The Literary Hobby Thread

[skeptik]

You still need to post that shit and let others read it.

Reading it over, I've realized that I actually don't like a lot of it, and a lot of it is overly verbose to the point that it actually distracts, so I'm probably going to rewrite this some day. It's too long to post here anyway, but I'll post this section:

"As an atheist, I have never placed significant value on the mere institution of living, and as a result would not put much emphasis on the event of death in and of itself. Most theistic cultures throughout history have seen fit to have much pomp and circumstance surrounding their rituals and ceremonies of death. They also, however, have a long tradition of theories of the afterlife, and the possibility of perpetual damnation, which in turn results in a great fear and anxiety associated with the end of life. Of course, the prospective afterlife is what makes the cessation of life such a significant occurrence for the theistic traditions; thus, removing that element from the equation significantly reduces the importance one may place on it. The logical conclusion from all of this would be that the theoretical act of suicide becomes more of a legitimate alternative to continuing to live when there is no dogmatic attachment to the lasting repercussions that may follow the deceased into the afterlife, as such traditions as Dante have held. Suicide may indeed be particularly appealing for an atheist who may not have been rewarded with the most favorable of conditions in life. After all, if one’s life is so dire, what worth is there to continue dwelling on this hell on earth by prolonging the inevitable fate of death? Once your heart ceases to beat, your eyes cease to see, your brain ceases to process and interpret, you have no cognizance of the ramifications that may grip those who knew you in life. You have no care nor need to care for the continuance of events on the mortal plane, not even for the events of those closest, when you are no longer an interactive entity and have fallen out of existence. One may question why a man holding such beliefs as these does not simply kill himself to escape the pain, suffering, and betrayal of all natures that makes up the foundation of life. I myself long struggle to find a logical answer that can adequately satisfy the depth of this inquiry…and yet the sheer perpetuation of my existence stands as a glaring contradiction to this very proposal."

 

[Lies and Perfidy]

edit: just remembered that I even went with a few buddies to specifically seek out the City Lights Bookstore in SF

i worked in their publishing department's mailroom for a year. the most interesting part was getting to pick books to send to convicts who wrote in seeking reading material. i also helped Lawrence Ferlinghetti move some boxes full of unpublished Ginsberg writing (apparently, mostly drug-fueled typewriter scrabblings.)

I have to be honest, On the Road didn't hit me that terribly hard. I enjoyed it, but I was much more fond of Kerouac's debut, The Town and the City (which is much, much less stream-of-consciousness than his later works.) I guess I'm a bit of a stickler for prose.

 

[spaffe]

Reading it over, I've realized that I actually don't like a lot of it, and a lot of it is overly verbose to the point that it actually distracts, so I'm probably going to rewrite this some day. It's too long to post here anyway, but I'll post this section:

"As an atheist, I have never placed significant value on the mere institution of living, and as a result would not put much emphasis on the event of death in and of itself. Most theistic cultures throughout history have seen fit to have much pomp and circumstance surrounding their rituals and ceremonies of death. They also, however, have a long tradition of theories of the afterlife, and the possibility of perpetual damnation, which in turn results in a great fear and anxiety associated with the end of life. Of course, the prospective afterlife is what makes the cessation of life such a significant occurrence for the theistic traditions; thus, removing that element from the equation significantly reduces the importance one may place on it. The logical conclusion from all of this would be that the theoretical act of suicide becomes more of a legitimate alternative to continuing to live when there is no dogmatic attachment to the lasting repercussions that may follow the deceased into the afterlife, as such traditions as Dante have held. Suicide may indeed be particularly appealing for an atheist who may not have been rewarded with the most favorable of conditions in life. After all, if one’s life is so dire, what worth is there to continue dwelling on this hell on earth by prolonging the inevitable fate of death? Once your heart ceases to beat, your eyes cease to see, your brain ceases to process and interpret, you have no cognizance of the ramifications that may grip those who knew you in life. You have no care nor need to care for the continuance of events on the mortal plane, not even for the events of those closest, when you are no longer an interactive entity and have fallen out of existence. One may question why a man holding such beliefs as these does not simply kill himself to escape the pain, suffering, and betrayal of all natures that makes up the foundation of life. I myself long struggle to find a logical answer that can adequately satisfy the depth of this inquiry…and yet the sheer perpetuation of my existence stands as a glaring contradiction to this very proposal."

That was pretty good. But is this a snippet from a novel? It comes off more as a personal reflective essay anyhow

 

[skeptik]

That was pretty good. But is this a snippet from a novel? It comes off more as a personal reflective essay anyhow

It's a short story that's about 5 pages long. I don't think it's really typical of a story though, which was my intention. For instance, the first line is "this is not a story." It's basically a man writing for himself reflecting on the death of his friend who killed himself by jumping off of a cliff, and he's just writing down thoughts that relate to what he and his friend shared in common, so yeah, it definitely is supposed to feel like a personal, reflective essay as you mentioned. I should mention that the diction was intentionally dry and dense, as it's supposed to give the reader a bit of a sense of the character, since there's no dialogue or action or anything in the story to actually reveal character traits.

 

[Divine Victim]

I rarely seem to be able to form any sort of long-term plots in my mind that aren't totally unoriginal, linear fantasies. I do like occasionally writing little pieces just to get across particular scenes or ideas though. Some things I write though are so over-the-top in the description that I deliberately turn them into comedies.

It's since starting to read some H. P. Lovecraft that I've realised a lot of my writing style has similarities to his preference for dense atmospheric description (although far from that grand master!!!)

