#and maybe some illustrated poems and short stories etc.

[celestefem]

have i mentioned that i’ve been obsessed with zines recently? i made one

this one’s just eight pages long, but it’s fun to just kinda ramble and arrange pictures and text around!

[landwriter]

Ten Books To Know Me

Rules: 10 (non-ancient) books for people to get to know you better, or that you just really like.

Tagged by @softest-punk, thank you for utterly derailing my afternoon into nostalgia <3 My problem is less not picking ancient books and more not picking exclusively Canadian and English children’s lit published between 1995 and 1999. (Still the first three picks all the same though because it is like, the opus within which my psyche is almost wholly contained.) This got long but I'm going to be very brave and not apologize about that at all. I love talking about books, and these are some of the books I love the most. In chronological order of arrival into my heart.

Some of the Kinder Planets - Tim Wynne-Jones This book has been a part of my life for so long I cannot remember when, exactly, I first read it - only that it was taken from my gran’s shelf; Tim had sent her a copy with a lovely inscription. It’s a short story collection which remains today (and forever) my favourite format. Ted Chiang’s Exhalation, Karin Tidbeck’s Jagannath, Karen Russell’s Orange World, Margaret Atwood’s Stone Mattress are all fabulous examples, stacked before me at my desk, but Some of the Kinder Planets itself lives (alongside my two most precious childhood stuffies) at my mum’s house, the safest place of all. The stories are kids being kids in the way you want to read as a kid yourself: clever and wondering and scared and brave. Special mention also to his Zoom trilogy, beautifully illustrated in black and white by Eric Beddows.

Skellig - David Almond Another book likely pilfered from my granny’s library. There’s a little magic in Some of the Kinder Planets, but here is ALL the magical realism, and it changed me. This book has a sickly bird-or-man-or-angel in a garage being nursed to health by a boy with an ill baby sister in hospital that he can’t help at all; the indelible image of surviving off bluebottles and then getting snuck Chinese takeaway and brown ale; nature and weird kids and William Blake poems. I will weep if I continue thinking about it.

[Not Any Book But Just A Lot Of Books] - Kit Pearson, Diana Wynne-Jones, Kenneth Oppel, Philip Pullman, Madeleine L’Engle, etc. Listen, I know this is an INSANE cop-out but if you know the authors you know more or less exactly what I mean. These are the books that made me more tender than I already was, made me believe in Good, and Kindness, and Love, in a totally immutable way I thankfully do not ever want to change, because I don’t think I could.

Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett My first introduction to Neil Gaiman, Terry Pratchett, and footnotes. Also one of the first books I did not simply pick up because it was Lying Around. I bought it because my older cousin listed it as one of her favourite books on Facebook, and she was (and is) impossibly, horribly cool. I was maybe 13 or 14 and wanted to be cool too. I’ve since read a smattering of Gaiman but I’ve yet to read Terry Pratchett on his own. I’d like to! I know I’d love it.

The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul - Douglas Adams Loaned to me by my best friend before we were best friends. It is, apparently, the second novel in the Dirk Gently series, and I remember nothing of it except a very good bit about a couch getting stuck in a stairwell; nonetheless it’s listed here because this is clearly actually a thinly disguised chronology of sentimentality, and also because Douglas Adams is a wonder and delight to read and I don’t need to fully remember the book to know that in my bones. I’m not sure if it’s fair but I’ll also blame Douglas Adams for my inability to be brief and to resist using semi-colons. Could’ve been someone else. But it was definitely someone English.

Sailing to Byzantium - W.B. Yeats This is not a book, but it was in my English Literature textbook in high school, so it counts. If it wasn’t, I would still count it. Why a sixteen year old girl connected with a poem that begins “That is no country for old men.” is irrelevant, as is every stanza but the third, which contains the fateful, ruinous lines: “Consume my heart away; sick with desire / And fastened to a dying animal / It knows not what it is;” I remember when I read it, and I remember the chill feeling of Yeats’ spectral hand reaching all the way from his grave in County Sligo, across the whole Atlantic and the enormous landmass called Canada, to reach into my chest and cruelly grab my own heart, and I remember thinking How, and Exactly. The first thing I read that named the strangeness I felt inside of me. The Father, Son, and Holy Ghost of all my teenage angst. Written on my bones to this day, if I’m being honest.

Hamlet - Shakespeare We got off on the wrong foot, after I was personally victimized by the line ‘Brevity is the soul of wit’, but I do love Shakespeare. I credit this to having an excellent teacher for it, and reading it aloud in a cohort of tryhards and musicians and theatre kids. A case of familiarity breeds...appreciation, actually. We did a lot of Shakespeare, but we were asked to learn 20 lines of Hamlet specifically, and rewrite them, marked down for every error. Forty lines for bonus marks. There was much grousing and it seemed like a cruel, outdated task of rote memorization, but writing this a decade later, I am belatedly realizing this was a sneaky way to get a bunch of kids to recite a soliloquy so much that they couldn’t help but find the life in it, the rhythm and meter to make it stick in our minds. And now look! I love it! I am writing fanfic in iambic pentameter! Wherefore art my fucking restraint!! I learned my lines so hideously well that when I pulled up the scene just now (2.2, from “Yet I, a dull and muddy-mettled rascal peak”), I a) noticed and b) was offended by, minute differences from the version I memorized, which I then searched out and knew the moment I found. Incredible?!  

Still Life With Woodpecker - Tom Robbins The most recent time I’ve read a work of fiction and been rearranged by it, at the tender age of 21. here I am, I wrote, in my journal, after a very good sob, happier and more rudderless than ever. This man writes with totally unfettered joy and unhinged sincerity, two things I am hopelessly into, but also with a deep distaste for institutions and conformity that I desperately needed back then: lost, returned from a year of magical realism and the sort of adulthood growth spurt that makes you feel dizzy, home and yet horribly missing the home I’d made for myself elsewhere, all my nearly-fulfilled ambitions towards security and prestigious government postings feeling sort of hollow and reeking in my hands. It comforted me that I wasn't wrong as much as it spilled my own guts into my hands, and while I went on for another year seeing things through, it planted a seed that quickly grew proper roots and pushed me right off the ledge of respectability. And it’s a love story, of course.

It’s his prose that sits glowing on the horizon to me when I try to write richly: a distant shore of orgiastic language (from which you can surely hear the wind-carried cries of people fucking day and night), towards which I, still shy and prudish, ever point my prow.

How to Be Happy - Eleanor Davis A comic collection. Sharp and wonderful and alive. Another Best Friend gift (bless those around us with impeccable taste), of which every single panel is MARVELOUS. I meant to share one of my favourites here but apparently it has! Gotten up and left!! I will buy another copy in hopes of coaxing it back out of wherever it’s hiding.

Down to Earth - Monty Don This did not rearrange anything. But it does give me a good hug about it, so to speak. A month-by-month gardening guide which is chock-full of brilliant, sensible advice, and also so cheerfully comforting in a highly specific English way that I actually feel like I’m drinking a cuppa whenever I read a page or two of it. It makes me think of my grandmother. And so we’ve come full circle, eh?

I hope some of you are now nodding thoughtfully and thinking, well, Chrissakes, that explains it. Very sorry, hope this helps, etc. Passing on the tag to @fancy-rock-dove, @chubsthehamster, @broomsticks, @wordsinhaled, @btwimkindagay, @hardly-an-escape, @xx-vergil-xx, @that-banhus, and anyone else who wants to expose themselves on main and chat about their fave books

[lovelymindescape]

hi! i was wondering if i could get romantic male matchup for the hobbit and/or stranger things?

my pronouns are she/her

i'm enfp 7w8, leo

i'm 6'0 and have amber eyes, long gold blond curly hair and hourglass figure

i'm positive and upbeat person, i try to see the bright side in most situations

i'm friendly, energetic, confident, sarcastic, responsible, maybe a bit chaotic, cheerful and bubbly

i care about my friends and family a lot, and go out of my way to show it

i enjoy having fun and living life to the fullest

i'm very competitive and passionate person

i really like puzzles, riddles and crosswords

i love making people smile

i have morbid, dark sense of humor

sometimes i randomly say a weird obscure fact in the middle of conversation

i can play on violin, cello, piano, guitar, saxophone, harp and drums, i'm currently learning how to play on trumpet

i like poetry and sometimes i write a poem or two, also i'm writing my book

i'm ballet dancer since i was a kid and i love performing

i'm working on my own cartoon

i never quite grew out of the fantasy phase, and i'm still enamored with tales of changelings and witches

i work as illustrator for fantasy books and books for kids

i'm kinda struggling with taking rest, doing nothing, because there is always something to do, something new to learn, etc.

i'm afraid of stagnation

i overuse this kind of emojis→(⁠ㆁ⁠ω⁠ㆁ⁠)

my style is something between whimsigothic and cryptidcore

i love: collecting things, astronomy, tea, making and watching movies, forests, making jewelry, cooking, baking, d&d, horrors, animals, plants, gardening, traveling, art, history, world mythologies, learning new things, psychology, handicraft

sorry if it's too chaotic

i hope you have a fantastic day (⁠◍⁠•⁠ᴗ⁠•⁠◍⁠)

You sound like a very cool person to me <3 I had much Information to work with and it's not to chaotic

