#the cover art is for an anthology I'm doing with some writer friends

[marlynnofmany]

Me: *working on cover art*

Me: "These green-glass edges look like asparagus."

Me: "That sounds like magic. What if--"

Me: "New story ideas later; finish art now!"

[fwoopersongs]

[Book Rec + Reaction/Thoughts] The Lantern and the Night Moths 灯与夜蛾 by Yilin Wang

An anthology of translated poems by five modern or contemporary poets and accompanying essays by the translator, @yilinwriter.

You can find the pronunciation guide and list of corrections here!

The cover art, a beautiful expression of the tone of this collection, is by Taiwanese artist Ciaoyin (check out her gorgeous insta!). I'm looking forward to the arrival of the physical book as my tab absolutely does not do it justice xD

Anyway! The official release date is 02 April 2024 though there have been some very thoughtful reviews by early readers already. Here, here, here and here.

(It was an ARC that I received too… though in the time it took to put this together, the ebooks have already gone out to readers >.< typical snail yj!) 

Instead, I’ll tell you who I think would be interested in this book or might benefit from reading it, then share things that are cool about it from the perspective of a bilingual hobbyist translator + lover of ancient poetry and lyrics.

Who should read it?

If annotations, translator’s notes and reflections spark joy for you...

If you’ve ever read poetry translations and been intensely curious about what goes on under the hood...

If you’re a translator yourself wanting to hear another voice...

Definitely check this out!

Also if you’re CN+EN bilingual and have ever read something in English that references Chinese terms and concepts etc. except ONLY in English, pinyin or wade-giles and been utterly frustrated by the ensuing guessing game (like me) Fear Not.

That will not be a problem here.

I really appreciate how Chinese words are used naturally where needed for concepts and quotes - they are also translated for those who can't read Chinese so no one is left out. It made this book of and about translation (and more) super comfortable to read! The solution is so simple, so direct, so rarely used that I am amused.

Oh, but do note that the Chinese characters are in simplified though!

The poems are organised by their writers who are listed here by order of birth year, not appearance in the book:

秋瑾 (Qiu Jin, 1875 to 1907)

废名 (Fei Ming. 1901 to 1967)

戴望舒 (Dai Wangshu, 1905 to 1950)

小西 (Xiao Xi, 1974 to _)

张巧慧 (Zhang Qiaohui, 1978 to _) 

Altogether, that covers nearly the last 150 years up to now. I’ve never really been into poetry by poets in such relatively recent times, in part because I’d been holding on to this stereotype of them spurning Classical Chinese and ancient poetry in the first half of the 20th century (not entirely true, as I came to realise xD). It made sense and was understandable, but felt sad.

Yet am I the target audience for this book?

Very much so.

In ways I didn’t think I would be too! It was so much fun to experience this both as a reader and a translator that I thought I’d share it here, where we are appreciating Chinese poetry together.

If you didn’t think you’d enjoy modern Chinese poetry, hey, give it a chance!

Oh yeah - on the way home a while back, I was talking to a friend about translation and was surprised to hear that her impression was that it ought to be a straightforward process. Like isn’t it a 1:1 conversion? At some point, ‘what’s the difference between something google translate might return, and how you would say it?’ was asked, and oh that was a delightful question to my ears! I showed her one of my comparison sheets where an original text is laid out alongside multiple translations line-by-line, briefly explaining some common and unique choices and how the people who had translated those probably arrived at the various interpretations. She was pretty amazed to see that the answer to her question was: very different. Hey, it’s a complicated process!

But there’s only so much one can explain in the space of a train ride. That’s why The Lantern and the Night Moths is a book I would also rec to someone like this friend of mine - open minded and curious but never having the chance to think about or encounter the craft of translation.

Like Yilin says, ‘the meaning of a word cannot be fully expressed in one single translation, nor through a series of translation attempts’. She then explains why with great attention to detail and some solid examples from one of the poems with word choices loaded with subtle connotations :D

What's interesting about it?

