the importance of being verbose
Nov. 3rd, 2008 08:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ontologyNaNo, day three. My head asplode.
I'm just over four thousand words, which is fairly good, I suppose. It's quite a lot more than I have written in some time, so that is encouraging. The story, however, is a complete mess, and I am trying to remember why I was in love with it in the beginning. Perhaps when one of the pertinent plot points actually crops up -- so far there has been no vampire slaying, though vampires have been mentioned (somewhat abruptly), and no vampire culture, and no underground city, and nothing is really in proper order, some of it doesn't make any sense, the character introductions are hazy (and I still have no idea where Mrs Nox is! she hasn't been mentioned, even by the gossipy neighbours!), the story wavers from third to first person, and worst of all, is terribly boring. I am also thoroughly winging it at this point, having little idea of what I'm about to write next. Also my usual problems of being unable to understand the physical world are cropping up -- I have immense difficulty visualising buildings, having houses make sense, having cities make sense, and my London is very non-specific and has no flavour at all.
Some interesting surprises, however: Evangeline seems to have some sort of supernatural ability to sense stories, and I have no idea what that means. It might be connected to how vampires acquire memories when they drink, but having Evy acquire vampire-like abilities doesn't make sense either -- there is no interbreeding, I think that sort of thing is ridiculous, vampires are dead. Also a Miss Lottie McKenzie also works at the library, apparently. She just cropped up today, name, cheery clumsiness, and all.
I find myself now in non-novel typing and also in speech unconsciously attempting to use as many words as possible. Heh.
BAHHHH. Please tell me that very wonderful books have had truly abysmal first drafts.
In other news, I start work tomorrow. At seven forty-five in the morning, eep. Which is why I am going to bed any minute now. Despite the hideously early hour, I am quite excited. Perhaps the change of scenery will set my gears to turning again. I have frequently been told that there are long stretches of boredom at the calendar kiosk, so perhaps I can do some scribbling now and then. Also, I made chocolate chip cookies (with a dash of peppermint). They are very cosy.
I'm just over four thousand words, which is fairly good, I suppose. It's quite a lot more than I have written in some time, so that is encouraging. The story, however, is a complete mess, and I am trying to remember why I was in love with it in the beginning. Perhaps when one of the pertinent plot points actually crops up -- so far there has been no vampire slaying, though vampires have been mentioned (somewhat abruptly), and no vampire culture, and no underground city, and nothing is really in proper order, some of it doesn't make any sense, the character introductions are hazy (and I still have no idea where Mrs Nox is! she hasn't been mentioned, even by the gossipy neighbours!), the story wavers from third to first person, and worst of all, is terribly boring. I am also thoroughly winging it at this point, having little idea of what I'm about to write next. Also my usual problems of being unable to understand the physical world are cropping up -- I have immense difficulty visualising buildings, having houses make sense, having cities make sense, and my London is very non-specific and has no flavour at all.
Some interesting surprises, however: Evangeline seems to have some sort of supernatural ability to sense stories, and I have no idea what that means. It might be connected to how vampires acquire memories when they drink, but having Evy acquire vampire-like abilities doesn't make sense either -- there is no interbreeding, I think that sort of thing is ridiculous, vampires are dead. Also a Miss Lottie McKenzie also works at the library, apparently. She just cropped up today, name, cheery clumsiness, and all.
I find myself now in non-novel typing and also in speech unconsciously attempting to use as many words as possible. Heh.
BAHHHH. Please tell me that very wonderful books have had truly abysmal first drafts.
In other news, I start work tomorrow. At seven forty-five in the morning, eep. Which is why I am going to bed any minute now. Despite the hideously early hour, I am quite excited. Perhaps the change of scenery will set my gears to turning again. I have frequently been told that there are long stretches of boredom at the calendar kiosk, so perhaps I can do some scribbling now and then. Also, I made chocolate chip cookies (with a dash of peppermint). They are very cosy.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-11-04 02:34 am (UTC)I <3 your word, asplode. Wonderful.
And yes, from what I've heard, many first drafts are deemed unreadable by the author. That doesn't mean they are, really :) I suspect it's an insecurity of all writers.
no subject
Date: 2008-11-04 03:25 am (UTC)♥
Forge onwards. I know how you feel. I am kind of just muddling though, am nowhere near 4,000 words, and kind of ... yeah. I am sure that your novel is a lot lovelier than you think it is, though. ;)
Yay work! This is exciting! Surrounded by words = inspires words?
no subject
Date: 2008-11-04 03:31 am (UTC)The first week of NaNo is always the hardest--it's so much easier when I'm cheating and working on something I've already started XD My reaction to tough sections always seems to be making something happen (pushing the main character's grandmother down the stairs, for instance) or throwing in new characters (why is there a random new character? eeeeer....)