I ship you with

LINDIR

you are an elf of Rivendell

your like the good soul of the house

he had known you from the very beginning

one of your closest friends

after years you both had fallen for eachother , but tried to hide it

one day he was walking through the many of the floors to get a clear mind

when he came to your door he heard you playing music

he knocked , you let him in

you were a bit nervous since you were now alone with him but you just kept playin

this day he just sat there and watched you in an awe

after that , the next day dwarfes came to your home , since you good with instruments , you were there to "entertain" them

one of the dwarfs admired you from afar , that´s when Lindir got jealous

he realised he really loved you and he couldn`t keep it to himself anymore

after the dinner , he took you to a bit more silent place

you had a feeling what was coming so when he started talking , you just cut him of by wrapping your hand around his neck

since that day you were happy in a relationship

sometimes you do riddels or puzzels with him , sometimes he just watces you practice ballet or one of your instruments

you write eachother loveletters and poems

at night you sometimes just lay in his arm and he tells you stories or reads to you

he makes sure , that when your working you take a break , drink and eat enough and not overwork yourself

your dates are mostly just meeting maybe at a lake and you make jewelry, while he does some of his hobbies , or you maybe do candle drawing , so it´s mostly just craftdates , or you go out at night and watch the stars

so you got a very loving partner , who would do anthing with and for you

hey , i hope you like it . i´m sorry that´s it so short , i hope it´s ok

it was my first one so tell me if it´ ok and/or what i could do better

[tohisprettyc00l]

hi! could i get romantic and platonic matchup for the owl house?

my pronouns are she/her

i'm demisexual panromantic

i'm enfp 7w8, leo

i'm 6'0 and have amber eyes, long gold blond curly hair and hourglass figure

i'm positive and upbeat person, i try to see the bright side in most situations

i'm friendly, energetic, confident, sarcastic, responsible, maybe a bit chaotic, cheerful and bubbly

i care about my friends and family a lot, and go out of my way to show it

i enjoy having fun and living life to the fullest

i'm very competitive and passionate person

i really like puzzles, riddles and crosswords

i love making people smile

i have morbid, dark sense of humor

sometimes i randomly say a weird obscure fact in the middle of conversation

i can play on violin, cello, piano, guitar, saxophone, harp and drums, i'm currently learning how to play on trumpet

i like poetry and sometimes i write a poem or two, also i'm writing my book

i'm ballet dancer since i was a kid and i love performing

i'm working on my own cartoon

i never quite grew out of the fantasy phase, and i'm still enamored with tales of changelings and witches

i work as illustrator for fantasy books and books for kids

i'm kinda struggling with taking rest, doing nothing, because there is always something to do, something new to learn, etc.

i'm afraid of stagnation

i overuse this kind of emojis→(⁠ㆁ⁠ω⁠ㆁ⁠)

my style is something between whimsigothic and cryptidcore

i love: collecting things, astronomy, tea, making and watching movies, forests, making jewelry, cooking, baking, d&d, horrors, animals, plants, gardening, traveling, art, history, world mythologies, learning new things, psychology, handicraft

sorry if it's too chaotic

i hope you have a fantastic day (⁠◍⁠•⁠ᴗ⁠•⁠◍⁠)

I romantically match you with: Amity Blight!

-I WAS going to say Amity seems like she would be short af. But she is only a few inches below six foot as a teen and taller as an adult so never mind I guess.

-You remind me so much of seasons 1 and 2a Luz.

-Just like her and Luz you both are that ship trope where it's like a grumpy person and a ray of sunshine.

-Her REAL family (so not Odaila) and friends are the most important thing to her. She knew what it was like to have social status as her number one priority and it wasn't great.

-Amity missed out on a lot of actually living her life so now she spends a lot of her free time living her life to the fullest. Usually to the point where she expresses stuff others wouldn't experience in ten lifetimes.

-Amity will be do all the smart game things in her free time (I.E like you said puzzles, riddles and crosswords.) She find them relaxing. (Unlike me who has a storke when I mess up in a crossword.)

-Amity will read some random fact online and go to everyone she knows and be like "Guess what I just learned!"

-Amity would love to listen to you play instruments!!! She might try to learn herself to surprise you.

-She has problems with resting/ doing nothing, but she'll be damned if she lets you also have that problem. She will force you to take breaks. You might not feel overwhelmed or burnt out yet but if you carry on like this it will happen sooner or later.

-You fear stagnation? You and her both. So she is pretty good at comforting you if you're having a particularly bad time with the fear.

-Luz loves using emoticons. So first of all she's used to it. But she also finds it very endearing.

-It may be a basic headcanon but I think Amity's favorite drink is tea.

-Amity specializes in a few foods but besides that, she can't cook or bake. But the fact that you are able to remember and make so many recipes and make them taste good? You're basically magical (And she has authority on the topic.)

-She loves spooky stuff but not horror stuff if that makes sense. Like she loves a Halloween-y vibe and a campfire story scary, but nothing gory or like jump scares. That last one is just because of the cheapness of it.

-I think Lilith rubbed off on Amity in her love of history.

-She loves learning about the psychology of things. Why do people do the things they do.

I platonically match you with: Luz Noceda

-Optimistic person and optimistic person friendship is honestly always chaotic. And that's just how Luz likes it.

-Luz loves her friends and family so much. That's like her main thing

-Luz unintentionally lives life to the fullest. Danger and new experiences gravitate toward her.

-I feel like Luz played any instrument she could in school, that's not to say she was good at it but she tried. (She got better after studying in the bard coven.) So when she finds out you play she's very excited and wants to play with you.

-She wanted to do ballet when she was younger but when she found out classes weren't just dancing and were actual y'know... Lessons she left. (I can't blame her I don't know what your classes are like but when I was in ballet the keeping your head straight thing was torture for me) But since you do the dancing part that she was interested in she loves to watch perform.

-If you let her she'll watch the hell out your cartoon. You finished a very rough sketch? She is already by your side asking to see.

-Girl literally lives in the demon realm and is also obsessed with Azura She is in too deep to get out of the fantasy "phase."

-Mildred Featherwhyle ass I think I've made it clear that she loves seeing your craft, but the fact that you write FANTSY books!? She was so excited she literally bounced up and down

-Luz is going to force you to take breaks. She's not going to force you to do nothing, she has adhd she knows that can be hard. But taking breaks is important.

-She is the queen of using silly emoticons.

-Luz was obsessed with space when she was younger and you can't convince me otherwise.

-Luz likes and runs D&D campaigns.

-Luz canonically likes art both the writing and drawing kind.

Bro, I don't know what happened but I went OFF. Um- Hope you like it!

[holmesgone]

books read 2021/a creative review

Wow!!! I have no idea what I tagged this in 2020, so continuity is for smart people with actual working and short term memory, but I did check OTHER documentation, and I can safely say I read way more books that I enjoyed in 2021.

Before we get into the RECOMMENDATIONS, here are the stats:

Books read  (novels, poetry, nonfiction, etc): 78

Comics read (webcomics, anthologies, collections, manga, etc): 99

Books/comics reread: 85

this was written after a whole five minutes searching my tumblr- maybe I haven’t done this since 2018? ANyway, I read way more than 2018, perhaps due to the whole student thing.

My creative writing really tanked because of going back into school but i did write a heck of a lot of poetry. the goal is to get back into a schedule because I really miss fiction writing!!

RECOMMENDATIONS:

Comics

Giant Days by John Allison

so fun! so pure! The faces! The YOUTH.

Cherry Magic! by Yuu Toyota

Listen. It’s the funniest conceit in the universe. Lack of boning makes you a touch-telepath???? TELL ME MORE.

Speak: the graphic novel by Laurie Halse Anderson and illustrated by Emily Carroll

I love Emily Carroll and have always meant to read the novel! I hopefully will get there one day, but this was such a impactful read that also was BIG OUCH.

Books

God I read a lot of excellent books this year so whittling this down is going to be hard!!!

Magic for Liars by Sarah Gailey

look. Im such a sucker for noir detective. Is this set in modern north america? Probably. Did my imagination make it a series of greyscale images and our lovely protagonist talked like she had hardboiled eggs rolling around in her mouth? Also yes.

Hex by Thomas Olde Heuvelt

Some really fun worldbuilding! A witch wandering town! ROLLICKING GOOD TIME.

A Libertarian Walks Into a Bear by Matthew Honglotz-Hetling

HONESTLY, such a fun and interesting read!  It is exactly what the title promises but also so much MORE.

Heaven’s Official Blessing by MXTX

Hua Cheng INVENTED romance and I don’t want to hear a word otherwise.

The Hands of the Emperor by Victoria Goddard

Miz Goddard isn’t messing around. She says, hey, want cool fantasy worldbuilding based off of Pacific Islander culture? Got that. Want to somehow reveal this beautiful world one unfurling petal at a time via FANTASY BUREAUCRACY??? Got that. Want friendships that change the world for the better? People working their asses off to make the world a better place one incremental gain at a time?????? THE STARS??? THE OCEAN????? THE FIRE????? THE DANCE?????? IM SCREAMING STILL MISS GODDARD LEAK UR ADDRESS

The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon

god why did i put this off so long!!! lesbians!!! dragons!!!! No lesbian dragons but you can’t have it all, can you!!!! It was so long and I was SO HAPPY FOR IT, because I was greedy for more and more story.

