When I was a kid, my first dream was to be a child actor. I memorized lines super easily. I loved turning every slightly-elevated area in my house and yard into a makeshift stage. I liked channeling my feelings along with a story. I could make myself cry with enough concentration. I could take notes pretty adequately from my theatre troupe director. I remember making it all the way into a professional casting office.
But then something happened.
There was a moment, I don’t remember if it was directly before or after my first commercial audition, when I realized everything that was at stake. While acting in a club had been purely fun, going out for auditions meant either winning or losing. And as a kid especially, I was not prepared to go through the process of losing over and over. My first audition was my last. But I find it funny now that I gave up professional acting at an early age to protect myself from the feeling of losing, and then eventually I ended up in… well, professional writing.
I was very fortunate last week to receive a great review from Kirkus on my upcoming YA debut, ALL’S FAIR IN LOVE AND FIELD HOCKEY. I’m so proud to share this positive review. But it also reminds me that this book is now entering the stage of publishing I most look forward to and dread in equal measure: the stage where it feels like everything’s on the line, where I’m back in the audition room, waiting to see if I’m a winner or a loser.
I take criticism very seriously. I bet a lot of people do; I bet it’s not even that unique a trait. But it is very true about me. I learned early on in creative writing workshops that if you take everyone’s advice about your writing, it will conflict, conflate, and eventually end up as one giant mess. I had to learn this lesson the hard way, of course. Over and over and over. The resulting glob infuriated me to no end every time. I wanted to please everyone.
Why can’t I find a way to make everyone in this room happy? I used to think at the end of each workshop. I would go home and lay out all their advice around me like a jigsaw puzzle. If I could just do this and cut that and stitch these two things together, it would all work out. But then I ran into the same problem every time in my revisions: The story, at some point, lost its heart. It lost my heart. When I became too focused on pleasing everyone else, I would end up forgetting about myself and why I wrote the piece in the first place.
I think about this background a lot, especially when I get to meet with young readers and writers at schools and book fests. For the most part, these young people are curious, inquisitive, often shy, almost always extremely inventive. Sometimes they tell me one thing about themselves and I know it’s such a precious gift, this one tidbit. Sometimes they will go on and on about a story they’re working on, and their voice is filled with so much excitement and pleasure about being the one behind the wheel, driving a narrative forward. I think about what writers like me tell these students. We want them to tell their stories, to create art, to put themselves out there.
But we don’t often prepare young creators for what comes when you do put yourself out there. We encourage encourage encourage, because young people need that encouragement. And I’m not saying we should balance encouragement with fear or trepidation. More so, I wish I could find the right words and tools to balance encouragement with enduring confidence and resilience for giving art to a world that is constantly poised to critique it.
Critique can be a wonderful thing. Critique can help an artist step away from the close confines of their own mind and give them new perspective. It can take the form of a new idea. Or it can be a reflection. “This is what I’m seeing. Is this what you intended?” Critique is a crucial part of the creation process for a given project, but it also bears a lot of weight on the longevity of an artist’s career. Sometimes an artist or creator can’t always get it right on one piece. Sometimes critique is a necessarily sandwich between works, helping the creator grow with every project.
But let’s face it, critique can also shut us down. It can make us want to walk out of the audition room, the workshop room, the Internet at large, and lie down on the floor for a very long time. It can make us say Never mind. In a perfect world, critique would always be offered in a way that promotes growth and new ideas. But of course, this isn’t always the case. Critique can often feel a lot like losing.
So how do you scrape off that loser feeling and let critique move you forward?
I’ve been paying attention to Lady Gaga a lot in the wake of the Joker 2 film reception. I think she’s handled the critique with a lot of grace, at least outwardly. She had a quote saying that sometimes the thing you make doesn’t have the impact you intended, and when that happens, you need to let go and move on to the next thing. I think this is great advice, especially for writers, who often get way too attached to their specific projects. I also think it’s great advice for young writers especially. Not everything you make will have the impact you intended, and that’s okay. Look for where it has the intended impact. Learn from the places and people where it missed the mark. Try again. Do better. Keep trying.
I want to hold optimism in my heart for critics. I think a lot of critics are really well meaning. I think when things miss the mark, critics can be just as frustrated as the creator. There are critics who are rooting for the work’s success as much as the creator. And in that sense, their critiques don’t have to entail someone losing or someone winning. When creation and critique work together, it feels a lot more like a team effort.
I will always try to please everyone in the room because I can’t help it. I always want to make as many connections as I can. It will always mean the world to me when a connection lands. (There really is nothing as great as finding your people through art.) But I pay close attention when things don’t land, too. I shoulder the grief and the disappointment. I think about the ways to serve those readers in future work. And I always remain grateful for their time, attention, and communication.
For any young writers or really, aspiring writers of any age reading this, here are some of my final thoughts: Critique is very scary, it’s true… but I hope you write anyway. I hope you make art you love, with the best of intentions, and put it out in the world. I hope that when critique finds you, it makes you think and ponder. I hope you’re able to organize it—to stow it in a good place that keeps you making art, but mindfully so. I hope critique becomes a vital tool in your writer’s toolbox, alongside mentor texts and inspirational quotes. I hope it never shuts you down and makes you feel like a loser. I hope you keep writing and sharing your work with the world. Even if you can’t please everyone in the room, I guarantee your stories will find their readers, will invite productive conversation, will propel you to grow and hone your craft.
How you handle critique* can be your kryptonite or your superpower. I hope you make it your superpower.
*Except critique from bigots and trolls. Say it with me: “We ALWAYS ignore the bigots and the trolls.”
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