Oh criticism, thou art a heartless bitch

Yesterday I got to thinking about criticism.

It all started because I submitted one of my books for a review in one of Wattpad’s many, many Review Shops. I figured it was a good way to get my book out there and, hopefully, get a few readers out of it. I asked for a specific reviewer and got accepted. However, because that reviewer was too busy, the admin of the Shop simply assigned me to a new reviewer and didn’t even tell me.

So in comes this new person, who apparently has a background in Literature and a bio that seems to say I’m not here to be your friend, if your writing is shit, I’ll let you know. Now, not to toot my own horn, but I’m quite proud of how Dark Hedges, the new book I’m writing, is coming along. It definitely shows an improvement in my writing and that’s, in part, to the many comments I got on my previous book, A Timely Knight.

So this new reviewer comes along, with all the intensity of a tiny earthquake, and starts going at it. And I mean, going at it. He seemed to have an opinion about anything and everything, and while I agree he was on to something with several of his comments, others I found to be quite objective. So in I go, replying to his comments and basically explaining why I wrote what I wrote.

This opened a whole new discussion within me. As I wrote back to this reviewer, I realized that I really felt the need to defend my choices as a writer, especially when I felt I had a solid ground on which to stand and have a back-and-forth with this person. Later, with my head a little bit cooler and with the benefit of hindsight, I realized I may have come off as a bit feisty. Rereading my comments, I noticed that while they didn’t seem rude or like I was angry at the reviewer, they could also be seen as me not taking kindly to the criticism.

Now, as writers, we all know it stings when someone criticizes your work, especially something that you’re proud of. And when your first read it, of course it’s going to have a strong impact. However, it’s also something that comes with the territory. Writing criticism is as old as writing itself, and pretending it’s something you can escape is simply fooling yourself.

But how much criticism can we take? How much should we take? Are we meant to take it all or is there a point when we should fight back? And if we fight back, does that mean we’re not listening? When we talk about criticism, how thin is the line between constructive and destructive? And how can we tell them apart?

As writers, I feel that we have the obligation to defend our stance and our choices. After all, we’re the only ones that truly know what we’re planning and trying to say with our words. Still, we mustn’t forget that what we write may not get through our readers like we meant it. Every person is different, and each individual reader will take from our writing something unique. Some may even take in something entirely different than what we wanted to convey and that’s just something we have to deal with.

When we write, we release our words into the readers, and they’re the ones that give them meaning. There comes a point when we just have to accept the fact that, after we hit Publish, the words are no longer ours. We just have to let go.

My review still hasn’t been posted, but the reviewer already gave me a sense of how it’ll be. He said it was neither praise-y nor condemning, it was simply his perspective as both writer and reader. In other words, I’m bracing myself for a harsh review. I don’t think it’ll be scathing or anything of the sort, because my book wouldn’t deserve a negative review unless it’s from someone extremely biased. However, I know I won’t get a glowing review, which is quite disappointing.

Still, I’m taking what I can out of this whole situation. There were some good insights and there were some comments that left me scratching my head in that I-can’t-believe-I’m-reading-this kind of way. Those I will simply discard. After all, I guess that’s all you can do. In criticism, just like in a sale at your favourite store, you go through the rack and take what’s useful, then leave the rest behind.