Other notable books I don’t want to grab images for:

Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez 

Listen, if you think you know stuff about women, men, and the world.... Please read this book. I thought I knew things. I definitely know nothing. Reading about data blanks was incredibly eye opening.

The Mummy Congress by Heather Pringle 

BRO I love me a mummy, and getting to hear about a specialist convention of mummy enthusiasts and also kinds of mummies I’d never heard of... What a party.

100 Tang Poems by Bruce M. Wilson 

So nice to read!!!

[merlinholidays]

Guide: Creating Prompts

Sign ups are going up soon and that means it’s time to fill in your likes and make your prompts. For some of us, the idea of making those prompts is a daunting thing, and maybe it’s sometimes tempting to just leave it blank.

But prompts are important for your gifter! So they can:

Understand you better

Find inspiration

Create something for you that you will enjoy

Even if it doesn’t matter to you what you receive, remember that a good set of prompts will give your gifter inspiration and drive to create! Think of it as a gift of sorts to the person who is paired with you!

For this reason, we’ve made a little guide to remind you of different types of prompts you can use. We hope it might give you some inspiration! We have split it into writing prompts and art prompts, since the two can be quite different.

Writing Prompts

There are many ways you can create writing prompts, and different writers like different things, but we have collected some tips/ideas for you:

Keep it short-ish:

Some people find it difficult to work with very long and detailed prompts. If the prompt outlines the whole story, it often feels very restrictive and allows no room for creativity. It’s more inspiring if your prompt leaves room for the writer to mix their own ideas with yours to interpret your prompt in a creative way. Try to create a prompt that acts as a guide rather than a complete story outline.

The One Word Prompt:

A simple solution, but a classic: the one word prompt. It’s simple and sometimes very effective and the gifter can easily combine it with another prompt if they want to. It can be:

Something sensory (like a color, a smell, etc)

Time-related (a season, a weekday, a certain time)

Interesting and uncommon words, or words from foreign languages

One thing to avoid can be extremely general words like “Christmas”. Instead, pick something about Christmas that invokes a more specific response, such as “mistletoe”, or “carolling” or “candles”.

The Poetry or Song Lyric Prompt:

Include a passage from your favorite poem or song lyric as an inspiration for a prompt, or link to the whole poem/song!

The Image Prompt:

One that we don’t see used as much anymore but image prompts are a great way to add variation to your prompts, and for many, the visual aspect triggers ideas. Maybe you can find an image that represents a mood you would enjoy, for example.

The Scenario Prompt:

Give a scenario that says something about a setting, a possible conflict, character traits, etc. How much info you include is obviously up to you.

Example:

Arthur and Merlin meet in the elevator at a hotel. When they exit it, everything has changed.

Morgana is tired of her city life and moves to a cabin in the woods to write a book. Enter Gwen.

The Trope Prompt:

Another tried and true staple is the trope prompt! Giving a trope or collection of tropes you like is a great jumping off point. Fake relationship with a side of hurt/comfort? Slow burn enemies to lovers? Was there only one bed?

Combine with a scenario to create a more specific prompt!

Variations:

Sometimes listing variations or further examples can spark more ideas. If you want a fic about dragons, you could include different versions of what that fic might look like.

Example:

I would love a fic about dragons! Maybe pet dragons are common. Or dragons suddenly return to the modern world after having been gone for hundreds of years. Maybe dragons are an extension of the magic user like daemons in His Dark Materials.

Art Prompts

Artists are unsurprisingly visual creatures, but sometimes it’s difficult to come up with prompts that are aimed specifically at inspiring an artist. Art is often a single image that captures a moment, and a lot of writing prompts that outline a story idea make it hard for an artist to pinpoint that moment. Here are some ideas for writing inspiring art prompts for those of you who are nominating art as a gift you would enjoy receiving. 

The one word prompt works for art as well, just look at Inktober! Something as simple as “mermaids” or “wings” works well for art when used in concert with your favourite character, ship and preferred rating.

A strong visual idea is always good when you would love to receive a specific image, especially when paired with some context. Your artist can easily work with a prompt such as your favourite pair cuddling on Christmas morning, a feeling of happiness, forehead kisses and opened gifts, whereas an open non-specific prompt like “Christmas morning” doesn’t give your artist much to go on.

Open but contextual prompts are great for art when you don’t have a specific idea. Telling your artist that you would prefer art in a modern AU setting always helps to set the scene. If you add “meet-cute” to a flower-shop AU, your artist has a moment or a scene to work with. If you say that you want to see a missing scene from your favourite episode, your artist could come up with a canon-age visual you’ve been craving. Or perhaps you’ve always wanted to see your faves in a certain movie AU? Your artist could transform their appearance for your Yule treat.

Giving your artist the option to illustrate for one of your fics could also be a great way to inspire a piece of art. It should be a fic they can easily access and that isn’t too long, which they can read and get on with making a piece of art for you. It shouldn’t be anything that has already received fanart or that has been a part of a big bang or collaboration with an artist, so your gifter doesn’t feel like they’re competing with anyone. You could specify which stories you’d like to see art for, or give your artist free rein to explore your works and find something they’d be interested in illustrating.

Tropey prompts can also work well but it’s good to give your artist some guidance or context. Prompts such as “hurt/comfort” or “angst” are too open by themselves, but can work very well to inspire art of an intense moment when paired with some keywords like “animal/creature attack” or “post-battle bathing”, “being carried” or “huddling for warmth”. Prompts such as “fluff” or “first time” are also ambiguous, but paired with keywords like “ugly Christmas sweaters” or “teaching to ice-skate”,  “frantic kisses” or “sex by the fireplace” can make all the difference to an artist searching for a visual flavor you would enjoy.

Poems and song-lyrics can work for artists, but can also be very open to interpretation and aimed at conveying a feeling rather than an image. Instead, you could write a short piece of prose or dialogue to inspire your artist.

Example:

“Sleep. I’ll keep you safe,” - conveys the visual of someone standing guard over their sleeping or injured companion.

“There are leaves in your hair, let me get those for you,” - conveys a fluffy moment or hair touching and blushy, shy smiles.

Mix it up:

This year we’re asking you to write at least 5 prompts to give your gifter plenty to work with and to choose from. As mentioned, different creators like different things so our best tip is to mix up different types of prompts. That way, it’s more likely that something will jump out at your gifter!

[alternateuniverse-coffeeshops]

hello! i have read your fic 'homesick for a mountain's song' and i wanted to tell you how beautiful and poetic i found it. i had a very off day today and my head was full of negative thoughts but your fic made me feel calm, warm and soft so i wanted to thank you for that! i also wanted to ask if you could give me some titles of the poems/books you featured in your story, i would love to read them as well! thank you again, i will read your fic over and over again during my off days for sure.

Hello! Thank you so much! I’m very glad this story could mean such things to you. I will try to recommend some works that set the mood for me & I hope that they’ll bring you the same calm they gave me <3 

I used ‘an illustrated guide to traditional Japanese architecture and everyday things’ as an inspiration on how the house looks etc. It’s one of my favourite books to have laying around. 

I also read ‘The Eight Mountains by Paolo Cognetti’ and that influenced how I wrote the mountain, I think. It’s also about a very close friendship.

If you want something that’s really wholesome and calm, I also recommend you read Bloom by Kevin Panetta and Savanna Ganucheau. It’s a very wholesome graphic novel about two boys falling in love in the bakery of one person’s parents. I think that that one is very domestic at some points too. 

I also think that you’ll maybe enjoy some Naomi Kawase documentary’s. They’s so so so calm. I watched Embracing and Katatsumori but I’m guessing that her movies/docu’s are quite amazing as well. 

Here’s a link to a small article about the Haiku poets I used, that links to their works: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/articles/70164/authors-note-on-writing-with-basho-buson-and-issa (: 

I also talked about a Dutch book, that’s not yet translated, but there were some very interesting parts about this book. One thing was how she used Yasunari Kawabata’s Moonlight in Water. I haven’t found this story, but I do know that the Pinguin Classics book of Japanese short story’s includes some of his work (I’ve ordered that one so I could let you know if it’s inspirational). She also talked about Japanese architecture, for example the Ise Shrine that gets rebuilt every twenty years and what it means for shintoism and their tradition. Information like this, and getting to know cultural things like this helped me settle the characters into their healing though getting a home. 

Then there’s a few fan fictions that were quite inspirational to me. So here are a few of those: 

A Hostage Situation by KinomiAkai 

40m2 by Winterdesu

Smooth by Calciseptine

& probably some more but I’m having a hard time looking them up. Feel free to ask about fanfic recs too if you want to! (: 

Wew, okay, I think that covers most of it! Tbh I really mis writing this fanfiction so this made me a little nostalgic hahah. Anyway, I hope you can enjoy some of these works & that you’ll be able to feel positive and calm more. Thanks again (: 

[loopy777]

What is your thoughts on the strenghts and weaknesses of Brandon Snderson as a writer?

Ooh, fun question.

I’ll get the weaknesses out of the way first (yes, just one): Brandon Sanderson’s writing is merely adequate. I never read a description from him that took my breath away, or wording that revealed some new insight about the world. His writing does its job, and nothing more. Perhaps related, Sanderson’s action sequences tend to be overly long and detailed; he goes into so much detail about all the various actions and movements that I lose track of what I’m supposed to be picturing, and none of it really matters- expect maybe to people keeping score about whether he’s playing fair with all the metal his Coinshots bounce off of.

