Last weekend I attended the 25th annual International Conference for the Fantastic in the Arts and though I'm scrambling to catch up with grading and other work, it was well worth the travel. One of the best panel discussions I watched was entitled "Writers Teaching and Teaching Writers: How Writers Teach Their Craft." Chaired by James Patrick Kelly, the panelists included TOR Editor David G. Hartwell, Tiptree winner John Kessel, and renowned dark fantasy writer, Elizabeth Hand. An excellent crowd of writers were huddled in attendance -- Peter Straub sat a few seats away from me; Andy Duncan was on the other side of the packed room. Many spoke out -- and I just listened in awe, considering my own investment in the ideas as both writer and writing teacher.

So much was said that was valuable. One thing that stuck with me was John Kessel's mention of the infamous Turkey City Lexicon -- a workshop cliche manual for sci-fi writers which, sadly, is often right on the money even if the observations it makes are somewhat tongue-in-cheek from time to time. The issue Kessel raised was how easily writing workshops can turn into jargon-ridden diagnosis sessions. When writers start pointing at forms only in order to label them -- "This is just another Adam & Eve story!" or "This is just another 'Jar of Tang' plot!" -- then little learning takes place because student-critics begin to go hunting for familar forms rather than critiquing a tale on its own terms, or in terms of what the story seemed to be trying to accomplish. Kessel speculated that a "false professionalism" often emerges from writing workshop culture in this way, since writers become skilled in diagnosing stories in dogmatic ways rather than learning to write them better.

Part of the issue, of course, might be genre: every genre community develops its own "lexicon" as its discourse develops. The science-fiction/fantasy genre-focus of such infamous workshops as Clarion can become a crash-course in "talking the talk" of sci-fi; the problem is when such talk becomes empty -- a conversation for it's own sake. It is a false professionalism -- a mask behind which one can hide and appear to know more than they do about the craft. But the fact is, the craft can only be mastered through disciplined hard work. (The best metaphor I can come up with is that it's the difference between a sports fan and an athlete, but that's not quite right....)

I teach a lot of workshops, genre-focused and not -- and I've learned that they really are all about reading, not writing. Workshops teach you how other readers read. Period. As a writer, you see what works, what sinks in, what goes so far over the toupe that it doesn't even tussle the bangs. When it works, this practice can train a writer into becoming a more discriminating reader and a better self-editor -- nay, even arm them with what it takes to become a professional book editor. But writing skill only comes with hard work and disciplined practice. And a lot -- a lot -- of time doing it. Workshopping is only one element in a writing student's milieu of knowledge. Community, networking, bonding...these are all important. But what happens in private in front of a screen and a keyboard is just as much so.

However, another part of this issue might be the role of the workshop leader. Some genre critique workshops don't have an experienced pro at the helm, or else, if they do, that pro (or anyone else in the workshop with a few publications under their belt) might be the one responsible for using dogmatic jargon and thereby -- as a role model -- teaching others to follow suit. This might be a reason why trained instructors like college professors or experienced editors can play an important role in workshops. This might be one of the distinguishing reasons why a writer might prefer an MFA program (or one like my college's MA degree in Writing Popular Fiction) -- because there are experienced teachers at the helm, hopefully making sure jargon alone doesn't drive the critiques.

In my essay, "Working the Workshop", I talk further about what creative writers can do to get the most out a workshop, even when it seems to be a failure. For more on the spouting of story formula jargon, I recommend John Casey's essay, "Dogma," which I believe is included in Crafting Fiction: In Theory, In Practice.

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