Okay, for one, Yilin shared a playlist of music that she listened to while working on this book. Here is the link to the spotify one and the one on youtube. Check them out! They sure put me in the mood to read xD (favs: 别知己, 小神仙 & 去有風的地方) Afterwards, this made so much sense like - ah! an audio moodboard.

She's also putting together these adorable mini profiles of each poet along with a cmedia and tea rec to match their vibes. Go see them on her instagram xD

Now to business...

structure

What really helped keep the reader’s focus was the way each section is organized, how the poems and accompanying essay were presented and finally the short bio of each person right at the end. 

The poets are first introduced through five or six of their poems, works well suited to this purpose. Their voices, distinct through the vision, ambition and emotion of their words, are brought across by Yilin’s sensitive, thoughtful and poetic translations into English. These translations were also creative and transformative in a way that made so much sense after reading one of her reflections on the process, how she ‘must guide it with gentle hands to ensure its spirit is kept alive and intact during this transformative, and often excruciating process’. A rebirth into another language!

Personally, I’ve come to think of reading translations as looking at a work through another’s eyes. So it’s delightful when the translator’s presence is discernible, and even more so when the reader is given insight into their intention and process via commentary. 

Yilin’s essays coupled with the poets’ bios at the end provide a means to go back and appreciate their works in context of their circumstance and inspirations. Similarly, to read the translations with a changed perspective.

I don’t know how much of a thing this is with translated poetry anthologies in English - can count the number I’ve read with both hands lol, and they’re all of the ancient chinese poetry variety - but I really like this design.

drawing on poets who came before them

Remember how we’re always recognizing traces of inspiration from ancient works (to them) in poetry of the various dynasties? 李商隐 Li Shangyin of Tang for example, was influenced by 楚辞 Verses of Chu and folklore and mythology such as that in 山海经 Classic of Mountains and Seas, 李白 Li Bai frequently references poets and history of the 魏晋 Wei-Jin era, and 王维 Wang Wei was clearly familiar with Buddhist scriptures which were translations themselves! 

Just like the late Táng poets whom he praised for boldly deviating from the voices before them, Fei Ming used popular references and tropey shorthands ‘in contexts utterly different from the original, reimagining them anew’. Dai Wangshu, too, ‘boldly re-envisioned what modern poetry could look like by revisiting the classics’. In fact, in his very relatable ‘To Answer the Visitor with Classical Imagery’, I see Li Bai’s 春夜宴桃李园序, Qu Yuan’s 离骚 and lots of - as the title says - classical imagery, as if pulling out painting after painting to describe a feeling.

And Dai Wangshu’s faith in the translatability of poetry, that ‘poetry isn’t what is lost in translation, but rather, what survives it’ reminds me of what a friend, @xiakeponz, said that I agree with so much - because readers can ‘experience something in their own individual way through (your) shared humanity rather than language alone’.

poetic tradition and beyond

Between the lines of contemporary poets Zhang Qiaohui and Xiao Xi, I can really see the charm of plain vernacular, how it can be beautiful, incisive and clever in turns. Even as it seems to have moved further than ever from the structure and language of literary Chinese, the themes that inspired common motifs remain a part of life. Mother and divinity, homesickness, finding oneself, tributes to admirable spirits and the issues that trouble society - just in a new form and with different ways of expression.

Qiu Jin

So many FEELINGS about what Qiu Jin was doing - ‘I awaken the spirits of women, hundreds of flowers, abloom’. I would love if she could see the world now. So many things for her to rouse and fight against, but at the same time just as many to be proud of. I am so in awe of her, but now hearing her loneliness and struggle there is a soft spot in my heart for those too. 

conclusion

So so so…

Qiu Jin’s admirable fire and lonely resolve. Zhang Qiaohui’s precious ability to express beauty in the mundane and in pain. Fei Ming’s utter delight! He is having so much fun and when* I’m vibing, I feel it too. Xiao Xi’s critical eye and keen observation of the world. Dai Wangshu’s whimsical charm and passion for translation. Finally, Yilin Wang, the connecting thread wound through them all, bringing them together so that we may be acquainted. 

*Reading his poetry is like unwrapping a seamless, many layered present. A gift that keeps giving - if only you have a key 😅 Fortunately, Yilin has halved our struggle 🤣

I’ve had such a great time with them all. And if you come, I hope you will too!

