From: mdhangton@gmail.com   
      
   On Friday, June 13, 2014 9:44:00 PM UTC-4, A. Tina Hall wrote:   
   >  wrote:   
   >    
   > > On Friday, June 13, 2014 6:46:00 AM UTC-4, A. Tina Hall wrote:   
   >    
   > >> William Vetter   wrote:   
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   >    
   >    
   > >>> The first time I tried to write fiction was a bit into my second   
   >    
   > >>> doctoral program,  and I generated a complete novel manuscript that   
   >    
   > >>> was (you can imagine) a sort of adult juvenilia.   
   >    
   > >>   
   >    
   > >> What's adult juvenilia?   
   >    
   > >>   
   >    
   > > Juvenilia is what children write when they start at 8 to 12.  What I   
   >    
   > > call adult juvenilia is what adults write when they start older, and   
   >    
   > > later are too embarrassed to show anybody.   
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   >    
   >    
   > I can't imagine what a child would write. (Maybe I could for a story,     
   >    
   > but I'd have to 'be there' and write it.)   
   >    
   >    
   >    
   > >>> And then I found some of those books about writing fiction and it   
   >    
   > >>> dawned on me that there were a catalog of things that needed to be   
   >    
   > >>> controlled.   
   >    
   > >>   
   >    
   > >> ?   
   >    
   > >>   
   >    
   > >> Which things, controlled how?   
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   > >>   
   >    
   > > Suspense level   
   >    
   > > Character's inner struggle   
   >    
   > > Science fictional idea   
   >    
   > > Description of setting   
   >    
   > > Realism and accuracy   
   >    
   > > Prose rhythm   
   >    
   > > Hook to force editor to read it   
   >    
   > > Impart reader with enough info in understand early enough without   
   >    
   > > slowing down opening Make sure reader isn't blitzed with info   
   >    
   >    
   >    
   > Ah, ok.   
   >    
   >    
   >    
   > For me, 'control' may not be the right word in all cases. It's more like     
   >    
   > watching out to get it how you want it (like I would want NO     
   >    
   > 'Character's inner struggle', and 'suspense' is just unpleaseant tension     
   >    
   > to me), and accuracy would have to be replaced with consistency when it     
   >    
   > concerns something made up (magic and anything it touches).   
   >    
   >    
   >    
   > I would not cling to books making statements on how these things need to     
   >    
   > be done. The 'rules' I've seen mentioned are usually plain out wrong,     
   >    
   > not just what I'd like in a story, but how writing feels that's done     
   >    
   > that way.   
   >    
   I didn't say that these how to books have all the answers.  They will list a   
   lot of the things that need to be done.   
      
   They will accelerate how fast some new writers improve at some stages in their   
   learning.  They are better than no book.   
   >    
   >    
   > Maybe these 'rules' work for people who know when to ignore which one. I     
   >    
   > just go by what reads right. (Though not always do I know how to fix     
   >    
   > something that reads wrong/boring.)   
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   >    
   >    
   > And some things I can't know (as in, what someone else would think).   
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   >    
   >    
   > > I could make this list much longer, include a lot a other things,   
   >    
   > > like everything in Turkey City Lexicon or whatever, but they all need   
   >    
   > > to be handled and integrated.   
   >    
   >    
   >    
   > I don't know what Turkey City Lexicon is, and not every writer works in     
   >    
   > that way (ticking off a lists of things to do).   
   >    
   It's a list of stuff that are supposed to be wrong in workshop manuscripts,   
   with names for them like Tom Swiftly.   
   Gosh, like, you never heard of it?  I thought all the cool kids knew it.   
   >    
      
   >    
   >    
   > >>> And I was involved in critters.org for a while then and I'd see the   
   >    
   > >>> different levels there, and it became clear to me that somebody who   
   >    
   > >>> was older than around 28 would need to spend something like four   
   >    
   > >>> years doing it full time to have the control to reliably produce   
   >    
   > >>> manuscripts that were publishable full time.   
   >    
   > >>   
   >    
   > >> How would four years full time writing change anything? (Except how   
   >    
   > >> 'having to' write full time may affect a person.)   
   >    
   > >>   
   >    
   > > The bottom manuscripts in online workshops like critters with no   
   >    
   > > entrance requirements are totally incoherent.  The next level is   
   >    
   > > these narratives of what happened the last time somebody played Doom,   
   >    
   > > or me and my buddies buy a case of beer, take our AR-14s into the   
   >    
   > > state forest and hunt Bigfoot.  The next level they begin to be   
   >    
   > > readable, but the author is having a conversation in his head that a   
   >    
   > > reader can't follow.  The next.... It is a cross-section of a   
   >    
   > > magazine slushpile where semipro authors are at the top. I would say   
   >    
   > > that it would take a full adult four years to work his way up if he   
   >    
   > > writes pretty consistently.  Many won't stay with it that long.   
   >    
   >    
   >    
   > You list different people, then say you'd have to go through being them?   
   >    
   I hope you skipped the levels where you submit video game sequences and write   
   time travel to kill Hitler stories.  I said there are levels that are obvious   
   after you've read 30 manuscripts or so.  You'll see the ones who have some   
   complete scene in their    
   heads, when they describe it in their writing, it reads like incomplete notes   
   to themselves.  And they won't know they're doing it.  They aren't oriented   
   toward communicating with a reader.  That one is a stage that most all need to   
   work through.  I    
   think.   
      
   >    
   >    
   > That's like saying everyone who writes on Usenet started with a     
   >    
   > fullquote top post "Me too!" and worked their way through different     
   >    
   > stages to finally do comprehensible posts.   
   >    
      
   I hope mumbles works through giving people a hard time.   
      
   >    
   >    
   > I don't think so.   
   >    
   >    
   >    
   > >>> And the teenagers that write these stories where all the characters   
   >    
   > >>> interact like people in a freshman dorm are going to take a lot   
   >    
   > >>> longer.   
   >    
   > >>   
   >    
   > >> Oh, so they are who write all the published books, and all TV   
   >    
   > >> series.   
   >    
   > >>   
   >    
   > > I don't know what you're saying.   
   >    
   >    
   >    
   > I'm saying that published books are full of charcters behaving like     
   >    
   > idiots, and TV series are too. ;P   
   >    
   >    
   >    
   > (It was half, what's the word, not ironic or sarcastic, but a small part     
   >    
   > was joking - small because it is all too true for too many things.)   
   >    
   >    
   >    
   > > I don't believe that doing what some staff screenwriter for Warehouse   
   >    
   > > 13 or whichever does is gonna get anybody on Nebula ballot.   
   >    
   >    
   >    
   > Yeah, stuff like that. Or what I call Kindergarden CIS.   
   >    
   >    
   >    
   > >>> Does anybody know anyone who sat down at a keyboard and never went   
   >    
   > >>> through that process,   
   >    
   > >>   
   >    
   > >> What process exactly?   
   >    
   > >>   
   >    
   > > What I described some of above, where they go from writing stuff   
   >    
   > > that's unpublishable, and they don't know it is, to a level where   
   >    
   > > they can reliably produce potentially publishable manuscripts.   
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   >    
   >    
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)