This weakness doesn’t hold Sanderson back at all, though, because there are two axes of creating a novel, and Sanderson is a genius at the one that matters. One axis is Writing, which he’s just good enough at, and the other axis Storytelling, which is what has the real impact on the audience.

To illustrate how good Sanderson is at storytelling, I’ll summarize my experience reading the original Mistborn trilogy. I finished the first book and really enjoyed it; it had good characters and a plot that really came together and twists and a romance that didn’t make me roll my eyes and really interesting worldbuilding and wild ideas and a good climax. It also had plenty of mysteries that were left dangling at the end. And then I read the second book, and enjoyed that as well for the same reasons, but I noticed that a bunch of mysteries from the first book had still been left hanging, and a whole slate of new mysteries had been introduced, more than had been solved. So I expected the third book to hit the ground running and start serving up reveals right away.

Well, it didn’t. It started piling on new mysteries.

“Dude,” I said to an imaginary Brandon Sanderson, “you are *not* going to be able to bring this all together unless you start working overtime right now.”

And I continued reading, and the mysteries kept accumulating, and I was seriously waiting for everything to either completely collapse or the story duck out at the end on providing satisfactory answers.

But I got to the middle of the book, and suddenly the answers started popping up. They made sense. They fed into each other. They fueled the plot as it accelerated towards the climax. It turned out that everything was a complex array of dominoes that, when tipped in sequence, created a sound like a Bach composition and then when completely fallen over revealed Monet’s Water Lilies.

So yeah, Sanderson has the Storytelling chops to skate by on his adequate writing and still wind up being one of the novelists in the business right now.

The strength he’s probably most well known for is his worldbuilding. The guy is great at coming up with a High Concept or a Magic System he wants to play with, and then spinning out a fully-fleshed world that makes sense down to the most nitpicky details. Usually, I don’t see this level of worldbuilding combined with adequate attention to character or plot, but Sanderson is the exception that proves the rule. Only Tolkien, who wrote down every poem composed by an elf in his LotR universe, exceeds Sanderson.

On the subject of characters, Sanderson nails this. They’re interesting, diverse, funny, wise, pitiable, etc. They make me laugh and get me invested. Wayne, in the Mistborn sequel series, might actually be one of the best characters of all time. (Seriously. And he’s the Comic Relief Sidekick.) And then there’s-

Well, going into another great character of Sanderson’s might be a spoiler, for those who haven’t read the Mistborn sequel series. I’ll just say that the subplot surrounding this character, is one of my favorite romances of all time.

The last big strength of Sanderson’s is that he is, apparently, a writing machine. Look at the amount of stuff he’s written in 15 years! Yeesh! Way to make everyone feel inadequate.

That all said, I’m not sure I’ve read enough Sanderson to provide a complete rundown. I’m mainly writing this based on the Mistborn series (currently up to six novels, two short stories, and a novella), which is amazing and probably stands at the top of the fantasy genre, IMO. I also read the Elantris stand-alone novel, and while that had a lot of the same good points, it didn’t make much of an impact on me; it had good characters and interesting ideas and a twisty plot and a cool new magic system and a series of dominoes that tipped over at the end, but it was a much simpler array of dominoes and some of them didn’t connect in a satisfying way. It’s still a good novel I’d recommend to anyone who wants to read something fun, but that’s it.

(However, I have seen people describe it as their favorite novel, so perhaps I just wasn’t on the same wavelength as the book for whatever reason.)

So a possible weakness is that Sanderson can’t always coordinate all the twists he has in play in his complex plot-filled novels.

But jeez, I’d take a weakness like that any day.

[imaghostwriter]

11/11/11 (or more like 44/11/11)

Rules: Answer 11 Questions, Ask Eleven Questions, Tag Eleven People!

alright, so i had a lot of people tagging me in this one and i was really happy about every single one! but to sum things up a little (and also so that i wouldn’t have to come up with 44 questions myself) i decided to put it all in one post. i will tag 11 people with 11 questions of my own and answer all 44 questions i received under the cut.

thanks to the wonderful @thewritingsofart, @i-rove-rock-n-roll, @writingsonesdreams and @waywordwriter for being awesome and for tagging me! xx

now, here are my 11 questions:

1. if you had to rewrite the earliest work you remember writing, what would you change?

2. have you ever written fanfiction? if so, what was your first fic about?

3. do you have any foolproof methods against writer’s block?

4. have you ever thought about quitting writing?

5. is there an author who you feel influences you as a writer?

6. would you like to have fanfiction written about your works?

7. what is the nicest compliment you’ve ever received on one of your works?

8. have you ever cried over one of your own stories?

9. do you draw about your own stories?

10. have you ever written an au about one of your own stories?

11. have you ever written something creative in another language than english? if so, which one was it? and which language do you prefer?

sooo, those were my 11 questions. now my 11 victims are: @storyteller-kaelo, @metaphors-and-melodrama, @wasted-hymn, @authorified, @writingnosefreak, @quilloftheclouds, @bookenders, @vhum, @madammuffins, @catgirlwarrior, @blueinkblot

and for those who are interested, here are my answers:

@thewritingsofart 

1. In what other format do you enjoy reading a novel? Script, Poem, Diary, Illustrated, etc.

i love stories of all kinds, the format doesn't really matter

2. What POV do you prefer reading from? Writing from?

third person, both reading and writing. it doesn't matter if the narrator is omniscent or stays up close and personal with the protagonist

3. Do you remember what your first creative writing piece was?

i remember the first one i created outside of school lmao it was awful but i've also grown a lot since then and i still remember my first work fondly. and tbh i still like the idea so i gottagive little me probs for that. it was about a girl who wakes up with no memories, in a world where everyone believes to have a certain destiny and thus doesn't question what happens to them bc they accept everything to be part of a greater scheme and she starts rebelling against that bc she doesn't want to accept that she was supposed to forget everything about her life and then tons of stuff happens

4. What are you working on now?

a fantasy novel which is a collab with a writer friend that i still know from school and a drama novel, set in the 1960's

5. How do you get in the mood to write?

usually i just reread what i've already written and that does the trick for me but if not then go back to my outline and work a little on that which reminds me of all the cool stuff that i wanna write that's yet to come

6. What in your daily life inspires you to write?

everything and anything. inspiration doesn't come from a certain place from me, it's compeltely random. i just hear or see or read something and it sparks an idea and then i'm stuck with it

7. Do you have a favorite writing snack(s)?

i don't snack much whilst writing tbh bc then i need my hands to write. but i snack a lot to procrastinate and then any snack will do

8. Who do you go to first when you want someone to read/look over your writing?

the friend i do my fantasy collab with is the only friend whom i'm entrusted with almost everything i've written in the last three years and i've even shared some of my older stories with her

9. What got you started in writing for pleasure?

i can't remember if there was a specific reason that got me started. i always liked the creative writing tasks that we got in class so one day i wanted to try writing a book. that was pretty much it

10. How do you create your characters? Do you use a character sheet or another method?

my characters are usually the first thing that come to me so i don't actually use any specific method to create them. they all serve the plot and are built for necessity around my protagonist to create the most believable and most fun dynamic that ultimately leads my main oc to where they need to be

11. If you could have one famous person, from today or history, to read your best piece of writing, who would it be? This includes authors

jane austen probably bc i think she could give me good advice on character dynamics and would smack me on the head for making a man the pov character in my drama novel. but i also think she would be super nice and encouraging in her advice. also she's one of my favourite authors so there's that

@waywordwriter

Heels or flats? flats! i can't walk in heels properly

What’s your favorite Starbucks drink? i don't go to starbucks. if i go to any café i usually get tea if i stay in or coffee if it's to go

Winter or summer both are very uncomfortable, temperature-wise. but i'll go with summer bc it's nice to be too hot for once when you're usually always too cold

Do you write short stories? heck yeah i do!

Favorite author? jane austen bc i always feel good when reading her books

3 words to describe your protagonist(s) going only with daniel from my drama novel: repressed, oblivious, gay

3 words to describe your antagonist(s) well, in my drama novel there is no clear antagonist as in it's not a person and in my fantasy novel the protagonists are kind of the bad guys so i don't really know how to answer this. capitalism? prejudice? believing you know what's best for the people you love and acting on it until your behaviour is downright abusive? none of these are three words but i'm rolling with it

Favorite school subject? constantly changed. when i graduated it was english, german, spanish, art and philosophy

Favorite book(s)? also ever-changing but since i picked jane austen as my favourite author i'm going with pride and prejudice

Favorite music genre? don't have one, it all depends on the song but atm i listen to a lot of old rock

How was your day today? veryyy stressful and emotionally exhausting but i also got to see a good friend of mine that i hadn't seen in some time now and that was nice!

@i-rove-rock-n-roll

1. What part of worldbuilding do you like the least? i'm a sucker for worldbuilding to the point where i procrastinate writing bc i worldbuild too much. there is no part that i don't like

2. Do you write in your own language? If not, why? i do! but i also write in english. at first bc it forced me to simplify my sentences due to a lack of vocabulary but now bc i like it and it gives me the possibiliy to share my work with a wider audience!

3. How many of your characters are orphans or have absent parents? not too many, actually. i think it's mostly a thing in my drama novel where it's 2.5/5 (one being an orphan, the other having abusive parents and one case where i'm not even sure if it's just a very complicated relationship or if it counts as downright abusive but the story doesn't dive too deply into it either). in my fantasy novel it's just 2/6!