[tamiveldura]

I'm autistic and have ADHD, and I'm a chronic illness spoonie, and I'm here to tell you that A System is your friend. You don't have to write every day. You don't even have to write once a week. But you do need a system or routine that you can activate when it's Project Time.

I have been writing to-deadline for about 6 years now. I have never missed a deadline, but a few of those first ones were skin-of-the-teeth and I've been perfecting my systems ever since so that never happens again. I can't handle the stress.

The deadline is not a healthy motivator. Though my ADHD peeps will agree that it is effective. I've spent the last 6 years figuring out how to avoid Crunch Time.

The answer is a system.

I do not write every day. I do not track wordcount. I tried both of those and they don't work for me. (Maybe they work for you. Try it, but try other things too. Don't force it.)

Your system will be unique to you. But you'll figure it out by trying other systems on until you assemble the pieces that work.

My process looks like this:

Idea or deadline: either I've thought of a genius plot or I've chosen to tackle a project with other people (like a multi author series, or an anthology). Both of these trigger a new file in my scrivener wherever the story belongs.

Setup: I have a brainstorm document, an outline document, a draft document, a notes document. These keep the project contained.

Ideating: most writers really love this stage of a project, it's where all the great excitement of discovery lies. I dump all of this into my brainstorm document.

Plotting: works very well for me. Might not work for you. I organize all the tangled things in the brainstorm document into a structure. I check the beats of my chosen tropes. I hunt down plot holes. I scene block characters and action sequences in very rough terms just so I have large movement gestures. Emotional arc.

Drafting: not my favorite task, NGL. I dictate the initial draft and it's not good. I'm not trying to come up with beautiful words and amazing turns of phrase. I could, but it would make this part take 10x as long and it doesn't need to. Often this is a very dull series of simple sentences just to work my way through each scene. My goal here is to literally convert the plotting notes into the correct tense and sequence of events. Nothing more.

Revision: I like this part because I don't have to do the heavy lifting of "what happens next?" I already know what happens, now I get to make it pretty

PWA: proofreading. Not my strongest skill, so I use Pro Writing Aid to jumpstart me. It really helps with passive voice, which I'll slip into when tired.

Editing: paid. Not everything gets a paid pass. Some works go on submission. Others are released naked into the world. I do a lot of short stories.

Publishing: formatting, cover art, audio art, uploading, audio upload, newsletter announcement, promo scheduling, etcetcetc

Ok so these are the general steps of authorship, but what is the dang system?

The system boils down to two things:

1: days I decide I'm working

2: days I decide I'm not working (number 1 can turn into number two if it's a bad day)

By default I work Monday-Friday from about 1 pm to 4 pm. Weekends are off. Any day my husband comes home early gets cut short. Any day he is off I'm also off. Any day I wake up with no spoons, I'm off. Any day I realize I'm feeling stressed, I look at the calendar to check deadlines and book a week off. I take a week off after every novella or novel, but I'll go two or three short stories in a row. I take December off, usually starting at Thanksgiving and ending a week after new year.

You may be seeing a trend here. I take a lot of time off. It turns out, when I started giving myself the time I needed to rest and read and relax without guilt, my output on workdays skyrocketed.

Side note: you are probably not living with a sugar daddy paying the bills. I'm really fucking lucky to have funding in my corner. But REST is a requirement and you must do your very very best to protect your resting days/hours to the death.

Tami, I hear you say, what is the system? The writing system. The system that keeps you getting up every Monday-friday and having the energy and attention (if not the motivation) to work every day on the book?

Rest is the system. But the system is Deliberate. The system is Attentive. The system asks: is today a rest day? If yes what storytelling are we consuming to refill the well for our next workday?

It's not restful to doom scroll Tumblr "looking for inspiration." It's not restful to binge 6 seasons of Survivor in two weeks. Both of these things have their place, but when was the last time you deliberately planned your rest to be fulfilling and recharging? When was the last time you gave it any more thought then "I'm just tired."

