Thinking Aloud: Workshop Models

Three Positions, You Decide

Look Into My Eyes…

First a story. In 1996 I visited my younger brother in Durban, South Africa. He’d accepted a job there and married and was raising a family (all very intimidating to me, geez, being below the equator). Anyway, my brother arranged a get-together at a lux game park (Kruger National Park, a German tourist had been killed there a day before we arrived, squashed by an elephant who sat on her car), and one night my new brother-in-law (the Minister of Education under Nelson Mandela¹) told me about the main problem he faced. Funding for education was limited, so:

Should they divide the money equally and spend a small amount on each pupil?

Or, should they identify the ones with the greatest potential and focus more money on them?

On the surface, the first option seemed the most egalitarian. But in reality the second option would likely result in more long-term gains for South Africa; therefore, more people would ultimately benefit.²

I was stumped. My gut told me: Equality. Option one. Everyone deserves the same portion of the education pie. In retrospect, I’ve been chewing on this bone since 1996. Most recently during the Story Nights at the Hindsight Taproom and at The Cavern. To be more specific, who should the evening be serving? The earnest writers who want to present their work and witness its emotional impact. Or, the listeners who want a night of entertainment and to possibly see a budding genius?

If we hand the mic to all the writers, beware the boor. At Hindsight, a slightly drunk, very nervous storyteller prefaced his reading by saying he loved women. He loved his wife and daughters. Then he preceded to read a story about a very wicked female character. He read and read and read. The audience was so unnerved and weary that a woman crept over and whispered to me, “Please, please, make him stop! He’s awful.”

To my mind, we can learn a lot from train wrecks. And this particular story was a train wreck. So I whispered back that everyone present was learning a valuable lesson in how to NOT tell a story. My hope was that this pain would sear the lesson “don’t be THAT guy” into everyone’s brains forever. In hindsight (no pun intended, but if the shoe fits) my tolerance killed that Story Night. The audience felt abused, so it quit coming. The bar wasn’t thriving so it closed.

Again, do we serve the hopeful writers who could never spend enough money on beer to make the night viable to the bar? Or, do we try to up our writing game and allow only those proven talents who’ll attract a paying crowd?

We tinkered with the model for Story Night at The Cavern. I provided a writing prompt, for instance, “Letters to Santa Claus,” and we limited each reader to two double-spaced pages. It worked much better. With the restrictions the stories were more consistently entertaining, and those that flopped were brief enough that people could overlook them. The new model for Story Night succeeded, but The Cavern closed for different reasons. The good news is that it’s reopening under new ownership, and the management has asked us to resume Story Night.³

So, Story Night will be reborn. Stay tuned.

Now Let’s Apply This Thorny Situation to Learning to Write

In a workshop where writers present and discuss their fiction, which of the following do YOU think should be the practice?

A. In a money-paying setting, typically an MFA program, should every student be heard in full?

B. Should the workshop focus primarily on the writers who demonstrate talent, and hope that others will listen and gradually benefit? Thus hoping the unheard will rise in skill until even the newbie writers become stars?

C. Or is there an effective—albeit painful—compromise between the two?

The Views of David Foster Wallace on the Matter…

In a piece eventually published in the essay collection MFA vs. NYC, Wallace sounded leery of graduate writing programs. As the product of them, and a teacher in them, Wallace held that such programs forced instructors to standardize what was “good” fiction. In effect, if you have no preset way of judging and measuring, how can you objectively assign the work a grade? If a professor tried to evaluate every work based on its unique creative effect, his/her job would be unbearable. As Wallace put it, “In that direction lies the liquor cabinet.” So the unintended consequence of MFA programs might be cookie-cutter stories.

In The Program Era, Mark McGurl backs up Wallace. In order to apply the success/fail binary to literary fiction, McGurl suggests that lit fiction needed to fall into one of three categories:⁴

• High Cultural Pluralism. Fiction that tells a story from within a specific ethnic/sexual culture. Books such as The Joy Luck Club or The Swimming Pool Library. These stories stressed the perspective of race or sexual preference.

• Techno Modernism. Fiction that depends on self-reference and a constant postmodern awareness to its own medium and structures. The classic examples would be Wallace’s Infinite Jest and anything by Pynchon. Fiction that seeks to escape self-awareness by putting it front and center.

• Kmart Realism. Aka “Dirty Realism,” this would be fiction typified by Joyce Carol Oates or Raymond Carver or Tobias Wolff. As McGurl defines it, the stories tend to depict white people for whom the lack of money is their chief concern. The pages are peopled by characters who fear slipping deeper into poverty.

By McGurl’s analysis, anything that does not fit into one of the above categories is dismissed as genre, and thus not taken seriously or given critical attention. Personally I tend to agree. It’s been a stretch since the last Kurt Vonnegut or Tom Robbins, and even they were dismissed as … too undefinable. The biggest hurdle facing new voices is the Marketing Department at a publisher asking, “Where the hell is Barnes & Noble supposed to shelve this tome? Is it fish or fowl?”

In the interest of balance, George Saunders also has an essay in MFA v. NYC and makes the case that graduate writing programs do their level best. No one is deliberately trying to hoodwink newbie writers. Universities try to be selective, so potentially fewer students venture down what could be a dead-end path. Besides, doesn’t everyone deserve to take their best shot at achieving their dream? How can we put up a velvet rope?

