Rule 2: Establish your goals

February 24, 2010 by Mohana Rajakumar (Writing Development Director)
Filed under: Writing Advice 

Mohana RajakumarMany of you had lots to say on the subject of writing groups and how to find readers in response to my founding rule number one: every writer needs readers.

This month we’ll focus on rule number two, which many of you have already hinted at: establish the writing group’s goals.

For me in Qatar, when I was setting up the Doha Writers’ Workshop, the aim was fairly simple: create a sustainable community to help me stay motivated toward my writing goals. Over the years I’ve attended many residences and one-day retreats, and in so doing I’ve had a chance to observe a variety of approaches.

The main ingredients are simple and may sound similiar to the conduct at primary school: respect everyone and their work equally.

If this is the founding tenet, then the one number complaint people have about workshops can be avoided: that their group so lambasted their piece, they will never put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard) again.

The other basic principles spread outwards like a web from the agreement of mutual respect:

  • people will be sure to first mention the strengths of the manuscript under discussion
  • submitted material will not necessarily be assumed as autobiographical
  • writers will adhere to submission deadlines to give readers enough time

From this base, your group will have to decide what it really wants. Is it focused on a particular genre: fiction, non-fiction, poetry? Will people submit only certain page limits or entire manuscripts?

This can depend on who is starting the group as well. If it is a publishing professional, agent or editor, then he/she may set the rules, ask for applications and charge a fee. If, as in the case of my writers’ workshop, the goals are more community development oriented, then consensus might be appropriate.

The key is to establish the core values and procedures in the first few months of meeting so that as the group’s membership rotates, those who stay can help communicate them to joiners.

Best wishes,

Mohana

(Reading & Writing Development Director)

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Comments

13 Comments on Rule 2: Establish your goals

  1. jacobite-royale on Feb 25, 2010 at 06:12am

    2. Writing groups are so useful, especially for debut authors. I’m no thinking of the Richard and Judy show groups, but actually just local library groups and associations, can bring valuable contact with new readers.

    Jacobite-rogers
    (book editor)

  2. Cressida Downing (Editorial Consultant) on Mar 2, 2010 at 13:29pm

    3. Respect is so important. It’s terrifying to put your writing out there for the first time – rather like asking someone if they find your baby pretty!

    Local groups can be great, and really supportive.

    Best regards,

    Cressida

  3. Mohana on Mar 2, 2010 at 13:47pm

    4. Jacobite-rogers and Cressida: Sounds like you all have found groups with good ground rules to help you through work or known others who have. It’s great to hear people in the industry on the editorial side who support workshops because often writers think they are wasting their time among the plebeians instead of generating something. (Which is what a workshop actually helps you do).

    Cressida: I’m five months pregnant so I know exactly what you mean. Although in the case of my writing I hope people tell me the truth. In the case of the baby to be… there’s that adage about not having anything nice to say :) .

  4. Cressida Downing (Editorial Consultant) on Mar 2, 2010 at 14:03pm

    5. Mohana – congratulations! I did in fact ask my friend to tell me if I had an ugly baby – I figured parental eyes might not be the clearest! With my second, she was sentimental (or polite) enough to say he was beautiful, whereas his parents felt he looked a lot like a little turnip….

    Cressida

  5. Shankut on Mar 2, 2010 at 20:30pm

    6. Mohana – congratulation, bet the baby will as pretty as you!

    Writer’s group? Where are they? Has anything gained from it? I,m new and still feeling the new world of writers. It sound exciting!

  6. Vengu on Mar 12, 2010 at 15:18pm

    7. Dear Madam,

    In many books, on the first page, below the words ‘All rights reserved’ there is a number lising, such as typed below:

    10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3

    What does the above number listing mean? What is the purpose of it appearing in the first page of the book?

    Since, I am a bibliophile and am curious to know its purpose, I would be thankful, if you or any of your readers could kindly clarify it to me.

    In fact, I have taken the above typed numbers, from the first page of Mr. Suketu Mehta’s book ‘ Maximum City – Bombay lost and found’ published by Penguin – Viking – Hardback edition -, just to provide an example.

    Thanks and best regards,

    G. Venkatesh.

  7. Mohana on Mar 13, 2010 at 04:43am

    8. Dear Vengu:

    I think the number you mean is what is known as an ISBN number – something assigned to most published books so that retailers and libraries can order it worldwide.

    It’s essentially a book’s ID and a unique identity.

    Different editions have different ones and this might be why when I look at the Amazon listing for this book (Amazon America) I see it published by Vintage and listed under a different number.

    Hope that is helpful in expanding your bibliophile vocabulary.
    m

  8. Vengu on Mar 13, 2010 at 10:58am

    9. Madam,

    Thank you very much for your kind and prompt response to my query.

    What you say about the ISBN number is perfectly correct. The fullform of ISBN is ‘ International Standard Book Number’. Further details about ‘ISBN’ is available on the Wikipedia.

    However, my query is different from ‘ISBN’.

    For instance, the ISBN number for the book ‘ Maximum City – Bombay lost and found’ by Suketu Mehta as mentioned on the dust jacket of the book is ‘ ISBN 0 -67 – 004921 – 2′.