The first day I decided to rest on purpose, I slept for 12 hours straight. The next couple of weeks were solidly 10/11 hours per night. That has since eased up to about 9 or 9.5, but it's 9ish Every Single Night. Before I decided to rest, I was only giving myself 6 or 7. Did you know some symptoms of chronic exhaustion are indistinguishable from dementia? I had no idea how much sleep I really needed.

If you're still here (I appreciate you), this is where we get to the work. You have rested. You have refilled the creative well. You wake up and decide Today Is A Writing Day.

Cool. Open the document and read your most recent chapter to figure out where you left off.

Take a glance at your notes or your outline if you have one.

What scene sounds fun today? Start writing that one, [put brackets around anything questionable] or that you have to look up later (do it later!) and as soon as you come to a point we're you've exhausted the initial energy of the day: STOP.

Write a few notes to yourself about where you think this is going next. And put it all away.

Congrats, you've probably been writing for 20 minutes. Maybe 50 if you had a good run. Perhaps you managed more than 1k. Maybe. I can only break 1k/hr when I'm dictating.

But Tami, the book is NineHundredThousand words long this will take forever.

Yeah, it will. It's a novel. But if you rest and you refill the well first, you will have more and more and more workdays.

You wanna write a book in a year? You're running a marathon, but you've gotta build up your muscles. It takes months, years, to train for a marathon. And you know what a marathon runner needs to train well and hard?

REST.

Writing Tip - What ‘Habit Over Motivation’ Actually Looks Like

We’ve all heard the writing advice that you can’t rely on motivation to get you through writing a book, sometimes you need to force yourself to do it and make a habit of it. And a lot of us will scoff at that or find it too restrictive or boring, it leaves us feeling like it’s a chore rather than a fun activity

As someone who only worked out what people actually mean by it recently, let me explain my take on it

You’re not always going to be inspired to write, you’re not always going to be motivated to write, but if you only write when you’re motivated it’s gonna take a crap ton of time - and writing anything to completion already takes donkey’s years as it is. Forming a habit is going to enable you to write consistently, and thus even unmotivated or uninspired progress is still made. Hence, sometimes you have to force yourself to write

But writing too much will make that habit impossible, or at least it becomes a chore and not a fun activity. You need to give yourself realistic goals to meet, even if it’s only something small. Write for ten minutes a day, write 500 words every week, any snail’s pace progress regardless of how insignificant it may seem. Something small enough that it doesn’t drain you but frequent enough that there’s still a habit being formed, there’s still consistency to it

I used to only write when I was inspired and motivated and could get myself to start writing, and even then the word count would be inconsistent. It could be weeks or even months between proper writing sessions. But now that I have a baseline for productivity, I have a baseline for consistent progress. And I’m only on 1K words a week! And if that doesn’t work, you can do less, or go by time spent writing if that’s a better metric for your writing style!

There’s no such thing as not enough progress when it comes to forming a consistent habit; if you can get at least one word per deadline (day, week, whatever) then that still counts as consistent progress

What everyone else seems to think of is “You must get this big amount of words written daily, think of it as eternal NaNoWriMo, if you miss even one day you’re a failure and you’ll never get the book done, SUFFER FOR YOUR ART!”

Just do what’s comfortable and it’ll be fine, no worries

[godzylla]

Comics I'm Excited About 4/11/2018

Howdy ho, comics fans! Gee, you all smell nice and flowery.

This week's releases contain some very interesting bits I'm going to cover.

I enjoy The Flash, but the series spends way too much with this silly "speed force." It's like making Batman about the Batcave or Superman about the sun. Nice idea for a story here and there but it shouldn't be the focus of the whole series for years on end. Issue #44 wraps up the current "Perfect Storm" storyline with Grodd, prepping the way for next month's launch of "Flash War". I've a feeling that the speed force is going to be the crux of that, too. Ah, well, this is fun, dancing on the periphery of the whole Rebirth/Doomsday Clock theme.

Something that fans have been waiting for for almost 40 years, Rom and the Micronauts are finally crossing over in IDW's, er, Rom and the Micronauts! Issue 4 drops this week, and while these aren't exactly the same characters that Marvel published, it's still great to see.

