Do you ever share your poetry or fiction here? Ever since I was 18, I posted my work on /lit/ and not once has anyone said anything constructive. But I still do it because I like the honesty and ability to not hold back criticism. I am a published poet and have five short stories in print. I feel comfortable in my skin now, and I’m happy 4chan was so critical of my work early on, that I got better in the long run. I posted my novel drafts here before, or my poetry, or my prose. Every time, someone has been scathing or burst my delusions of grandeur. Now, I’ve sort of put poetry and fiction on the back burner. I am more into music and film photography now; I always stop and start different art projects. But I think I got better because of the harsh criticism from /lit/ and I’ll return to poetry and prose soon. So thanks, /lit/, for being real with me.
There's a writing general. I posted a few thousand words of what I'd been working on the past week, and the only response was negative, which is fine, but what bugged me is much of it was non-specific. Like:>well, this thread is off to a terrible startOnly a few specific, useful comments.
Effortposting has quickly vanished off this board. There's a nigger on /wg/ that says everything in present tense is automatically shit. Who knows, maybe all the negativity is coming from the same two guysBut what do you expect on a website where most engagement comes from ragebaiting?
>>25384117I have really appreciated the feedback I’ve gotten from /lit/, but there’s still a lot of people that are just here to fuck around and be mean. And that’s fine. I don’t want yuck someone else’s yum.Here’s the problem with asking random people for writing feedback—there’s no way to contextualize it with your skill level. If a ten year old told me he was good at basketball, I wouldn’t compare him to Jordan. I realize he’s still learning and still has time to grow. He’ll likely never be at that level, but maybe, with more practice, he can get pretty good.With writing everyone is compared to the best writing ever created, and even then, it’s subjective. You’re never going to please people, and they’re never going to give you encouragement to get there.Writing is lonely. Nobody is going to help you. And nobody wants to read your work. It’s a crushingly difficult thing to do, and even harder to get good at. The only way to get anywhere with it is to be unwaveringly persistent, and unbelievably fucking delusional.The alternative is finding writing Discords, but then you’re in a whole new can of worms with other competitive, self-deluded amateur writers, and they’d kill you in an instant if it meant they’d get a foot in the door to see their garbage published somewhere. And if you’re actually good, and maybe get an opportunity, they’ll have you even more.
>>25384117I think part of the issue is that good critique requires energy and it's hard (especially nowadays) to get invested in any discussion on this competitive dog eating forum when so few people seem to care. It's a negative feedback loop in a way>refresh>see low effort post >read low effort reply>repeatAnd the only real way to fix it is to pour yourself into the ether
The poetry thread here is full of shitters who don't know anything about poetry, share your poems somewhere else.
>>25384117I used to give effort posts and do my utmost to give valuable and constructive critique but 8 out of 10 people sharing their writing are writing for the first time and doing so to confirm their delusions that they're a preternatural talent. if they receive any comment that isn't mindless praise (i.e, any feedback at all) then they blow up and rage about it, even if the feedback is positivevery disheartening I've migrated my /crit/ posting to d*scord because I've found that people are less willing to chimp out at criticism when they have some form of identity attached to their words
>>25384866Could you recommend some genuinely good discord servers?
>>25384870no because then they'll get flooded and turn to shitgo for 18+ ones and avoid anything that mentions lgbt or gay shit in any capacitythe best discord I've been in was a private one that I got invited to because I gave good critiques and showed decent writing in a public discord. you could try doing the same and poaching people but that probably takes comfort networking so people like you enough to jump into your circleI've seen people mentioned that the truelit subreddit is good, which prompted me to check out https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingHub/might be an option. people are basically posting personals and forming small 1-10 person groups. just make a post saying your age demo and if you want to get published or focus on craft and you'll probably get some messages asking to group up with you. or scroll until you find something that seems compatible with you but I suspect this is a shit idea since you'll be leaving the selection process to some retard who won't trannies or thirdiesI got into a pretty good poetry group (that slowly died because a couple troons were let in who started siphoning all attention and constantly being emotional blackholes)
>>25384881Haha okay fair enough. I have been involved in a great poetry sub, once. It was fairly niche, and people actually read one anothers' works. Unfortunately it's basically dead. I will hunt for a good discord, since I now have hope that they exist.
I do critique stuff but not on /lit/. There are too many tourists here who just dump their crap hoping for praise.
>>25384781I’ve been here so long that I never used the poetry threads because they’re newfag territory
>>25384781the poetry thread gets people who dump their shit there then disappear anyone who actually sits and waits to see if they get replies is going to be new and have an egoI remember someone posting their poem depicting major poets as children in a playground, talking, playing, and bullying each other. that one was quite good
>>25384781it's also full of people who can only talk about form and meter and never of the actual poetry
>>25384870This is the only good writing discord. Don’t shit it up.https://discord.gg/kb29Xnv4Z
Sublimation is not going to help you.
>>25385821What the fuck are you talking about? Sublimation is a word that exists and is used independently of whatever fucking publishing outfit has taken it as a name?? I meant it in the sense of its actual definition; I’m not talking about some publishing house?? It’s absurd that you would even assume that.
>>25385847replied to the wrong post sorry
>>25384258>There's a nigger on /wg/ that says everything in present tense is automatically shitAnd he's right
>>25384117Yeah, all the time. Made me a much better writer. Most are too precious and feel attacked, but eventually your ego dies and you screen the helpful from the spiteful. Now? I've got chops.
