Thoughts on the criticism of my writing

[RonPrice]

brocktonblockbust and walrus have supplied some solid and honest feedback. For that I thank you both. At the age of 70 I have come to appreciate cyberspace honesty even when it is aimed at my jugular. I'll add a little piece in response knowing, as I do, full-well that some readers here at SaddoBoxing.com like what I write and some don't. All writers have this experience.-Ron Price, George Town, Tasmania, Australia
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Part 1:

In November 2002, a dozen years ago now, I began to get some feedback on my website and my poetry. My website is found at: http://www.ronpriceepoch.com/auto.html It had been 18 months since my website, the second edition, went online. But it was not for another 18 months, in April 2004, that feedback on the subject of my poetry began to come in to any significant extent. This feedback confirmed to me that I was indeed writing material that gave some pleasure to some readers. Of course, not everyone liked what I wrote. No attempt is made here to keep a comprehensive picture or outline of all the feedback. The contents here are suggestive only.

In September 2004 I opened a new file and inserted it into the sequence of my Publishing Files, numbering and naming it Publishing Volume 3.2.2. I added to this file correspondence in connection with the About internet site entitled All Experts> Spirituality> Baha’i Faith which I had begun posting at and receiving feedback from back in September 2004. This was a two-way feedback of a different, of a special, kind, all in relation to the Baha’i Faith.

Part 2:

In the winter of 2004 I divided the feedback I had been receiving for two years into several sections. Two years later, by the winter of 2006, the feedback had become extensive, as I say, too extensive to keep a comprehensive record of in my files. In March 2006 I divided my file 3.2.2, (Now found in Poetry>Feedback> INTRO to Feedback Vol. 3.2.2.)into the following sections for some kind of organized form and record: (i) feedback to/from other poets/writers(4.3.0), (ii) feedback from individuals(4.3.1.1), (iii) feedback from significant individuals (4.3.1.2), (iv) feedback from forums/groups/sites(4.3.1.3), (v) feedback to and from All Experts.com(4.3.3), (vi) feedback of a critical/negative nature(4.3.4), and (vii) feedback on my website and my autobiography both entitled Pioneering Over Four Epochs.

Some of the feedback, as readers can see from this outline of sections, was strongly negative. In the month of my 60th birthday, July 2004, the first really negative stuff came in. It went for the jugular, but in cyberspace one is insulated somewhat from the harsh reality of face-to-face criticism. Now after nearly seven years I have kept a sample of this material in section 4.3.4. Most of the feedback was positive and is in 4.3.1. I may analyse this feedback one day but, after having this file for 7 years, I am content just to get its contents into some sort of ordered form.

Part 3:

Finally, it seemed relevant to see this file as a companion piece to Letters Section X Volume 11 since it is a good indication of the type of “work,” type of “job-hunting,” if one can call it that, which has occupied me since I left the word of formal employment, PT, casual and volunteer work. Now that I have been able to devote myself to writing and teaching, editing and research, through this medium of activity a whole new world of activity has opened-up.

(1) See the table of contents of my job-hunting file: Letters Section X Volume 1 which reflects my “work” until this feedback began to come in. I may post an outline of my 50 years of job-hunting: 1955 to 2005 at some future time here at this site.

Ron Price
21/9/'07 to 12/6/'14.