I dunno from the Exiles. It's an X book and for the most part that means I'm probably not interested, especially if it features characters created after 1985. However, there's a new Exiles series which also features the return (or has he already popped up somewhere?) of Nick Fury. But what's put it on my radar is that it it written by Saladin Ahmed, and that, my friends, makes me sit up and take notice! Ahmed is the writer behind the exquisite Abbott from Boom! Studios and that means I have to check this out. A good writer can make check out books I normally wouldn't glance at. Bonus, the artist is Javier Rodriguez!

Over in Captain America, Mark Waid has been doing everything possible to relieve the pain of the last couple years of the title (okay, that's just my spin; he's been working hard to produce the finest stories he can, as always). In #700, his final issue, he's setting things up to turn over to Ta-Nehisi Coates. But what's pricked my ears? Waid wrote a story with art by... Jack Kirby? Repurposed classic art from the King. I have to peek at this. Oh, this issue also features Chris Samnee's final art for Marvel (for now) as his contract is complete and he's free to do.. other stuff!

And finally, here're two somethings that've never been seen before in one package! A “reboot” and a #1 issue for Mad Magazine! After a delay, DC brought the operation out to the west coast to join the rest of the venture. Which means the "Usual" Gang of Idiots is actually a "New" Gang of Idiots.

On the trade front, be sure to check out Lazarus X+66, a nice companion to the series, collecting stand alone issues with Greg Rucka focusing on different characters with a variety of artists. Also arriving this week is America (Chavez) volume two, concluding the run of her recent series.

The Avengers: The Avengers/Defenders War: in 456 pages you will find a truly Epic Collection. Today, crossovers and battles between groups of superheroes is called an "event" and happens a couple times a year. To my mind, they usually aren't worth reading and because they spill over into dozens of other books they tend to ruin the stories in those books as well.

But this was something quite new at the time: a story crossing between two series, and a conflict that wasn't borne of too much testosterone. There really was a story here! Plus, this volume re-presents more crossover goodness from the Bronze Age, interconnected stories that weren't simply cash grabs but legitimate stories in addition to being cross-marketing.

Seriously, though, it collects not only 14 issues of The Avengers (plus Giant-Size Avengers #1), but 4 issues of The Defenders, Captain Marvel #33, Fantastic Four #150, and even a bit of fun from FOOM!

his gives me an opportunity to talk about something that I think is terribly important. Marvel Comics' Epic Collections are, at long last, the proper way to anthologize comics. Complete. Include appropriate sidereal material. And laid out so that the volumes' contents are planned for and they can produce them in any order (hitting things like this which have preeminence because of Thanos and Avengers: Infinity War coming to theaters this month), but the reader is assured that as Marvel fills in the gaps across the decades, they won't miss an issue or be forced to buy something twice within the series. Now, I fully expect the relevant issues of Avengers to be in The Defenders' Epic Collection series - I just mean that you won't have an Avengers Epic book that includes content from the preceding Avengers Epic volume.

This, along with DC's completely chronological presentation of Golden Age stories, is the proper way to anthologize comics.

[ladyjaneasher-blog]

Hey I came across Philip Normans book and as I'm not familiar with him I was wondering what was wrong with him as a lot of people seem to dislike him

short answer:

pictured here is philip norman writing anything ever.

long answer:

i honestly don’t know where to even start, dear anon. it would be easier for me to list what isn’t wrong with philip norman. i can’t tell you what people as a whole dislike about him, but i can tell what i dislike about him. my immediate kneejerk reaction to your question was this poem of norman referencing paul published in the sunday times in the early 70s:

O deified Scouse, with unmusical spouseFor the clichés and cloy you unload,To an anodyne tune may they bury you soonIn the middlemost midst of the road.

to paraphrase a comment i read on heydullblog a while ago: nothing like a biographer hoping for the speedy death of one of his (later) subjects. 

