I’ve been blogging for over two months now. It’s been an interesting learning curve. These are my thoughts on the pros and cons.
Pros
- Absolute freedom. It’s possible to post whatever you want, whenever you want, without facing rejection by a publisher or having to kowtow to somebody else’s timetable.
- Aesthetic effect. A blog is the perfect place to combine photography, which captures the physical appearance of an area with poetry to depict a person’s experience.
- World wide audience. The potential readership is limitless.
- Meeting like minded people. Through linking with other blogs and writing reviews I’ve made contact with many people I wouldn’t have (virtually) met otherwise.
Cons
- The temptation of premature publication. Because it’s possible to publish something immediately, fuelled by the buzz of completion it’s easy to publish poems prematurely and regret it. I’ve done it a few times.
- Lack of quality control. Because they can publish anything, people do. I’ve published many poems here that wouldn’t make it into a small press magazine. Whilst the occasional gem can be found on the web, there’s a mass of rubbish and I’m contributing to the tip. I’m not the only one to feel that way. At Druid Life Nimue Brown says: “Some days it feels like every other person online is writing a book. The world has no use for that many books. I feel like I’m adding to a pile of crap, not giving something of value, and I’m suffering from profound inspiration fail.” Ditto. The number of people ‘liking’ a poem is no indication of a poem’s quality. More people have ‘liked’ the s**t ones than those that have been published or won a competition.
- Once a poem’s published on a blog it’s ineligible for publication elsewhere. Some poems are works in progress, whose final forms are indeterminable until the right destination appears. Whilst publishing on a blog can be perfect for some poems, others only come to completion through critique and editing to fit with a publisher’s requirements.
In Conclusion…
A blog is great for sharing the experience of a place in photographs and verse. However blogging isn’t helping me improve my craft. Therefore from now on I am going to use this blog as a place to share moments of magic from my land in poems and photos when inspired to do so, whilst getting my other work up to a standard worthy of professional publication.
Speaking a day later, such a rational conclusion isn’t easy to follow when poems seem to demand to be written and posted. It seems that the Awen doesn’t follow writers’ poorly thought out self imposed rules…
Saving things in a draft can be handy..but I know what you mean Lorna..it seems writing has become a social disease..Everyones Doing It!
Lorna, you pobably know this but some poets put up drafts of their work for maybe 24 hours, maybe get some feedback, then take them down. I don’t think that this practice disqualifies those poems for magazines or competitions; leaving them up does so, yes.
Thank you again for your thoughtful and generous review.
I wasn’t aware of this rule. Thank you.
Add to the pros, getting feedback, building an audience and developping a reputation. But yes, that issue of ‘published’ is a consideration, working out what to give and what to keep back… but its also good to know that anything will have a home in the fulness of time. I’ve got a whole anthology of short stories, written for various things, not homed…
And, I love what I’ve encountered of your stuff, there’s a lot of craft in what you do and a lot of soul.
Thanks for the added ‘pros’ and your kind remarks about my work.
I think the conclusion you have arrived at says it all. I look forward to everything you will put up in the future, but don’t disqualify yourself from your goals by posting items that could change your life some time in the future. Photography does work well with helping others to see what you are saying. (Hope that makes sense).
Good Luck !
Are you sure posting poems in a personal blog means they can’t be published anywhere else?? Have never heard of that before….. I would think airing your writing on a blog would be a great way to try fledgling poems out. What’s the harm in that?? Am sure many of today’s non-creative writers get their ideas out to the world first as blog entries that are later published in book form. Yes/no??? For heaven’s sakes, Yeats kept revising his already published poems right up until his death…..
Maybe you are being a bit too hard on yourself, as what you have put up recently has been lyrical, musical, moving, and really coming from the land you inhabit…. Love the combo of poem and photo too….
Perhaps it might be worth asking some of the publishers I’m aiming at in person?
Hmm… my rational conclusion isn’t very convincing when I feel the urge to post a poem…
The great thing about blogs is you can add diversity to them: poems, ideas, photos, stories. Variety is the spice of life as they say.
Poetry is a subjective matter, what one likes another hates. Each individual finds their own meaning in a poem.
The author of Druid Life has been unreasonably harsh of their own work and their view of the internet. The Awen is a messy creative force that manifests in many ways, anything created has an element of beauty in it. As the archaeologist says the rubbish pits of the Iron Age people are a treasure pit to the archaeologist. Ancient human poop and broken pottery gives archaeologists orgasms.
One of the advantages of the blogger is they have full control of their output, and also of the material they wish to read of others.
It’s all part of the journey, an expression on paper is a snap-shot in time. Follow the path, follow your passions. It might not seem like much now, in time look back, and see the monumental move.
It’s not what you feel they need to hear, it’s what you feel that needs to be said.
Blessings…
Interesting points. I didn’t know being published on a blog precluded being published elsewhere though I have seen that in some submission guidelines.