Grammar girl here, have you ever cringed when you got back comments from an editor or

teacher?

Today, Roy Peter Clark, who teaches writing at the Pointer Institute, a school for journalists

in St. Petersburg, Florida, has a great advice for dealing with editorial criticism.

Some good advice or criticism may be hard to take because of the way it's delivered.

Editors and teachers have been known to savage writers, bleeding over texts and rivulets

of writing.

Even when a critique is rendered with the writer's feelings in mind, it can hit a wall of resistance.

The writer is over-sensitive, or controlling, or diva, or maybe an over-sensitive controlling

diva jerk.

Without constructive criticism, the writer can't grow.

With it, the writer can improve a particular story in all the work that follows.

Editors must learn to accept criticism, even when it seems harsh or uninformed.

As a reward, rather than as a punishment.

If writing is about cause and effect, criticism reveals the effect and allows the writer

to evaluate the power of the cause.

So if all that criticism and pencil editing gets you down on Deadline Bunky, here are ten

lifelines to grab on to.

One, reflect on how you handle criticism in other areas of your life.

Each of us brings our personal history to the table of writing, revision, editing, and

criticism.

Without getting all Freudian, we can easily imagine that harsh parents or tyrants in the

...