Friday afternoons there's always a sense of winding down. We come out of the crit session, have a class photo taken with this week's tutor and unless you have a one on one your time is your own until 5:00 pm on Sunday. Well you have to crit the stories for Monday 's session, work on your story for next week, shop, prepare your share of the Sunday night meal, not to mention washing etc but apart from that your time is your own. Hmm once you factor in sleeping that means you have about 30 minutes but that is all your own.
I spent mine today in the G Bar. This is a very popular place because it is air-conditioned. All parts of the campus are rated by us as to whether or not they are air-conditioned. Extras like food and alcohol are just that - extras. As well as alcohol the G Bar also serves coffee and light meals. In fact its only fault is that it closes around 4:00 pm because most of the university is still not operating - which makes you wonder just who all the busloads of people arriving every morning as we head to class are.
Crit sessions are improving all the time. We have a better idea of what things are important and what to concentrate on. Nitpicking is mostly left to line edits but we have more understanding of story arc, plot, voice, resolution, agency and pace to name a few so when we find something lacking we have useful suggestions to make. As well we all have our strengths in critting. One guy is great at making us realise what our characters need to be rounded and credible. Another analyses storyline and plot and succinctly points out the holes. We have people who have edited magazines or read slush piles and they brings another perspective. Every one takes their critting very seriously and puts a vast amount of work into them.
Having said that I'd better get on with my crits so I can, I hope, spend the rest of the weekend writing.
3 comments:
I hope the weekend was restful, with steady critting and writing and a bit of R&R, too. Not long to go now!
Helen, many thanks for your crit of La Belle Dame. How you've found time to do crits for people outside I have no idea as Clarion is obviously keeping you flat out. You must've got on a roll and just kept going after you ran out of Clarionettes to crit!
Useful stuff: thanks again:-)
That was the end of my weekend productivity. I came down with the "Clarion Flu" shortly after.
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