4. Do you have any happily married couples in your story? uhhh... now that i think about it.. i don't. wow. never realized that, you really got me there!

5. What kind of visual arts (cinema, sculpture, painting…) inspires you and your stories? all.

6. Did you ever go somewhere and think “this is exactly my story’s setting”? not really. but certain places do sometimes inspire me to set my story somewhere similar. my trip to cambodia led to an outline for a pirate story that has yet to be written

7. If you take public transports, do you ever look at the people around you and imagine their story? yesss, i am 100% that creep that is constantly observing and analysing other people

8. What is the last book you read (or are currently reading)? Would you recommend it? it was "the death of mrs. westaway" and i definetely recommend it! it was a good read. even though i guessed the ending it was still thrilling and it didn't chip away any of the suspense bc the author always kept me questioning myself and always had me asking "but what if i'm wrong?"

9. When was the last time you read fanfiction and what was it about? maybe about two weeks ago? i can't remember what it was about bc it was just small bits of fluff but i do remember that it was a merthur fanfic

10. What is the first thing that came to you for your WIP? Was it a scene, a character, or something else? going with my drama novel: it started out with the idea to write something where the story couldn't stand the way it does if a single sentence where to be taken out. to have something written so minimalistically that only what is absolutely necessary remains but still have it be interesting, engaging and compelling. so i started writing something from the pov of someone who is just the most oblivious rhabbarb the world has ever seen. the rest evolved around it

11. Is there a genre or writing format you’d like to try in the future? not currently. these things tend to come to me with time and as soon as they do i try them out at once bc i can't wait haha

@writingonesdreams

1. How much of your writing is influenced by your daily life? Like does what happened during the day affect what and how you write? not intentionally but when it happens (and i notice it happening, usually) then it influences mostly my characters. their aspirations, their internal conflicts. the reason why daniel is struggling with the expectations of others is bc it's something i experience myself, although maybe not as strongly as he does. but then again, that's kind of a universal experience so it's not that noticable

2. How much of you is inside your characters? every single one of them has something from me but i always make sure to never make them too similar to me and whenever i see myself too much in them i start changing them around until i can distance myself enough from them to be able to write about someone else's experiences instead of my own

3. Do you start writing from the beginning or somewhere else? yes, i usually do

4. What is the most difficult for you about writing? connecting scenes. i never know when to write something out or to sum it up in one sentence and just dive into the next scene. it confuses me to no end

5. What is the hardest part about creating characters for you? my characters tend to come very naturally to me. they're born out of necessity for the plot and thus are fitted to it. i guess what is most difficult for me is reminding myself of the fact that all my charas have a live outside of the plot, except for my protagonist and usually have more than just that one (1) friend

6. What are the themes of your wip and what do they mean to you? both my wips deal with questions of morality, loyalty and autonomy and those are all themes that i spend a lot of my free time thinking about and/or that are very important personally. especially autonomy was always something that i was taught to value as a child and that my parents value a lot as well, even more than most germans which is saying something.

7. What books/movies/series whatever inspired or influenced your current wip the most? i honestly don't know. they're both not consciously inspired by specific media although i don't doubt that i was influenced by a lot of different works

8. What would be the biggest appreciation of your work for you? if someone loved it. if someone would read it not just once but then again just bc they felt like it and wanted to insert themselves into the world again. if someone would love the characters and bond with them. if my work meant something personal to someone.

9. Why did you choose to write this wip and not something else? What’s so special about it? my fantasy novel: i wanted to do a collab with a friend of mine whom i've known for a while now and she only writes fantasy so i thought it would be a good excuse to try myself out in the genre my drama novel: i honestly don't know. i can't even remember how the idea came to me but suddenly i was heads deep in a 1960's period drama about a gay dude and social pressure. i guess it was the way i write it, as minimal as possible, that appealed most to me

10. What kind of scenes do you not want to write/don’t enjoys writing but can’t get around them? scenes where i don't know what's going to happen plotwise but only the feeling that i want to get across

11. What part of the writing process is your favourite? (Coming up with the idea, thinking, outlining, researching, writing itself, editing, reading what you have written, etc) worldbuilding and creating characters bc i get to enjoy the creative process without worrying too much about perfection and editing bc it's meditative and bc i feel proud for completing my draft and don't have to worry about still having to write anything out. but i also love reading what i’ve already written! i guess in the end i have fun with all the parts lmao

[rainycloudh-blog]

Dictionary of literary terms (A-U)

A

Alliteration:

The repetition of sounds at the beginning of words. It is what gives many a tongue twister its twist: How can a clam cram in a clean cream can.

Allusion:

An (in)direct reference to another text, e.g. the Bible

Anaphora:

The repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive clauses.

Antagonist:

An antagonist is the opponent to the protagonist/main character.

Antithesis:

A rhetorical or literary device in which an opposition or contrast of ideas is expressed.

B 

Bias:

A prejudice for or against one person or group, especially in a way considered to be unfair.

Broadsheet:

A newspaper with a large format, traditionally regarded as more serious and less sensationalist than tabloids.

Byline:

A line at the top of an article giving the writer's name.

C 

Caption:

A text that accompanies a photograph or illustration.

Character:

Character is the term used about the persons in a work of fiction. We distinguish between main characters (see below) and minor characters. In contrast to the main characters, who may be round and dynamic, the minor characters tend to be rather flat: they do not change or develop.

Chorus:

Part of a song that is repeated after each verse (= refrain in poetry)

Cliché:

A cliché is an idea or phrase that has been used so much that it does not have any meaning any more.

Climax:

The climax is the moment at which the conflict comes to its point of greatest intensity and is resolved. It is also the peak of emotional response from the reader.

Column:

a. A regular article on a particular subject or by a particular writer.

b. A vertical division of a page or a text.

Composition

Composition is the term used about the structure or organization of the events in a story – the elements of a text. A typical composition gives the events in chronological order, maybe with a flashback or two.

D 

Dialogue:

Dialogue is a conversation between two or more characters in a piece of literature. It can be written as direct speech (with quotation marks and “he said”) or the conversation can be presented as indirect speech (reported speech), not using the exact words used by the characters.

E 

Editorial:

A newspaper article expressing the editor's opinion on a topical issue.

Ellipsis:

Ellipsis is the term used when there is a significant jump in time to a later point in the story. The word refers to the fact that something has been left out.

Essay:

An essay is a composition giving the writer’s personal thoughts on or opinion of a particular subject or theme.

Ethos:

A form of appeal based on the speaker's character (e.g. reliability).

Exposition:

Exposition is a narrative technique that provides some background and informs the reader about the plot, character, setting, and theme of a story. In classical short stories, the exposition will be placed in the opening, but in modern short stories it may be placed anywhere – or even left out.

F 

Figurative language:

Figurative language is often associated with poetry, but it actually appears quite often in prose as well. It describes things through metaphors and other figures of speech.

First-person narrator:

The first-person narrator uses an “I”, takes part in the story but has no direct access to the thoughts and feelings of the other characters. Be aware that the “I” can only see things from his/her own point of view, and this also limits the reader to that one perspective – can he/she be trusted? (See unreliable narrator.)

Flashback: Flashback is an entire scene which leaves the chronological narration for a while and jumps back in time from the point which the story has reached. The purpose of a flashback is to provide background for present events.

Flashforward:

Flashforward is an entire scene which leaves the chronological narration for a while and jumps forward in time from the point the story has reached. The opposite of flashback.

Foreshadowing:

Foreshadowing is hints or clues in a story that suggest what will happen later. Some authors use foreshadowing to create suspense or to convey information that helps readers understand what comes later.

Formal language:

Formal language is a style of writing that often uses fairly complex sentences and neutral, sometimes technical, words that tend to be more difficult/abstract than common everyday words. Formal language is often used in official public notices, business situations, and polite conversations with strangers.

G 

Genre:

We say a poem, novel, short story, fairy tale, etc. belongs to a particular genre if it shares at least a few characteristics with other works in that genre.

H 

Hero:

The hero is the central character around whom the events revolve and with whom the audience is intended to identify. If the hero is female, we may use the term heroine. If the hero (or heroine) has an opponent, the villain would often be the preferred term for him (or her). If the hero behaves in an unheroic way, we could talk about an anti-hero.

I 

Informal language:

Informal language is a style of writing that uses everyday (spoken) language. It usually uses simple sentences and everyday words, sometimes slang and/or dialect.

Imagery:

Imagery is the use of vivid description, usually rich in words that appeal to the senses, to create pictures, or images, in the reader's mind.

In medias res:

In medias res is the term used when a story does not begin at the beginning, introducing the setting, the characters or the context of events, but instead opens “in the middle of things” (this is what the term means in Latin).

In retrospect:

Most stories are told in the past tense, thus indicating that they describe past events. But some stories - especially first-person narratives - make this much clearer than others, probably to remind the reader that the narrator is no longer the same; he or she is now older, maybe even wiser. The reader also understands, of course, that the events still mean something to the narrator. A story like this is told in retrospect, we say.

Interior monologue:

The written representation of a character's inner thoughts, impressions and memories as if the reader "overhears" them directly without the intervention of a narrator or another selecting and organizing mind.

Inverted pyramid:

The metaphor used in journalism to illustrate the placing of the most important information first.