it exemplifies my problem with norman: he’s made a living out of holding a grudge for the pettiest reasons. he envied paul, not only because he was “good-looking” (and boy, does he veer off into paragraphes about paul’s “doe-eyes”, “angelic” “delicate features” only “saved” from girlishness by his “five-o’clock-shadow”) but also for his “mounting riches” and his dating of “a classy young actress”. his envy turned into outright dislike for paul. norman saw paul’s failed relationship with jane as his “public sense of duty” weakening; he blamed paul for the end of the beatles, felt that he had turned into a “self-satisfied lightweight” and you can almost feel his satisfied glee whenever he feels that paul’s life veers of its “perfectly polished-rails”.    

i’ve read a few books by norman – most recently paul mccartney: the life – and excerpts of others, and each time i’ve come to the same conclusion: norman comes across as a very peculiar mix of a self-importantance, jealousy and nastiness. much like other authors of his caliber – sounes comes to mind – he seems to have been motivated by these emotions that had left him embittered enough to write books, rampant with confirmation bias, one-sided accounts, mistakes, snipes, digs and disproven or outdated anecdotes, hardly offering any new insights. yet i don’t want to dictate how you think about norman, so i present to you some pearls of wisdom by our dearest of beatles biographers to make up your own mind about how much he’s on the mark – or how far off:

“Barrow later discovered that when they’d signed their management contract, Paul had told Brian that if the Beatles didn’t work out, he was determined to become a star on his own.”

‘[And] unlike John (and Brian), Paul did not seem to have any half-concealed demons to deal with.’

“Over the next six years, Barrow would realise that the inexhaustible geniality Paul showed the world was not always replicated in private.”

“[…] Frieda Kelly[…]” (throughout the entire book, I might add)

“With the Beatles brought a radical change of image, illustrating the vastly altered demographic of those who were now with them. On the Please Please Me album cover, four cheery, unabashedly working-class lads had grinned down a stairwell at EMI’s Manchester Square headquarters, with Paul’s good looks barely noticeable. Now they were shown as solemn, polo-necked faces half in shadow against a plain black background, less like pop musicians than a quartet of Parisian art students. It was an ambience which suited none of them better than Paul, that one-time art student manqué.”

[1968/1969] “John had always been recognised as an uncontrollable maverick, but being a Paul fan involved a strong feeling of proprietorship. Like so many tut-tutting aunts, the gate pickets now observed the change from his former dandified, fastidious self; the bushy black beard, the perceptible weight-gain, the baggy tweed overcoat he seemed to wear all the time. To the fans, it signified how ‘she’ [Linda] had got her hooks into him; what it actually signified was that he was happy.”

[1968/1969] “His [Paul’s] personal life thus replenished and stabilised, he now turned his attention to replenishing and stabilising the Beatles after their ordeal with the White Album.”

“Knowing now just how much McCartney meant to Paul–and feeling a twinge of compassion for one who’d never before invited such an emotion–Ringo talked the others into reinstating its 17 April release.”

In the same week, Stella’s first collection for Chloé was shown in Paris with the help of her ‘mates’ Kate Moss, Naomi Campbell and Yasmin Le Bon. Paul and Linda were both seated beside the catwalk: he [Paul] in the novel position of applauding someone else, she still with close-cropped hair, the result of prolonged chemotherapy, which gave her face a new gentleness and repose.

The order of [Linda’s] service was as meticulously planned and arranged as a McCartney album tracklist.

However, when the Beatles made the Decca tape, Best had still been with them, so was due a share of royalties from ten tracks used on the Anthology. The first he knew about it was a phone call from the one who’d been so keen to get rid of him [Paul] –the first time they’d spoken since it happened.

all of the above quotes – and keep in mind: these are just a select few that i had at hand from a book that spans around 800 pages of much the same quality of writing – are from paul mccartney: the life, published in 2016(!!!). while norman proclaims to have had a change of heart over the years from his previous assessment of paul in shout!, which he in the very same breath during promotion claims wasn’t really anti-paul:

…it rings hollow. to the point of where i’m not the only one wondering about how much he truly means his words, and how much of it is simply trying to save face in light of his waning monopole on being an authority when it comes to beatles history. he still heavily relies on the same old tired clichés: paul the master manipulator of all around him lacking heart and substance, paul the ambitious starlet ready to sacrifice everything and everyone, determined to make it big, paul the stingy boss of wings, paul the borderline abusive husband to linda’s dichotomy of easy american groupie vs fraught shy housewife trying to escape her domineering husband by way of her career as a photographer and writer. some of them may perhaps contain a kernel of truth, but norman seemingly lacks the ability to acknowledge nuances and the willingness to dig deeper, search for other viewpoints, or consider context. 

he still uses every other opportunity to get his digs in no matter how macabre it may be in the light of events he’s referencing as evidenced by his description of linda’s funeral procession; he, at times, solely relies on people with questionable motives like peter cox for entire chapters without questioning a thing they are saying, or letting the reader hear other voices to provide a more balanced view; he lacks the insight into his subjects as portrayed by his claim that paul’s weight gain and drastic change of looks from ‘68 to ‘70 was brought on by being “happy” with linda or his equally outrageous claim of ringo never having felt a “twinge” of “empathy” for one of his closest friends; paul and john’s relationship is reduced to a rivalry that even to john’s last breath was defined by one-upping each other. although, is it perhaps no wonder considering that paul mccartney: the life seems to be mostly a copy/paste job of his previous books (here a part of shout!, here a part of his john biography).

the less said about shout!, published in the early 80s, the better. suffice it to say that during its promotion, norman titulated john as “three-quarters of the beatles”. yes. i repeat: the less said, the better. it’s only sad that this book helped shape entire generations of authors that would buy into norman’s narrative and perpetuate it decades later.

yet my excerpt of philip norman’s books simply don’t do the man’s tastelessness and scope of grudge-holding justice. for your reading consideration i present you philip norman’s letter to paul from 2005 as well as his obituary for george harrison and his complete dismissal of ringo from an interview in 1987.

to not let this already too long post end on such a note, i feel obliged to throw in this quote by mark lewisohn, who was partly motivated by norman’s… skill, to research the topic on his own:

Mark Lewisohn: “I came to meet Philip Norman. He wanted to meet someone who was a kind of studious Beatles fan, if you like. And when we met it became clear that there were certain areas of the story he was unclear of. There were certain areas that were cloudy. And I said I would research them for him. I was 21 and he said, yes, that would nice. So I still had a job, but in my weekends and evenings I did this research for him. I was so intrigued by the findings, that I just carried on after that. I gave him what he wanted and then carried on researching and I haven’t stopped to this day.”DK: “By the way, what do you think of his book, Shout!? I don’t mean to be putting words into your mouth, but your intent, I think, is to correct a lot of mistakes that have become fact as a result of other people’s biographies of the band. Could you bring that into perspective?”Mark Lewisohn: “Well, when I was less mature, I did want to correct other people’s errors. Errors always offended me, particularly when they resulted from laziness. And I had always wanted to correct other people’s errors. But I’ve grown up, a bit, since then, and with these three books I’m writing, I’m not interested in correcting anything. I’m just telling the story from the beginning. I am starting fresh. And along the way, I am debunking myths right, left and centre. But I am not pointing out what they are, because it is not relevant. Shout!, when it came out in 1981, just after John Lennon was murdered, was the second Beatles biography, with the first being the Hunter Davies biography which came out in ‘68. And it was reckoned by a lot of people to be better than the Hunter Davies book. And because I am in it, and because I was young, and because I was blinded to it, I thought it was a great book. And a lot of people do. It is so stylishly written, and all of that. But the older I’ve got, the more I see where I can no longer agree with my original opinion. Well, Philip Norman came up to me at a recent event and said he professed himself unhappy with some of the things I’ve been saying about his book, so I need to be delicate here. But I do think that it is out of date. It left scope for the job to be done again. That book has had 30 years in the sunshine, but it is in no way the definitive book. I am hoping to write the definitive book that is a lot more comprehensive and is also much more deeply rooted in research.“

mark lewisohn: beatles researcher extraordinaire and classy thrower of shade.

[marlynnofmany]

I've recently discovered your take on... well Tumblr. Amazing 👏 love the work! Fabulous!