Here's one brief thing from not long ago:

“|-||||--|-||-|---|||-||||-|-||-|
-|-|-|||-|||-|----||---||||||--||
||-|||||-|--|----||-||----||||-|-|-|-||||--”

The distress signal of the pioneer vessel InterStel-14 flashed across the interface screens on board the Beacon 9 docking station. There was something cold and foreboding in the encrypted blinks of green light, which the station’s systems would normally have decoded as follows:

“…orbit terminated..[we are] attempting…
“He(They?) knew… jeopardy of…
“…seized cargo! Advise [you] flee(?) and…”

But the blasted circuitry and control centres of the Beacon 9 could do nothing but relay the ominous code and its far fetched source, with the cruel indecipherability of dimly flashing characters.
In any case, the message was received by no one. The craft which once hummed with mankind’s industrious pursuit of the stars now drifted vacantly through the airless eons of the unknown, the command deck and the rest of the once teeming station now devoid of life and voice. The dull information screens flickered with the dwindling energy of the station’s nuclear core, but no operatives remained to man them. The main lighting had long since faded to a gloom which barely held back the bitumen blackness of space, but no corpses or bones would have been seen if power was regained. Perhaps though the ever-dimming twilight of the ghost ship’s corridors was a blessing (had there been any onlooker to appreciate it), for the shadows hid darker shades of their own. Scattered silhouettes of human forms stained the floors and walls of the station with a dusty residue – poignant glimpses of a community subjected to the horrors of impossible, alien weaponry.
The strike had been instant and unexpected. A wave of terror had gripped every crew member by the throat instants before the station was engulfed by the sudden flow of Un-Matter which reduced all living souls to a fine, powdery near-nothingness. The horrible ash-like impressions were all that remained of the United Galaxy Initiative’s finest, now mercifully veiled by the perpetual twilight of Beacon 9’s dying lights.

The command screens flickered once more, but the urgent stop-start warnings came too late to the silent, funereal deck. Soon the worries of the InterStel-14 crew would be themselves swept away by a wave of oblivion, and their craft would join the fleet of drifting, dusty husks which littered a corner of the abyss where man was never meant to dwell.

“|--|--||||-|-||||--|-||-||------||---||---

“|---||-|__________________________________________”

And a more typical fantasy-based thing:

A thin horn note sounded from the battlements high above. Many at Canillin Keep had all but forgotten that a lone sentry still patrolled the crenellated heights of the Western barbican, but the sound was unmistakable.

The peaceful life of the small fortress was shattered as the few men of fighting fitness scrambled to don rusty mail and imperfect swords. The scattered muster was conspicuously drawn from the overly old and overly young - the most capable militia had been summoned to die in far-away fields the last time that chilling horn had called. But now death had come to their doorstep.

Gripping makeshift blades and worm-eaten shields in shaking hands, the meagre forces of Canillin made for the battlements. Those with initiative carried hunting bows or shepherds' slingshots, but all knew in their hearts the inadequacy of human missiles now that the Age of Strife was upon the realm.

The Foes from the Woods would be upon them swiftly and with all the merciless chill of creeping midnight ice. Cities and farmlands had withered before this relentless tide unleashed upon the land, for what sin no one knew. And now it was the turn of Canillin Keep to face the hordes of the Prince of the Moonlit Realms and his sinister bat-winged retinue.

The air was getting abnormally cold atop the castle walls, and the fearful gasps of the men-at-arms escaped as misty vapour. All had heard of the frigid dread that preceded the arrival of the Lunar Host, but it removed none of the terror from the icy onset.

Through chattering teeth, a uselessly armoured Canillin elder muttered a final vigil from frail beard-framed lips: “By the Lady of the Ever-Glade…may our judgement be swift…” The words ended just as the weak sun was eclipsed by a fell moon, and the Keep was plunged into the cold, black void of sorcerous midnight. The Prince had come.

Pretty cliche really, and you can probably see why building a longer plot in that direction would just be a bit boring and unorignal.

~ ~

Majestic Moose, the extract reminds me of an Ancient Near East history course I took last year, although yours seems much more centred on literary analysis. In fact, I wrote an essay entitled 'Trace the formation of the Middle Assyrian Empire and evaluate, where possible, the reliability of the sources used.'

 

[dorian gray]

Damn, I'll have to read some of this shitz when I'm not busy trying to get blasted.

 

[Lies and Perfidy]

Kay, found something. I decided to fuck around with the Arthurian cycle a year or two ago and wrote this story. Luckily, it stands pretty well on its own, as I never got any further with the whole mess.

 

[Demilich]

I'm too embarassed to post any of the stories I used to write... been a long time anyway. They're from when I was in grade school.

 

[MFJ]

come on, somebody read my bit

 

[dorian gray]

Yours looked most interesting, in fact. But right now, I have to do* my taxes



*cheat on

 

[cthulufhtagn]

max--really good stuff, yes quite reminiscent of the authors you mentioned but still worthy. also liked the poem, the phrase "reptilian sincerity" stood out to me. well done, keep it going.

 

[einride]

This one?

The nice hardcover version from Bakhåll? Win if so, even though I've yet to read it, though I don't doubt that it's quite excellent.

no, it's an old cheap ass used softcover edition i bought for 20:-, i don't really care about books lookin' fancy

 

[MFJ]

one last bump

 

[NAD]

Where I write, sometimes a lot, sometimes not so much:

http://www.boogeresque.com/

It is basically one long rant, about a year and a half worth of "material" so far.

I'm subscribing to this thread to dissect later. Some of you fuckers are truly talented individuals when it comes to the written word.

PS: On The Road changed my life, w00t!