L 

Limited point of view:

A narrator with a limited point of view knows only the thoughts and feelings of a single character, while other characters are presented only from the outside. This is also called a restricted point of view.

Logos:

Appealing to the receiver's logic and reason.

M 

Main character:

The main character is the central character around whom the events revolve and with whom the audience is intended to most identify.

Metaphor:

A direct comparison, used when you describe someone or something as if they were something else. If the comparison uses the words 'as' or 'like', it is called a simile: Human breath is like a dangerous weapon.

N 

Narrator:

The narrator is the one who tells a story, the speaker or “the voice” of an oral or written work. Although it can happen, the narrator is rarely the same person as the author.

Novel:

A novel is a long and complex story, usually with several characters and many related events.

O 

Omniscient narrator:

An omniscient narrator has a godlike perspective, seeing and knowing everything that happens, including what all the characters are thinking and feeling.

Onomatopoeia:

A term used about words that sound like the thing that they are describing. Animal sounds may be the best examples: quack, meow, croak, and roar!

Oxymoron:

A paradoxical antithesis with only two words: freshly frozen, deathly life.

P 

Parallelism:

The use of successive verbal constructions in poetry or prose which correspond in grammatical structure, sound, metre, meaning, etc. E.g. Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I may remember. Involve me and I will learn.

Paraphrase:

When working with difficult and/or condensed texts - typically poetry (and Shakespeare's plays), it is a good idea to make a paraphrase of the text to clarify its meaning. To make a paraphrase, you "translate" somebody else's words into your own, thus making the text simpler but without losing its essential meaning. A paraphrase is written in prose and can be done line by line, stanza by stanza, or whatever suits the text and your purpose.

Pathos:

Appealing to the receiver's emotions.

Personification:

A figure of speech which gives human qualities to inanimate objects, animals and ideas. The wind can howl, cats can smile, and hope can die.

Plot (and story):

The plot of a story is the order in which the author has chosen to tell the events of a story. It may or may not be chronological. The chronological order in which those events would have happened is called story.

Point of view:

The position from which the events of a story are observed or considered is called point of view. The author must choose to present the story from either a neutral point of view, one person’s point of view, or the points of view of several characters. They can be participants in the events, or simply observers.

Protagonist:

Protagonist is another term for the central character around whom the events revolve and with whom the audience is intended to most identify. If the protagonist has an opponent, he/she would be called the antagonist.

R 

Receiver:

In the communication model it is the general term used for the audience/listener/reader.

Refrain:

The part of a song of poem that is repeated, especially at the end of each verse (song) or stanza (poem).

Rhetoric:

The art of using language in a way that is effective or that influences people - rhetorical device.

Rhetorical question:

A question you answer yourself, or that needs no answer.

Rhyme:

When two words sound the same, especially at the end of each line.

Rhythm:

- or metre - a sequence of feet. A foot is a combination of stressed and unstressed syllables. The most common foot is an iamb: an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one, as in da-DUM.

S 

Scene:

In prose fiction, a scene is one part of the story during which there is no change in time or place.

Second-person narrator:

The second-person narrator uses a “you” about the main characters and his/her actions. It will feel as if this type of narrator is addressing the reader, or as if the reader is a character in the story, which is quite weird, and therefore a second-person narrator is rarely seen.

Sender:

In the communication model it is the general term used for the speaker/writer.

Setting:

Setting refers to the time and place of a story. If the focus is on the conditions and/or values and norms of people at a particular time and place, we talk about milieu or social environment.

Short story:

Short story is the term used about a brief work of prose fiction which usually focuses on one incident, has a single plot, a single setting and few characters. It tends to provide little action, hardly any character development, but simply a snapshot of life.

Showing: Showing is a narrative technique in which a character’s feelings and mood etc. are expressed in an indirect way (through what the character says and/or does) so that the reader may create his/her own images and understanding.

Six Ws:

The six elements that must be covered in an article: What has happened to Who, Where and When, How and Why.

SOAPSTone:

Acronym for the elements you look at when analysing non-fiction: Speaker - Occasion - Audience - Purpose - Subject - Tone.

Sonnet:

A classical poetic form which has 14 lines, subdivided through its rhymes into two parts. The Petrarchan or Italian sonnet: I = 8 lines, an octave, rhyming abbaabba, and II = 6 lines, a sestet, rhyming cdcdcd (or cdecde). The metre is an iambic pentameter (da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM). Shakespeare created his own version which has slightly different rhymes. 

Standfirst:

An introductory paragraph in an article, separated from the body of the text, which summarizes the article.

Stanza:

The grouping of lines in a poem, like the 'paragraphs' of the poem.

Strapline:

An additional headline above or below the main headline.

Stream of consciousness:

In literature, stream of consciousness is a narrative technique in which a character’s thoughts and feelings are expressed as a continuous flowing series of images and ideas running through the mind, thus imitating the way humans think.

Symbol:

A symbol is an object, a person or an event that represents or stands for something else, usually a general quality or an abstract idea.

T 

Tabloid:

A newspaper with small pages, traditionally popular in style and dominated by sensational stories, e.g. The Sun. Today, also some serious newspapers use the small size.

Telling:

Telling is a narrative technique in which the narrator tells the reader directly what characterizes the characters in a story – what they are like.

Theme:

Theme is the central idea, opinion or message that is expressed in the story. The heart and soul of the story.

Third-person narrator:

The third-person narrator uses “he”, “she” or (more rarely) “they”. This type of narrator provides the greatest flexibility to the author and is therefore the most commonly used narrator in literature. The third-person narrator’s point of view is what determines the type even more. If the point of view is from the outside, with no access to the thoughts and feelings of the characters, we call it an objective third-person narrator. If the narrator has access to one character’s thoughts and feelings, it is a limited (or restricted) third-person narrator. And finally, if the narrator has access to the thoughts and feelings of several characters, it is an omniscient third-person narrator.

Tricolon:

A list of three items, building to a climax, e.g. ... the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

Turning point: A turning point is a point (usually an event) in a story where the plot takes a (sometimes unexpected) turn, and things change because of this. In long texts, there may be more than one turning point.

U 

Unreliable narrator:

An unreliable narrator (usually a first-person narrator) gives his or her own understanding of a story, instead of the explanation and interpretation the author wishes the reader to obtain.

[pamphletstoinspire]

Fundamental Theorem of Calculus, from Math 121 Clark Univ.

[Feynman] "Do you know calculus?"

[Wouk] "I admitted that I didn't"

[Feynman] "You had better learn it...It's the language God talks."

Herman Wouk, converstion with Richard Feynman in The Language God Talks, p.5

"What is your number?" My grandson, Gabriel (age 2), on meeting someone.

"If you ask how such things can occur, seek the answer in God’s grace, not in doctrine; in the longing of the will, not in the understanding; in the sighs of prayer, not in research; seek the bridegroom not the teacher; God and not man " St. Bonaventure, The Journey of the Mind to God.

IS REALITY ALTOGETHER MATHEMATICAL?

In his very fine book, Is God a Mathematician?, Mario Livio gives a good history of mathematics and its foundational applications to science.  He also discusses whether mathematics is a Platonic ideal or is a construction of the human mind -- i.e. is mathematics "discovered" or "invented"? But he does not address the question posed in his title, which I propose to do in this post.  I'll also discuss some related arguments by physicists and philosophers that reality is mathematics (see references).

Now it goes without saying (although I will say it), that if God is omniscient, he knows everything and therefore, perforce, must know all mathematics. These propositions do not, however, require that reality is altogether mathematical, as suggested by Max Tegmark in his book, Our Mathematical Universe.  If reality is altogether mathematical, then everything can be quantified, represented by numbers or properties that can put into correspondence with numbers.  Is this so?

I invite the reader to suggest things that cannot be quantified by numbers.  Here's my list of a few such:

self-awareness, consciousness ("Cogito, ergo sum")

moments of communion with God, The Holy Spirit, Jesus

love of another

shame

anger

pain

happiness

joy

feelings aroused by nature

feelings aroused by music

feelings aroused by intellectual discovery

the literary excellence of a poem, a short story, a novel

boredom on reading blog posts dealing with the reality of mathematics

etc...

Now psychologists might say that most, if not all of the above can be quantified: just use the simple 1-5 scale as, in satisfaction response surveys. I claim that, unlike measuring the mass of a steel ball or its radius, such a procedure would not yield a universal measurement -- one person's "2" might well be another person's "4".  The qualia referred to in the above items are non-quantifiable, in the sense that a universally applicable measurement cannot be applied.

Let's explore just one of the above in more detail--feelings aroused by music.  In another post, God's Gift to Man -- the Transforming Power of Music, I've discussed the emotional and spiritual impact music has had on me, an effect which cannot be explained by mathematical relationships. The Pythagorean harmonies have no place in the dissonances of Bartok, Berlioz or even Mozart (Symphony #40, the Great G - Minor.

The inability of computation -- mathematics -- to emulate musical creativity is illustrated in a science-fiction story by James Blish, "A Work of Art".  In this tale "mind sculptors" of the future install a recreation of Richard Strauss in a non-musical volunteer.   The volunteer thinks of himself as a resurrected Strauss, composes an opera, and then realizes it uses old musical devices and is not creative.  At the concert in which the work is premiered, the volunteer knows that the resounding applause is for the mind sculptors, not for his musical work.