And I have been skimming your NaNo posts, and I had started a playlist of things that I thought might suit your purposes--not a long list, because so much of the folk music I happen to have is too American, and the instrumentals the wrong period, but we do have a bunch of George Winston if you're interested?--and there was one song, a sea shanty in French that mentions three sisters and is an old recording sung by two women or girls with rather unnervingly high and small voices, the kind of thing that would be easy to warp into something really creepy....and now, of course the computer crash has caused me to lose all of my iTunes playlists. So I have to find it again! But when I do I'll post a link.
no subject
Date: 2008-11-04 04:09 am (UTC)My story is abrupt and slightly random at times to, but I am still going to finish. You can always polish it later.
no subject
Date: 2008-11-04 05:26 am (UTC)The lyrics, and a bit of commentary that I found on it:
Sept Ans Sur Mer
On a reste/ six ans sur mer
Sans pouvoir border la terre.
On a reste/ six ans sur mer
Sans pouvoir border la terre.
Au bout de la septieme annee
On a manque/ de provlslons?
(2x)
On a mange/ souris et rats
Jusque le touvre du navire.
(2x)
On a tire/ la courte paille
Pour voir lequel qui s'rait mange/
(2x)
"En voila, p'tit Jean, s'il tombait-z-au cas,
Ca serait p'tit Jean qui serait mange/.
O voila, p'tit Jean, qu'il tombe sur toi,
Ca serait p'tit Jean qui serait mange/.
"O p'tit Jean, ca fait du mal."
Il crie, "Courage, mes camarades."
(2x)
"Je vois la terre sur toutes cotes,
Trois pigeons blancs qui s'a votltige/.
(2x)
"Je vois aussi trois filles du pere
Que se promenaient au bord du rivage.
(2x)
"O si jamais je mets pieds sur terre
La plus jolie je l'e/spouserai.
(2x)
On stormy seas we six years sailed,
And never once green land we hailed.*
(2x)
The bitter seventh year came on,
We found our stores at last were gone.
(2x)
We ate the mice, we ate the rats,
And through the hold we ran like cats.
(2x)
And then at lots we took a try
To see which one of us would die.
(2x)
"Look, little John, if chance does will,
It's you we'll take, it's you we'll kill.
(2x)
"Too bad, Little John," they cried
"Oh, courage, comerades, "he replied.
"For I see land on every side
And three white pigeons towards us fly."
"And I see lovely sisters three
Come walking down all by the sea
"And if I set my foot on land
I'll ask the fairest for her hand."
"Perhaps no other sailor's chantey can compare with 'Seven Years at Sea' for fame and historical interest. It is one of the most extensively traveled songs of European folk repertoires. Best known on the shores of Brittany and Poitou where it seems to have originated, It has spread across France
and followed thwe seacoast into neighboring countries, north and south. It occurs in Icelandic, Danish, Norwegian, Catalan, Porugese, Spanish and Swiss (sic) versions. Thackarey adapted it for a humorous rhyme called
'Little Billee'" Marius Barbeau, Folk-Songs of French Canada
note: see also Ship in Distress RG
note2: the slashes are an attempt to produce an accent acute in ASCII
no subject
Date: 2008-11-04 05:42 am (UTC)It gets better every year. But don't ask Rose...
no subject
Date: 2008-11-04 05:47 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-04 08:15 am (UTC)ty
no subject
Date: 2008-11-04 01:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-05 05:23 am (UTC)...maybe?
Hmm, both of those things just happened. I have a new librarian, and all of the lights have just gone out. Seeing as this is the age of gas-lamps, this is a bit suspect.
Oooh, hurrah! I am very interested in your playlist. I have a bit of George Winston (mostly Christmas, and I think we have some on tape somewhere, but we never listen to tapes except on car trips in Dad's CD-player-less van) and love it quite a lot. And sea shanties for the win!
(Losing playlists is devastating. This happens to me with disturbing frequency, and I have a lot of playlists. :p)
no subject
Date: 2008-11-05 05:24 am (UTC)(o hai, Randy Giles!)
no subject
Date: 2008-11-07 04:47 pm (UTC)Of course they do. Remember Trotter? And
TevildagornTevildo?As for Evy's ability to sense stories--very interesting. That would obviously have a lot to do with her being drawn to libraries, I imagine--like, maybe just being around books, not even reading them, helps her absorb a sense of story or something? And...well, if this is a supernatural sort of thing, there are a couple ways you could go with it that I could see being very helpful in the whole vampire-slaying thing--on the one hand because she has all this knowledge of story forms, she might be able to sense the strongest possibilities for which way a certain story is going to go, which would therefore translate into a slight clairvoyance in real life (a bit like the shebiyl, heh--he just saw possibilities for the future, after all). But on the other hand, she might be able to sense something of the past, too, like the stories of objects or people--so, I don't know, if they come across a place where vampires might've been, she could...touch something and get a vague sense of what happened there? Something like that?