    But the number that I mentioned in my query, appearing on the first page of the book is ‘ 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3′.

    Hence, what I have queried about is not the ISBN number of the book ‘ Maximum City – Bombay lost and found’.

    To give another example, the book ‘ THE WORLD IS WHAT IT IS – THE AUTHORISED BIOGRAPAHY OF V.S. NAIPAUL’ by Patrick French, published by Picador India – Hardback – 2008 – has on its first page, a listing of two ISBN numbers – Viz: ‘ISBN 978-0-330-43350-1 HB’ and ‘ISBN 978-0-330-45598-5 TPB’.

    I presume in the above ISBN listings the alphabets at the end ‘HB’ and ‘TPB’ stand for ‘Hard Back’ and ‘Paper Back’.

    However in the same book, on the same first page the below mentioned numbers appear:

    1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2

    Hence the above listed numbers could not be the ISBN number of the book.

    I have a guess that the above listed numbers probably indicate something about the typeface used for printing the copyrighted book, which could probably a way to avoid and detect the printing of pirated editions of the book. But it is only a guess and I am not sure about it and I do not also understand how it would work.

    In due course, as a person from the publishing industry, if you could kindly research this printing practice of printing a series of numbers on the first page of the book, and clarify my curiosity and doubt, I would really be very thankful.

    With best regards,

    G. Venkatesh.

  9. Claire Fogg (Publisher, Yearbooks) on Mar 13, 2010 at 18:15pm

    10. Dear Vengu,
    I believe that you could be looking at the printing number of a book. You can identify the printing of a book via the countdown of numbers that appears on the copyright page. The numbers descend from 10, with the number at the end indicating the printing.
    For example, this is what you’d find on a first printing of a book: 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
    However, the following would appear on a fourth printing: 10 9 8 7 6 5 4
    The book that you first mention would be a third printing, while the following book that you mention would be a second printing.
    Best wishes,
    Claire

  10. Vengu on Mar 14, 2010 at 13:42pm

    11. Madam,

    Thank you very much for your kind and prompt clarification and explanation.

    Now, I am able to understand the concept of these series of numbers appearing on the copyright page of a book. It is quite clear.

    As a humble bibliophile, who subscribes to the motto ‘ Wear the old coat and buy the new book’ ( Austin Phelps) and as someone who has bought quite a reasonable number of books, over the years, within the limited income available, these series of numbers had always intrigued me, and fueled my curiosity.

    But I did not know, whom to ask.

    Thanks to Writers and Artists website and its wonderful team of bloggers, I have found an answer to a longstanding doubt.

    A big thank you once again to all of you bloggers, whom I follow regularly, and with much interest, almost everyday. I have been a regular happy visitor to your website, for the past few years.

    To sign off, if it would make you happy madam, as a publisher, I wish to inform you that I have so far bought the 2004 and 2008 editions of the Writers’ and Artists’ Year Book – which I still posses and preserve carefully – and I have ordered the 2010 edition of the Writers’ and Artists’ Year Book on the 3rd of March 2010, through the A & C Black Website.

    I have found the 2004 and 2008 editions thouroughly enjoyable, a wonderful read and very very useful and educative.

    I am eagerly looking forward to receiving the 2010 edition shortly and enjoying a stimulating and educative read.

    Many thanks to Mohana Rajakumar and Claire Fogg for their kind and prompt response and help.

    With best regards,

    G. Venkatesh.

  11. Vengu on Mar 14, 2010 at 14:10pm

    12. Dear Ms. Claire Fogg,

    On revisiting my query on a series of numbers printed on the copyright page of a book, on further scrutiny, I have just one further question.

    As per your explanation, the series of numbers indicate the reprinting details of the book.

    If so, in the case of the book ‘ The world is what it is’ by Patrick French, cited in my earlier query, why do the following numbers appear, which are not in a linear or consecutive order.

    1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2

    When you notice the above numbers, it is in an incremental order of two numbers for each of the next number upto the number 9 ( i.e. 1 3 5 7 9) and then the next number is 8 and then it decreases by two number for each of the next number upto the number 2 ( i.e. 8 6 4 2).

    Sorry to bother you and tax your time.

    But I would be very thankful, if in due course, you or any of your fellow bloggers or readers can crack this.

    With best regards,

    G. Venkatesh

  12. Claire Fogg (Publisher, Yearbooks) on Mar 15, 2010 at 18:27pm

    13. Dear Vengu,
    I believe that the same principle applies – it is just that the numbers are not necessarily written in descending order. So, ‘1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2′ would be a first printing. Why the numbers are sometimes written in a different order, I could not tell you – but I would be interested to find out.
    Best wishes,
    Claire

  13. Vengu on Mar 16, 2010 at 13:42pm

    14. Dear Ms. Claire Fogg,

    Thank you very much for your kind and prompt response and explanation regarding the series of irregular numbers appearing on the copyright page of a book.

    In is indeed very helpful of you to suggest that you would be interested to find out as to why the numbers are sometimes written in a different irregular order.

    As and when you do find the answer, I would request you to post it on this blog.

    Many thanks and best regards,

    G. Venkatesh.

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