I AM NOT A NUMBER!" (Number 6, in "The Prisoner")

Let's turn to consciousness/self-awareness as an attribute of mathematical reality. Is the brain a "meat computer"-- can consciousness/self-awareness be programmed? In other words, does the self-aware brain operate by algorithms?  

The eminent mathematical physicist, Roger Penrose, has said no to this proposition in three books: "The Emperor's New Mind", "Shadows of the Mind", and "The Large, the Small, and Human Consciousness".  Penrose demonstrates, using Godel's Incompleteness Theorem and Turing's Halting Theorem, that the human can know the truth of a mathematical theorem even when a computer can not.

In "Shadows of the Mind" he gives four types of belief or non-belief in the possibility of Artificial Intelligence (AI), that self-aware intelligence can be programmed by some set of algorithms:

Consciousness is reducible to computation (the view of strong - AI proponents);

Consciousness can be simulated by a computer, but the simulation couldn't produce "real understanding" (John Searle's view);

Consciousness can't even be simulated by computer, but nevertheless has a scientific explanation (Penrose's own view)

Consciousness doesn't have a scientific explanation at all (the view of Thomas Nagel --see Mind and Cosmos)

Penrose is looking to a theory of quantum gravity to explain consciousness, The philosopher John Searle posits, as does Penrose, that consciousness has a scientific explanation , but that it will be an explanation in which consciousness is an "emergent" property of the brain's biochemistry and biophysics, much as wetness can be explained by theories of surface tension for water.  I have discussed Nagel's views (with links to other discussions) in the post which is linked to above.

A quantum computer (i.e. a scientist engaged in quantum computation), Scott Aaronson, has given an amusing and almost-convincing critique of Penrose's thesis in one of his Physics Lectures.  Some of his criticisms can be answered, particularly the one dealing with the Libet experiment, but I don't propose to engage that discussion here.  The critique relies primarily on two features: the activities of the mind are finite, not infinite; a computer which would be allowed to make mistakes would not be bound by Goedel's Theorem.

Finally, note that Max Tegmark does not show in "Our Mathematical Universe" how consciousness can be explained as a mathematical phenomenon.  He claims that this will be done in the future, but that seems to me very much like a scientism of the gaps.

IS MATHEMATICS QUASI-EMPIRICAL?

If mathematics (maybe I should upper-case that?) is to be the end - all and be - all of what is, then it seems reasonable to suppose that mathematics is complete in itself --there are no loose ends.  A primitive view of Goedel's and Turing's theorems suggest that this is not so.  The computer philosopher Gregory Chaitin reinforces this opinion in his books "The Limits of Mathematics" and "The Unknowable":

"What I think it all means is that mathematic is different from physics, but it's not that different. I think that math is quasi-empirical.  It's different from physics, but it's more a matter of degree than an all or nothing difference. I don't think mathematicians have a direct pipeline to God's thoughts, to absolute truth, while physics must always remain tentative and subject to revision [emphasis added]. Yes math is less tentative than physics, but they're both in the same boat, because they're both human activities, and to err is human." Gregory Chaitin, The Unknowable, pp 26-27

MY TAKE

I view mathematics, logic, reason as the foundations and the framework of the building in which we live.  There are essential additions--faith, religion, beauty, love, ... -- which are non-mathematical and above the bounds of logic.  As Pope St. John Paul II, said.  

"Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth; and God has placed in the human heart a desire to know the truth — in a word, to know himself — so that, by knowing and loving God, men and women may also come to the fullness of truth about themselves" Pope St. John Paul II, Fides et Ratio.

So my answer to the question in the title is, God is much more than a mathematician.

*I've gone back to my Jewish roots, inverted the title of a very good book, "Is God a Mathematician?" by Mario Livio, to make it a declarative sentence in form, but still a question (imagine a rising inflection at the end, as with a Yiddish or Pennsylvania Dutch accent); I've put one of the few Yiddish phrases I remember at the end.  If you don't know what "oy vey" means, I'll have to ask "what planet are you from?"

REFERENCES

Mario Livio, Is God a Mathematician?

Roger Penrose, The Large, the Small and Human Consciousness

John Searle, Minds, Brains and Programs.

Max Tegmark, Our Mathematical Universe.

Herman Wouk, The Language God Talks.

From a series of articles written by: Bob Kurland - a Catholic Scientist

[taiyakikancho-blog]

CAGD390 Week2

During the 2nd week tutorial, I spent my time conceptualising possible ideas for the major project (in relation to last week when identifying 3 project concepts).

I particularly focused on publication and branding design (doodles and jots are shown below).  

1st Idea: Publication design

I was inspired by some illustrative books that I saw during my trip to Korea, while I haven’t been to the bookstore in quite a while, I don’t feel like I have seen many illustrative books (with the exception of graphic novels/comics/storybooks etc). Especially ones that have coloured illustrations. I personally know a few old short novels with illustrations alongside the text, but they were in b&w. As such, I feel like I want to have a shot at publication design, with focus on possible experimentative layout/grid/text & illustrations and how it may be best represented for paper and digital formats. Possibly could design a front/back cover too? Would target young adults. 

Would require existing material:

- short stories (maybe roughly 200-300 words?)

- poems/haiku

- quotes

- anything motivational/

(Title rough translation): Don’t try too hard/ Don’t stress too much)

(Title rough translation): I am good as is)

2nd Idea: Branding Design

The 2nd idea I had was a branding design for a stationary shop that designs everyday goods (more so- pencils/pens/paper/cards etc. like Morning Glory = character-based merch). The name of the shop is “Poodle Doodle” - with a cute poodle mascot to match. The poodle would also have a rainbow lorikeet as a buddy. 

The branding brief would require:

- identity/branding design & system

- website?

- product samples

The brand aims to support eco friendly strategies in the making of their products. Has a recycling station to put in used pens etc. The owner has a poodle (?). Aims to stimulate creativity and motivation through cute stationary goods. Would target more towards younger audiences/ probably more female oriented?. 

[montpahrnah]

Hi! I know this might come out as a strange question, but do you think that gay marriage exist in the hp universe? And what are your thoughts on gay wizarding culture (is that even a word? Pardon me for my absolutely horrible english)? Anyway, I hope you're having a good day

beatrice you are the loveliest and i hope everything is bright and beautiful for you

so, as far as canon/word of jkr goes, i know she’s said something similar to what a lot fantasy/sci-fi writers do whenever this comes up, which is that ~wix~ are more tolerant than muggles and being queer just doesn’t matter, or no one cares, etc, which is an incredibly cheap cop-out for all the obvious reasons (and like, “it just doesn’t matter!!” et al is just… such a clueless, straight thing to say. of course it matters). the thing is, blood purity just doesn’t work as a catchall or replacement for real-world oppressions–as in, within canon, it doesn’t even work that way:  we have plenty of examples of sexism and misogyny throughout the series, very few explicitly non-white characters play significant roles, and the single canonically gay character is a chaste old man who has learned the error of his ways via a bad romance* and remains closeted for the entire series. THUS, i think blood purity is best (and most interestingly) viewed as another layer of oppression in addition to racism, sexism, transphobia, homophobia etc rather than a one-size-fits-all exchange for those things.

because of that, i tend to think wizarding society would progress along similar routes as muggle society re:  gay rights, liberation, marriage etc. especially because i think queer wizards would necessarily have to have a knowledge of both worlds/learn to exist in both–given how small and insular wizarding society is, the muggle world definitely has more going for it! there are absolutely gay wizard bars/clubs/groups/resources etc, but they’d be far fewer/possibly feel a bit claustrophobic given the relatively tiny population of magical folks in general (on the other hand, it would foster an intimate, invaluable sense of community), so i feel like straddling that border between muggle/wizard is inevitable! as a result they bring muggle ideas back with them/bring wizard ideas to the muggle world, and as they got involved in muggle movements, they’d come back and start their own concurrently in magical society.

as far as modern-day magical society is concerned, i see no reason why gay marriage wouldn’t exist! i do think it’d take a bit longer for them than for muggles, and let’s be real, strict pureblood families are never going to go for it (tbh purebloods in general probably don’t take well to it), though i’ve always had a headcanon that queer witches and wizards from those families typically try to seek each other out for sham marriages lol, though that obviously wouldn’t work every time. given that muggle-magical duality i think they’d probably opt for a joint ceremony to make everything official in both places, or maybe just have two separate weddings for both since that might make things a little less complicated… i was trying to think of co-magical/muggle spaces for this where that might have a lot of symbolic meaning but atm i can’t come up with much. also this is kind of tangential, but something i’ve always been interested in is thinking about non- and part-human populations that function mostly outside of both magical and muggle societies, i.e. kelpies, veela, even werewolf packs, because there’s no way they would conform to mainstream muggle or magical ideas about gender and sexuality and i’d kill for a fic that explores any of that someday!!

other than that, i think at hogwarts and even after, a whole lot of queer content both magical and non-magical would get passed around like contraband. certain of auden’s poems, rimbaud’s letters to verlaine, orlando, some of nin’s better short stories, illustrated magical copies of things akin to the joy of gay sex and various zines, mixtapes ft. queer artists/obsessive queer yearning, sleater-kinney’s music later on, my beautiful laundrette, g.l.o.s.s.’s demo, new bloods’ lone album passed around like a sacred heirloom… i like to think they sometimes come to muggle stuff years or decades later and are so extremely enthusiastic about it their muggle buds can’t even bring themselves to tell them they’ve already read it fifteen times. (though part of our shared history, i think, has that ageless quality:  given the scarcity of art about and for us, and given how close we hold those things that are ours, there’s something about them that always feels relevant–and such joy in seeing other people discover them.)

