Discussion -- June 2011 Challenge

[The Spurring Platty]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

Whew... with all this discussion I'm glad I didn't go with my other entry:


On the aspirations of an agile, yet hungry, weasel-like omnivore;
or how a slothful yet poisonous snake became a victim of the food chain.

The quick brown (1) mongoose (2) jumps over the lazy cobra (3).


(1) Some species display red tinges of fur; very fast they make a blur.

(2) From the family Herpestidae, native to Asia, Africa, and southern Europe.

(3) From the family Elapidae, highly venomous; sometimes prone to indifference.



Somehow it just didn't seem "kippled" enough.


All kidding aside, I'd like to commend ya'll (sorry, it's my vice) on keeping a civil discussion.
It's refreshing to actually see healthy debate on a forum.

 

[MstrTal]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

I find this all very interesting. Especially in light of how one off hand comment of mine seemed to spark a whole sub-debate. Like every one here I try very hard in my own attempts at writing yet it seems that there is a very clear line, so to speak, when it comes to certain aspects of things. Particularly in these challenge.

The line seems to divide with the bulk or mass of people on the side of vocal grammatical perfection and polish and the minority slated on, well I am not sure how to term it other than, the side of content over punctuation. Forgive me if I am rambling or if my post makes no sense. I literally just climbed out of bed after a long night. To me this sort of thing reminds me of that old saw about art.

I don't know if it's art but I know I like it!

Or something to that effect. Some people go to museums and galleries and you hear them discuss the technique, the color tone and the like. They use phrases like "Exquisite use of. . . ," or "I love the way the artist blah blah blahed into the blah blah blah." Other people go to the same places and look at the artwork and just enjoy it not for how its made but for the feeling it invokes in them. They look at the painting, sculpture or installation and they feel happy, sad, excited or moved in some way simply because the artists skill has invoked the reaction.

I had a professor, different one than previously mentioned, once tell me that writing is a conversation between the author and reader. Further that each reader brings their own internal noise and baggage with them when they are reading so that each reading and rereading is a different and unique experience. The reason I participate in the challenges and joined this site is not only to become a better writer and find a community such as this where we have such interesting and decently cordial debates and interactions but also so that I might some day hopefully become the type of writer that can converse in such a way with readers. To take them on a journey and evoke or illicit responses through the written medium.

 

[digs]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

EDIT: by way of example, here's a post from Parson which we were perfectly happy to accept http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/foru...words-march-2011-the-judge-2.html#post1476170

Ah TJ, any excuse to link to your own victory!

That is tough... unless the expired vegemite is like expired marmite - ten times tastier, and irresistible!

I think vegemite is expired marmite.

 

[nixie]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

That must just be the head office in the UK - the regional office down here has a small jar of expired vegemite and a broken coffee machine that seems to have been purchased circa 1982...

The regional offices in the UK only have a plastic bowl of out of date twiglets and a leaky tap. How do we get an invite to the mythical head office?

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

The line seems to divide with the bulk or mass of people on the side of vocal grammatical perfection and polish and the minority slated on, well I am not sure how to term it other than, the side of content over punctuation.

I think you are misunderstanding our posts. I haven't seen one person say they prefer punctuation and grammatical perfection over content. The point some of us have been trying to make is that when two stories are equally moving, equally well-written, equally everything else, mistakes of that sort help us make a decision.

I doubt even the strictest among us are going to pass on stories they think stand high above all the rest, merely because of simple mistakes in grammar or the occasional misplaced comma ... well, unless such mistakes are changing or clouding the meaning of what the writer is trying to say, which they might very well do.

In the worst cases, poor grammar, spelling, and punctuation can distract from the impression a story is meant to make. They can dilute a story's impact. For those of us who are distracted, it isn't about not caring about content, it's about caring about all the content.


As for regional offices: Here in California, all we have is a tent and a camp chair that keeps folding up when you try to sit down. The nearest drinking fountain is half a block away, and the raccoons eat up any stores of food the management supplies.

 

[The Judge]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

Ah TJ, any excuse to link to your own victory!

Damn. I didn't think anybody had seen through my cunning plan...

The regional offices in the UK only have a plastic bowl of out of date twiglets and a leaky tap. How do we get an invite to the mythical head office?

Twiglets? We have twiglets? No one told me. I thought the cat kibble was for us.


My take on the punctuation debate is more or less the same as Teresa's. When I've only got one vote and many stories deserving of a vote, a piece with errors has to work so very much harder to convince me it's the right one. This can happen -- and did, last month with Chris's -- but all other things being equal, mistakes of grammar/spelling etc would usually make me favour another piece.

