "weights."

*Have you or do you still molest children?

Hmm...do you consider these bubble-butt fat-tittied latinitas in
g-strings and hot pants children? I don't.

*Do you have more than a grade school education?

Didn't you know that was mandatory?

*Do you look like a piece of shit?

http://newyork.craigslist.org/brx/rnr/108673833.html

*Have you been introduced to this group or did you just stumble into it?

Google introduced us.

*Are you on drugs - if so please itemize.

GNC Mega Whey.

*Do you have regular bowel movements?

Every day -- which is weird to me. Does that mean I eat too much?

*Have you ever held a job for at least 3 months consecutively? If so,
please
list your former employers.

X, Y, and Z -- not necessarily in that order.

*Do you really think that the crap you post is funny?

It amuses me.

All replies in strictest confidence.

Let me know what your research demonstrates.

Post by Ivor Longhorn
You need a writing workshop, squire. That paragraph would be illegal
in most states.

Uh, right -- all depends on your state of mind.

Post by Ivor Longhorn
Dr Zen
Excruciatingly embarrasing signature contents go here.
http://gollyg.blogspot.com

Didn't Servile used to lift weights? Whatever became of Servile?

Dr Zen
Clap your hands say yeah.
That's either shilling for a top-class rock act,
or the overexuberant outcome of too much cask wine.
Decide for yourself.
http://gollyg.blogspot.com

NYC XYZ

2005-11-18 21:02:36 UTC

Permalink

And Hitler was a vegetarian. Wanna make something of it?

Post by Ivor Longhorn
Didn't Servile used to lift weights? Whatever became of Servile?
Dr Zen
Clap your hands say yeah.
That's either shilling for a top-class rock act,
or the overexuberant outcome of too much cask wine.
Decide for yourself.
http://gollyg.blogspot.com

NYC XYZ

2005-11-18 20:09:07 UTC

Permalink

Glad you know how to use google. Maybe you need someone to explain
ATL+CTRL+DEL to you?

*Do you lift weights or are you simply a loser?

I lift weights and like it.

*Have you chosen this group for any particular reason?

It says "weights."

*Have you or do you still molest children?

Hmm...do you consider these bubble-butt fat-tittied latinitas in
g-strings and hot pants children? I don't.

*Do you have more than a grade school education?

Didn't you know that was mandatory?

*Do you look like a piece of shit?

http://newyork.craigslist.org/brx/rnr/108673833.html

*Have you been introduced to this group or did you just stumble into it?

Google introduced us.

*Are you on drugs - if so please itemize.

GNC Mega Whey.

*Do you have regular bowel movements?

Every day -- which is weird to me. Does that mean I eat too much?

*Have you ever held a job for at least 3 months consecutively? If so,
please
list your former employers.

X, Y, and Z -- not necessarily in that order.

*Do you really think that the crap you post is funny?

It amuses me.

All replies in strictest confidence.

Let me know what your research demonstrates.

Post by Ivor Longhorn
You need a writing workshop, squire. That paragraph would be illegal
in most states.

Uh, right -- all depends on your state of mind.

Post by Ivor Longhorn
Dr Zen
Excruciatingly embarrasing signature contents go here.
http://gollyg.blogspot.com

Ivor Longhorn

2005-11-16 23:57:52 UTC

Permalink

Post by ***@hotmail.com
"Another bowl of stupid" is a cliche. Did you learn that in your
reprehensible workshop?
See if you can find something more novel..
Or if you are ready for intermediate level work, attempt to demolish me
using some other method besides name-calling.

Why? Namecalling works a fucking treat with you, manrepeller.

Post by ***@hotmail.com
Show us what you got, writer.

Oh lord.

Dr Zen
Excruciatingly embarrasing signature contents go here.
http://gollyg.blogspot.com

chris_tine49@hotmail.com

2005-11-17 05:08:11 UTC

Permalink

Post by Ivor Longhorn
Oh lord.

I love when you do that world weary yet still imperious, limp Brit
thing.

Christine

NYC XYZ

2005-11-14 19:46:52 UTC