In Need of Help

[Animaiden]

Help cheering up my roommate that is.

Here is the situation:
She is a creative writing/theater major, and was once part of this forum (FelineEyes). The quarter she is taking a creative writing class in which they students bring in their big project and have it read by their classmates. This would be a good thing except that she is the only one in the class who is writing sci-fi/fantasy. The rest of the class is writing fiction that my roommate says she would not force any high school kid to read. It is all dark, depressing, and really not the kind of stuff she even likes to be forced to read. The class wouldn’t be so bad except that the professor is insensitive and a jerk who doesn’t realize what he says many times. She came back from the class one crying her eyes out, which is really rare for her. She had been doing sound for the college’s production of Little Women and hadn’t gotten a chance to write but a few ideas down for her class. The professor reamed into her about how she should put schoolwork before theater (try telling the theater people that). He then proceeded to go off onto a different topic. She interrupted him and asked if they could talk about the ideas that she had for her story (the rest of the class wanted to do this also). The professor proceeded to tell her, and I quote, “No I want to talk about something important.” She was physically hurt by this and is still depressed by what he said. It wouldn’t have been so bad but she is something of an outcast in the English department because she is a “genre fiction” writer. She came back from that class today, which was the last one, and was crying again.

Any ideas on how I can cheer her up and show her that she has great ideas and is a good writer?

[Overread]

well I would say that you might have grounds there to complain to the department head (or higher) the trick would be ensuring that you have enough evidence (people willing to state that events have been happening like this).
As for creative writing - well if the teacher won't comment there is a good and helpful community here who can - get your friend to head on down to the crits deparment and post up a sample (something in the order of 1000 words - very very long posts get overlooked as they take a long time to read - and often any problems with technique can be seen in smaller samples)

[Heretic]

I agree with OR, though my own opinion to make her feel better is compare her writing to mine. She will see how far ahead a intellectual she is.

Wait, she is taking theater AND Creative Writing?

[andreyu]

I've heard stories of famous people being unappreciated or ridiculed in school or college (the first example to come to mind is Einstein). A famous writer from my country was actually told by his writing teacher that he was basically a loser and that he would not ever be good at anything.

Maybe you can tell her about that...teachers are not the ultimate judges of human value. In fact, most of the time they suck at it.

Or you can tell her to start posting her stories here again, and see the reaction of the public...that would be a much more "real" feedback in my opinion.

Hope it helps,
-A

[chrispenycate]

Yes, I remember feline eyes.
You could say that there is an entire community here ready to be supportive (and that if she needs help with threatre sound I used to be a professional terein, though it was some considerable time ago)

Not that I've much confidence in teaching people creative writing, (my sister used to teach it) but I agree that the relevant pieces of paper are useful in life. And a mismatch of teacher and pupil can be catastrophic in any subject, but in one where value judgements are largely subjective, it's ten times worse.

And you say she was "once part" She's still on the list, and can visit (although I can see this should be strictly rationed; we are a little chroniverous) Sometimes wasting some time with friends is more use than applying it "profitably". Not that we can do anything about the professor, or the other students, but low morale is a positive feedback, feeding on itslf and you; breaking the cycle can put a whole new viewpoint on the universe.

I know cats want to get through the problem on their own; but even then a scratch behind the ears and a symbolic shrimp do no harm.

(She seems to be succeeding in the theatre bit, anyway)

[Animaiden]

Heretic: Yep both creative writing and theater. She's double majoring.

chrispenycate: Theater isn't going as well as she would like. She is not the greatest actress so she doesn't get many parts, and she has problems withe the sound people, since in Little Women she was a senior taking directions from a freshman who treated her like she didn't know/couldn't do anything.

Thanks for the advice so far. It's been good, and she has cheered up a little. Spending time with friends, and some video games helped. I'm going to try and tell her she should come back, but she has posted some of her stuff on a different forum she has joined (seventh sanctum). Everyone who has read her writings has liked it, but I think she was just looking for a little approval from the English dept., which I don't think she will get since most of them believe that genre fiction isn't real writing. She also sometimes has fits of "I will die a poor starving artist because I will never get published and I have so much debt from school". I believe in her, and her writings, and I know that she will get published some day, it might just be a while.

[Teresa Edgerton]

Tell her that it is very common for SF/Fantasy to be either scoffed at or ignored in creative writing classes.

Except in very rare cases, these classes prepare you to do one of two things:

1) teach creative writing classes
2) get your stories published in obscure literary magazines

Chances are the teacher is ill-equipped to evaluate genre fiction and his scornful attitude is a way of covering that up.

Her writing may be brilliant, her writing may be abysmally bad -- but she's not going to find out either way in a class with a teacher like that.

[jamescomehere]

maybe you are right. lol.