The Same Goes for Writing Workshops and Public Readings: Who Should They Serve? All the Writers? The Audience? The Proven Talent?

Whose voice should be heard and amplified? Let’s consider three models:

Everyone Deserves a Shot

Everyone gets to read their work to everyone. Sure, we can limit the page count, but everyone gets a chance to present. And everyone else must listen. Because: Courtesy and Respect.

This one burns out quickly. Yes, it feels mutually supportive and seems to meet emotional needs, but who wants to listen to the boors who seem unable to gauge their audience’s lack of interest? And who wants to get behind that microphone and realize at page two that people hate the story and in response panic and keep reading aloud for another ten pages? It becomes agony for all parties involved. Witness the example from Hindsight cited earlier.

The Proven Talent Gets Priority

This stands a better chance of pleasing the audience, but some writers will argue that it’s Not Fair. As in, I worked hard on my pages and deserve a chance to test them. And, Will people in a bar/workshop appreciate a longer work that’s sad or upsetting? And, Why should fiction have to pander to people?

Think of the scene in Flashdance where the plucky blonde ice skater falls and is humiliated in front of the crowd. Everyone loves her and wants her to do well … but CRINGE. Note, it hurts us, but it’s the set-up for Jennifer Beals to eventually almost-fail-yet-succeed. Take note: Always show what’s at stake so the reader will be scared and ultimately feel a greater victory by the end.

And should the response of an audience even be the litmus? Is fiction supposed to be stand-up comedy—short and performable and entertaining in a public setting—or will even that become tedious? Tom Spanbauer’s training at Columbia stressed reading aloud. While Tom earned his MFA he was also performing as an amateur actor at the Bowery Theater in lower Manhattan—not this Bowery Theater—but a ragtag small playhouse on skid row in the ’70s and ’80s. Performing was part of the game for Tom, as well it should be if a writer hopes to survive a book tour.

Besides, if David Sedaris wasn’t pithy and funny and if his work didn’t “land” in a few minutes, do you think he’d get to read on National Public Radio? NPR can’t hold an open mic night and expect to pay the bills.

But if new voices aren’t guaranteed a chance to present, again, will the crowd diminish until the series fails? Don’t we always need to attract new blood? If we provide a spotlight, will it eventually attract a star?

Then There’s the Gordon Lish Method

As Tom and other former Lish students described it … A huge number of aspiring writers would bring work and pay to sit in a large classroom. One by one, Lish would ask each student to read. The moment the work lost his interest he’d interrupt. Even after only a few words, the writer might be silenced. Lish would use that stumble as a teaching moment, and he’d explain the student’s misstep or error or whatever. Maybe the student had used a cliche (“Received text” in Lish’s terminology) or the writer was sounding “writerly,” or the story just plain stunk on ice.

As Tom tells it, the process was brutal to watch. Hopeful students who’d worked on their stories for months were stopped midsentence and then lectured. Then Lish would ask the next student to read work. Someone who wasn’t David Sedaris, who couldn’t hold Lish’s attention, might only get to present a few words during the entire term. Tom hated the process, but even Tom admitted that Lish’s class launched a remarkable number of professional writers. Among them Anthony Bourdain, Amy Hempel, Mark Richard, and too many to list here. Compare that to other programs, and no one comes close in teaching success.⁵

And a lot of people got hurt along the way. Sorry to flip-flop, but again, which is worse? Not hearing a person’s work? Or, not serving the audience? Keep in mind, most of the audience is rooting for every writer. People would love to say, “I knew her when!” Imagine hearing The Beatles in Hamburg at some dive bar in 1960 and having the bragging rights to that experience? Every audience crosses their fingers for you to be great. Until you’re not and you bore them. Or they catch wind that you’re pandering for a laugh.

So What’s the Answer, Chuck?

You tell me. Battle out the issue in the Comments.

For now, keep all the above in mind. Turn it over in your head. I’ll let you know when The Cavern is back in business. Most likely, we’ll have a two-page limit and a theme.⁶ You can decide whether to be funny or scary or profound. Just don’t be a boor.

BTW, that’s Gordon Lish in the picture.

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Recently Joe G called me “the Bob Ross of writing.” I’ve never felt more deeply complimented. I sincerely hold that the basics of great storytelling can be taught. Once the writer begins to build confidence the “Happy Accidents” occur and a career begins. How many successful painters are too afraid to say, “Bob Ross got me interested by showing me some basics on TV”?

Today a friend, a successful architect in his eighties, told me that he hadn’t felt truly creative since his college days.⁷ As a student he could take risks and could feel the thrill of a successful experiment. Later, too much money was always at stake. Please keep in mind that you have a freedom right now to enjoy the miracle of “accidents” and experiments that will change the culture for decades to come.

More than thirty years ago I sat, bored, at my desk and wondered, “What if I used ‘rules’ as a way to elapse time in a short story?” Thank you, Joe G.

1. Yes, this reads like a fever dream to a kid raised in Burbank, Washington. My brother and I shake our heads in disbelief about how our lives have turned out.

2. Unless the well-educated ones decamped for Germany.

3. I’ll keep you posted.

4. In no particular order.

5. Even Tom eventually implemented a two-tier system in his workshop. Students who paid full price sat at a central table and presented/commented on work. Students who paid a lower rate sat around the perimeter of the room (“like pond scum,” Tom said, but not with malice) and learned by listening and watching.

6. Think “Where Do Babies Come From?”

7. Circa 1962.