AGAIN, i’m always desperate to hear what people think about queer magical culture–tell me your headcanons!!!!! we don’t talk about this nearly enough as a fandom, u know?

*as i wrote this i remembered that i don’t think we actually have confirmation that grindlewald reciprocated dumbledore’s feelings, so maybe “romance” is a strong word? idk

[uchicagoscrc]

The stories books tell: Provenance

One of the most exciting aspects of working with rare books, especially books from the hand-press era (approximately 1450-1800), is that one often encounters evidence that can give some insight into the life of the book up until the time at which it came to rest with its current owner.  These can include marks of provenance such as bookplates, inscriptions, annotations, stamps, shelf-marks, etc. or evidence of the book trade like booksellers’ or binders’ tickets, publishers’ bindings, and even evidence of the physical production of a book like printing or binding errors, cancellations, variant states, etc.  Today’s post will focus on provenance marks; hopefully, this will become a short series on the book as physical object.

Provenance as defined by Merriam-Webster is: 1) origin, source; 2) the history of ownership of a valued object or work of art or literature. Many of us have encountered books with a library stamp or maybe even a former owner’s bookplate:

Or we may have been given a book for a special occasion inscribed to us from a family member or teacher. A book recently re-cataloged as part of a retrospective cataloging project, generously supported by Julie and Roger Baskes, revealed itself to be much more interesting than the old catalog record let on, largely because of the provenance evidence found inside.  This book (call number alc B659.D2 1501) is an early Latin edition of Boethius’ De consolation philosophiae printed in Strasbourg by Johann Grüninger in 1501. A book printed this early, just outside of the era of incunabula (1450-1500), has many interesting physical aspects including the types used, layout of the page, illustrations, etc., but more on that at a later date. University of Chicago Library’s copy of this particular edition is chock-full of inscriptions and annotations making it truly unique. The only printed text on the title page pictured below reads: Boetius De philosophico consolatu, siue De consolation[n]e philosophie, cu[m] figure, ornatissimis novit[er] expolit[us]. (Note: The letters in square brackets are the expansion of Latin abbreviations that were commonly used in manuscripts, and are frequently found in very early printed books)

The two large inscriptions here are excerpts from other texts about Boethius written in two different hands, that is, by two different previous owners of this book. The most interesting inscription on the title page, written in yet another hand, reads: Liber Ioannis Cincinnij Lippiensis: que[m] sibi comparauit olim quu[m] philosopharet studio Colonien[sis]. Anno D[omine] 1503. This roughly translates to ‘this is the book of Joannes Cincinnius of Lippstadt, bought while studying philosophy in Cologne, in the year of our lord 1503.’ As part of the re-cataloging project not only is all provenance evidence described in notes in the catalog record, but, if possible, an attempt is made to trace former owners with an added entry. The added entry, a standardized (a.k.a. authorized) form of the person’s name, allows the catalog user to collocate all instances in which he/she is listed as an added entry in the catalog by simply clicking on the name within the record. In this case, we have the owner’s name, his place of birth, place and discipline in which he studied, and the year in which he acquired the book. After a little searching in Google Books with various combinations of the information he left for us, I was able to determine that Johannes Cincinnius was a German humanist scholar who lived from approximately 1485-1555, and who amassed quite a large personal library. As luck would have it he already had an authorized form of his name in the online authority file, which made it easy to plunk him into the catalog record as a former owner of this particular book. 

While Johannes Cincinnius may have been the first owner of this book, he was definitely not the last. Throughout the text several other former owners have added marginal and interlinear annotations in Latin, underlining, textual corrections, manicules (pointing fingers), captioning of figures in the illustrations, and even musical notation.

In the image above a former owner has labeled the king in the illustration, based on the surrounding text and added a devil to Nero’s shoulder.

Here someone added musical notation for the first two lines of the printed text. On the blank verso of the final leaf there are extra-textual inscriptions and poems, mostly in Dutch, in at least four separate hands. 

This is just a sample of the provenance evidence that can be found in this book. If you are interested in learning more or examining this book in person, it is available to use in the Special Collections Research Center reading room.

[kaleidoscopictarotartprocess]

Week 1: Journal

(1) what was successful? 

I am really happy with the collages I created and like the ideas I generated for the analog project. 

(2) why?

I think the collages were successful because they are visually pleasing to look at [in my opinion] and they also tell some sort of story as well as have a strong connection with the card they were inspired from. 

In regards to the ideas I generated, I count this as a success because it gives me the proper footing moving forward to create content that is well thought out. Also having a list of ideas will help me if I hit some sort of mental block and am not sure what I want to do. 

 (3) what was unsuccessful

I did not create 15 analog assignments as was required of us. 

 (4) why? 

I fell short on time and am not someone who typically likes to rush through ideas just to get them down, I like to focus on my project and finish it and make sure it is something I am proud of before presenting it. In a situation like this, I think I should have done some more quick sketches just to help further visualize my ideas and meat the 15 composition requirement that was expected of us. 

(5) what would I like to test next? 

-wrap a cubic lamp I own with some sort of semi-transparent material and use different colors--> will resemble the star tarot card but also will be more colorful 

-mosaic with mirrors 

-stained glass with watercolor markers 

-Starbucks cup packaging 

-blow up the design on Starbucks coaster and paint splatter it 

-makeup designs on my face and/ or makeup template (take pictures)

-face paint card inspired designs on people and do a photoshoot of them with their cards 

-use the box for inspiration--> think pandora’s box 

-work with the holographic material on the sides of the cards (maybe buy some more as well)---> think futuristic/ cyborg esc 

-burn cards and videotape?

-videotape a reading 

-gif of a reading 

-photoshoot different tarot spreads 

-play with trippy lights 

-create a blue and red version of the card design and overlay the to make it 3D (will need 3D glasses) 

-house of cards with characters on the card cutout to make a kingdom 

-create a storybook in InDesign with card illustrations 

-collage made with cards/ scans of cards 

-alchohol packaging inspired by cards (ie. tequila and death card) 

-something with meditation 

-voice record a reading 

-virtual collage work--> cut out pieces of illustrations on the card and replace it with an image of glitter, gems, etc. 

-eyeglasses with mirror in frame facing in and the outside illustrate eyes like the omes on the box or maybe the high priestess card 

- fashion sketches--> inspired looks 

-black and white with pops of neon color 

-kaleidoscope pattern 

-colorful brain 

-work more with glitching 

-American traditional tattoos

-designa  pattern and project it ona  wall and take a photoshoot  

-paint masks (maybe glue on broken pieces of mirrors)

-contour line drawings 

-Forged in Fear poem w/ swords suit for inspiration 

[skeviviscom]

5. Don’t forget the picturesA picture book is a collaboration between an author and an illustrator (unless you’re one of the few who have the skills to be both). So think of the pictures as you write. Is there enough in your words for an illustrator to picture – changes of place, time? Is there too much detail? You don’t need to describe clothing, scenery, etc, in any detail because it will be in the pictures. Think pictorially and cut out what you don’t need (even if it’s your favourite piece of writing; if it’s not serving the story, then it has to go!).How to write a picture book

1. Listen, observe, scribble

The first thing you need to write a story is an idea. If you have young children (or grandchildren), keep a notebook handy and jot down things they say and do and are interested in. Ideas often spring up this way. Or perhaps it’s something that you recall from your own childhood. You might well find you reject a number of ideas before you come across one that really works for you.

2. What’s the point?

A story told to a specific child has its own value, but if you want to take it further it needs to have a wider resonance. So why would any child who doesn’t know you want to listen to your story? The theme doesn’t have to be original – the same ones come up time and time again (a favourite toy, fear of the dark, love between child and parent, common childhood experiences) – but the way you treat it does. Make it uniquely yours.

3. Human, animal or alien?

You’ve got an idea and a theme, now you need a character (or two). Who is your young reader going to identify with? You might decide it should be a girl or a boy (never an adult!) – but maybe it could be an animal instead: a bear, a cat, a monkey… Animal characters often are used anthropomorphically (acting as a child would), but sometimes are chosen for some particular natural trait they have – chameleons change colour, skunks make a stink. They also have more universality – for example, in a picture book story an elephant is just an elephant, we don’t think about its ethnic background. You might go even further and make your main character an alien – or set the story on an alien planet. Characters are the most important element of any story so it’s vital to get them right. They need to have “appeal”, even if they behave badly!

4. Keep it simple, make it sing!

Picture books are for young children. Keep sentences short and easy to follow. There’s nothing wrong with throwing in the odd unfamiliar word but too many and you’ll lose your reader. The type is large and pictures need space so you don’t have unlimited words (a max of 600-700, but preferably fewer). Like a poem, a picture book is written to be read aloud, so make the language sing. Only use rhyme if you are sure your story needs it and every word is moving the story on. More important are rhythm and repetition – how the story sounds. Remember you are writing for an older reader (a parent or sibling perhaps) and a child listener. It’s not easy, but you need to entertain them both. Keep the humour broad – irony’s a waste of time!