DKender
Only One Skeleton has the Power to Control both Life and Death, Light and Dark, Words and Blank Space, Our Humble Lives Continue Only by the Grace and Magnanimity of This Skeleton
Nay, let us walk from fire unto firey skeleton ...
Posts: 9,204
Gender: Unknown Skeleton
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Post by DKender on Oct 25, 2013 18:49:11 GMT -8
@ Christopher - Fortunately, that was just my regular pre-exam nervous amnesia. It's all good. And now it's all over. Woot. I did well.
Kristi's comment about zombies being human-centric made me wonder if there are some stories about squirrel zombies. Ya know, humans go about their business as squirrels play out a life or death or undeath struggle with each other in the woodlands.
I was reading over my notes related to animals and the zompocalypse and realized that most of the stuff with citations = related to sea life. No more shark finning/no more farm runoff/so on so on. That won't do. Gotta incorporate some bison facts.
@ Jara - What is that book about (Your Inner Fish)? Evolution?
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Post by Thy Dungyeon Maestyr on Oct 26, 2013 18:12:57 GMT -8
So we don't get your essay? Fooey.
Your Inner Fish is kinda about evolution, but more narrowly the ways our descent from fish continues to influence our biology to this day. From what I gather. Haven't read it.
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DKender
Only One Skeleton has the Power to Control both Life and Death, Light and Dark, Words and Blank Space, Our Humble Lives Continue Only by the Grace and Magnanimity of This Skeleton
Nay, let us walk from fire unto firey skeleton ...
Posts: 9,204
Gender: Unknown Skeleton
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Post by DKender on Oct 26, 2013 19:11:38 GMT -8
Essayifications are probably how I'll spend my plane ride tomorrow - going on a work trip. Now that I think of it, Jara once wrote a paper for some EEB class describing the biology of an IRL zombie outbreak. Do you still have that, mang?
I'm going to pretend that our evolutionary history is proof that Dagon is real.
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Post by Thy Dungyeon Maestyr on Oct 26, 2013 19:42:10 GMT -8
ia ia etcetera ftaghn
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DKender
Only One Skeleton has the Power to Control both Life and Death, Light and Dark, Words and Blank Space, Our Humble Lives Continue Only by the Grace and Magnanimity of This Skeleton
Nay, let us walk from fire unto firey skeleton ...
Posts: 9,204
Gender: Unknown Skeleton
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Post by DKender on Oct 28, 2013 14:41:45 GMT -8
Some things being discussed in the NaNoWriMo thread inspired this stream of consciousness whatever it is:
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Post by ∆§Indea§∆ on Oct 28, 2013 15:04:27 GMT -8
What it is , is very well written and a fantastic point. Assumptions suck. Hopefully the human race grows past them one day. I'd say you're not re-enforcing it , people are responsible for their own assumptions.
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Post by Dr. Maneep Pamplemousse on Oct 28, 2013 15:04:54 GMT -8
I don't know. I think you could make the point quite briefly. Just add a little flavor to the protagonist's observations or emotional interactions. You wouldn't need to harp on it, it could be as little as the choice of a single adjective in the right place, probably in the first couple of pages. Just some thoughts from someone with no experience writing fiction.
As Indea says, people are responsible for their assumptions, but a very small hint could help people like me that haven't broken those old habits yet to pick up on the alternate point of view.
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Post by Thy Dungyeon Maestyr on Oct 28, 2013 15:26:59 GMT -8
Agreed with Brett. Also with Indea in one sense - you don't have to feel guilty about doing things you didn't know any better than to do, if you can and will do them differently... That was a nightmare of a sentence. I'm ready for November.
Here's something from an interview with Vonda McIntyre, with maybe a different tactic to shake up normativity:
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DKender
Only One Skeleton has the Power to Control both Life and Death, Light and Dark, Words and Blank Space, Our Humble Lives Continue Only by the Grace and Magnanimity of This Skeleton
Nay, let us walk from fire unto firey skeleton ...
Posts: 9,204
Gender: Unknown Skeleton
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Post by DKender on Oct 28, 2013 16:28:33 GMT -8
@ All Tha Guyz - Thank you for your wisdoms. I think I'll try to squeeze a sentence or two in future work to at least hint at my characters breaking the mold and all that. It's for the greater good!
Ohmygosh I'm reading Vonda McIntyre's wiki entry - she started life with a biology degree, studied genetics, and then became a magical sci fi writer. AND she's hilarious. Case in point:
McIntyre is like my dream person.
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Post by Thy Dungyeon Maestyr on Oct 28, 2013 17:17:04 GMT -8
I am far from knowledgeable about SFF, but that article recently came up on a conversation at an unrelated forum I follow. Seemed relevant. Also, she seems quite entertaining.
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Post by Kristi is prescribed skeletons on Nov 1, 2013 5:38:38 GMT -8
Introducing thing about characters through the characters feelings about things going around them is great. I have a non heteronormative couple as the protagonists of one of my projects I'm going to be working on, and because they're usually working on solving mysteries not too much about their personal life comes into it. Maybe I can work with this?
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Post by Thy Dungyeon Maestyr on Nov 2, 2013 15:13:23 GMT -8
I s'pose so. Off the top of my head, it's hard to think up a way to include biographical info about a character that isn't directly relevant to what's happening in a way that isn't heavy-handed or weird, but I'm positive it can be done. Just,... running out of brain cells after writing that awful sentence....
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Post by Dr. Maneep Pamplemousse on Nov 13, 2013 21:14:46 GMT -8
I'm in an "intro to poetry" class that will meet some ill-considered general education literature requirement for my degree. Mostly it's boring. Very much so. One of the requirements is that we write several short (two to three page) papers on selected poems from the reading. I picked this one last minute and it somehow triggered a strange response. This paper was written far faster than any I've written before and I cut myself off in the middle of the third page, knowing I could write more, but realizing the paragraph seemed an appropriate conclusion for the demi-paper that had tumbled out onto that screen. I'm pasting the poem here so you will have a point of reference besides the direct quotes in the poem. Oncoming Train
I hate that moment when the train’s coming into the station, hurtling, inviting, so ferocious in its forward momentum,
the most dangerous thirty seconds of my day, twice every day, sometimes more; sometimes I have to steady myself against a pillar
on the platform, or stand at a distance, against the back wall, in order to feel that I will more firmly resist the impulse.
Not that I want to be dead, exactly; and certainly not that I want to suffer, I have a great deal to live for—
But the idea of simply stepping out of forwardness —that moment is the clearest invitation and opportunity
to strike against time, to refuse to accede, to win some power over what no one controls. I’m not proud of this,
I wouldn’t tell just anyone, but I will tell you. The train’s a huge onrushing refusal,
and who has any power over time, save to refuse?
Or no: to hurry time, to make him run—that is a radical form of submission.
Mark Doty, 2006 "School of the Arts"
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Post by Thy Dungyeon Maestyr on Nov 15, 2013 0:57:20 GMT -8
Do you think the response that provoked indicates it was an unusually successful poem?
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Post by Dr. Maneep Pamplemousse on Nov 15, 2013 5:55:50 GMT -8
Do you think the response that provoked indicates it was an unusually successful poem? I don't know. It could just be that it was of a familiar experience, but then I'm sure I could write a poem about D&D that would capture the imagination of absolutely nobody, so it's probably not just that. I guess probably, yes.
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