Then I've noticed: you wrote a book! (It being in my amazon basket and waiting for payday), may I be so bold as to ask: do you publish yourself? Writing, editing, publishing, all the jazz? I'm very curious 😆 like a cat. Curiosity still hasn't killed me, so why stop now? 🤣

Thank you! Yes, I've written several, and I publish them myself. My original plan was to get an agent who would introduce me to the big publishers who would shower me with money and fame, but that turned out to be, shall we say, unlikely. (The industry is changing fast. Even the lucky souls who do get a deal with the big publishers generally don't make much money.)

But luckily for me, self-publishing has turned into an arguably better route in many ways! I've tried a few different companies (BookBaby, Ingram, Draft2Digital), and I plan on sticking with Draft2Digital for the foreseeable future. I'd be happy to go into detail if you're interested.

Self-publishing does mean that it's on me to either Do All The Things, or to pay other people to do some of them for me, but I enjoy adding new skills to my hoard! And this is the internet age when you can learn just about anything online. Plus I've made a lot of writer friends who are in the same boat, and sharing resources/recommendations/etc is GREAT.

Everybody wants to help everyone else! YouTube is full of how-tos, and every indie writer I know will happily share what expertise they have with anyone who asks. Including me. :D Feel free to ask more questions!

Here's a list of all the books I've put out, including my own novels and anthologies that I organized (editing and formatting and cover art, oh my), plus a collection of writing prompts because I have far more ideas than I'll ever have time to write.

More of everything is on the way! This is the career I've been aiming for since I was a kid, and it's a blast.

[bishophazel]

The fact that they're also calling the condemnation of generative AI classist and ableist is an insult and a disgusting move on their part. LLMs and generative AI don't help disenfranchised or disabled writers, they steal from them and everyone else.

I once worked with the Young Writers Program, meeting with kids, editing and formatting books. That was a long time ago. I'm revolted to see what NaNoWriMo is doing now.

I've never officially participated in the writing event (I tend to do the bulk of my writing earlier in the year) and it goes without saying that I'm grateful my work isn't living on their site somewhere, feeding the eldritch AI horror.

Fuck this shit.

ON AN ASIDE I work full time as a professional author now. I specifically submit work to publishers with anti AI policies and avoid those who don't (here's looking at you, TOR). There was a recent kerfuffle where a short story I wrote got paired with AI art. Thankfully, my best friend caught it right out of the gate and the publisher gave me traditional art. Where am I going with this? GET ANTI-AI IN YOUR CONTRACTS!

No matter what level you're writing at, if you're selling work (even to online or print publications that don't pay), negotiate anti AI into the contract. Publishers can take steps to protect your work (to some extent) from being fed to the AI barf machine, and you can put protections in place so that real artists or images/graphics get used with your work, not AI regurgitated garbage. Selling a novel to a publishing house? Require AI protections for your writing, demand real art/images/graphics be used for your cover, advertising, marketing, everything. Protect yourself, editors, and artists/designers. Selling a short story for zero dollars to the local anthology and there's a contract? DO THE SAME THING.

I am *just* learning this shit and learning how to advocate for myself. I have a lot to learn as I go and will do my best. Generative AI has NO PLACE in the arts of any kind. I will fight on this hill, I might kill on this hill, but god damn it I won't fucking die here.

So... apparently the NaNoWriMo organization has been gutted and the people at the top now are fully focused on Getting That AI Money.

I have no reason to say this other than Vibes™️ and the way that every other org who has pivoted to AI has behaved but I wouldn't trust anything shared with or stored on their servers not to be scraped for training LLMs. That includes pasting stuff into the site to verify your word count, if that's still a thing. (I haven't done Nano since 2015).

Also of note:

Age gating has been implemented. If you haven't added your date of birth to your profile or if you're under 18, it's supposed to lock you out of local region pages and the forums. ... It's worth noting that the privacy policy on the webpage doesn't specify how that data is stored and may not be GDPR compliant.

...

Camp events are being run solely by sponsors. Events for LGBTQIA+, disabled writers, and writers of color no longer appear to be a thing at NaNo.

Just... go read the whole thing. It's not that long. Ugh.