I do know what you mean, though, MstrTal. The Judicial Helpmeet is a keen photographer, much into the technical issues. When we've attended craft fairs he's looked at the work of other photographers and poured scorn (afterwards and only to me, needless to say!) on photos where the horizon isn't level, or something is out of focus. I'm willing to bet, though, that the people buying those cards/pictures aren't concerned because they're looking at the image as a whole, ie the pretty scenery or whatever.

However, as craftspeople ourselves, my view is we should aim for the picture which is not only of pretty scenery but also as technically perfect** as we can make it. To my mind it's a false dichotomy to say, as your first professor appeared to do, that one can either have a piece which is grammatically correct** or a piece which is moving, enthralling etc. I sincerely hope that we can have both. That's what I'm hoping to achieve, anyway.


** I don't mean by that never any split infinitives even in dialogue, or no sentence fragments/ ending sentences with prepositions etc, since adherence to rules of that kind can make for dead writing.

 

[Pyan]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

It's the story that does it for me - the punctuation and/or grammar doesn't really come into it unless the errors are really distracting or cloud the narrative. There's only been one month that the two I liked best were finally separated by syntax rather than the stories themselves.

The regional offices in the UK only have a plastic bowl of out of date twiglets and a leaky tap. How do we get an invite to the mythical head office?

I thought all the regional offices were like the South Coast one - free pizza on tap, delivered by hunky men/slinky women, according to taste, a well-stocked cocktail bar, and three or four large recliners facing a 42" plasma TV...

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

I've been thinking about the comparison to visual art.

Suppose that I was looking at two pictures that attracted me, that I otherwise thought equally beautiful and meaningful (although in different ways and for different reasons), but I found that one of them had a big ugly smear in one corner and that one of the prominent figures didn't have its face entirely filled in. Since it was a piece of visual art, I might think that there were some particular meanings behind those two things that looked like errors at first glance, and that they were there to make me ponder the nature of ... something. Even so, I might also think that in my eyes they spoiled the beauty and would always distract my eye to the point where I couldn't really enjoy the rest of the picture, whether those two things were meaningful or not. (This would be the more likely scenario.) But suppose that while I was wavering I heard the artist confide to someone that there was no meaning either to the smudge or to the face that was practically blank. He had just been careless, which accounted for the smear, and didn't want to take the time to fix that or fill in the face. With that information I would know that every single time I looked at that painting my eyes would be drawn to those parts of the picture, I would remember that the artist hadn't cared, and it would always have an influence on my enjoyment of the picture.

The other picture that attracted me had no such defects. Which do you think I would choose?

 

[Bob Senior]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

How The Farmer Raised His Pigs And Got Them To Market In Time To Make A Handsome Profit While Others Were Struggling To Keep Their Heads Above Water As It Was In Todays Terrible Economy Which May Or May-not Be Of Our Own Making But It Does Throw Us All Into The Same Mix So Sink Or Swim My Friends We Are All In This Together.





"E FED 'EM GARBAGE !!!!!




I 'ave no comment






(this is intended as humor, no slapping please)
Bob

 

[The Judge]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

I thought all the regional offices were like the South Coast one - free pizza on tap, delivered by hunky men/slinky women, according to taste, a well-stocked cocktail bar, and three or four large recliners facing a 42" plasma TV...

Hush, pyan! It was meant to be a secret.

 

[Ursa major]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

The over use (obsessive use) of exclamation marks -- good grief: five in a row!!!! -- would rule that story out of contention for getting on even my long list, Bob. (Oh, and there shouldn't be a space before the exclamation marks. And where's the full stop (period) after your non-comment?)


Sorry.

 

[Parson]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

When it comes down to the brass tax in the end for me its the story that resonates with me the most.

Slight misquote there. The correct quotation is "Getting down to brass tacks." It comes from the business of selling yard goods. When the salesperson would measure the cloth for sale instead of a quick measurement or guess, s/he would spread it on the counter and carefully measure between the brass tacks that were placed a yard apart on the counter. So... "Getting down to brass tacks" means (as you say) making the final and accurate measurement of something.

 

[Ursa major]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

I think you've nailed that explanation, parson.


(In the UK, brass is usedas a name of money (and some other things**), as in the phrase, "Where's there's muck there's brass." So 'brass tax' makes some sort of sense. )






** - You probably don't want to know.

 

[TheDustyZebra]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

The over use (obsessive use) of exclamation marks -- good grief: five in a row!!!! -- would rule that story out of contention for getting on even my long list, Bob. (Oh, and there shouldn't be a space before the exclamation marks. And where's the full stop (period) after your non-comment?)


Sorry.

You forgot the double quotation mark at the front of the story, which makes me wonder if it should have had a matching one after the exclamation points or if it was just supposed to be an apostrophe. Sheesh!

 

[Bob Senior]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

Ursa,
I knock out a 67 word title, a 4 word story and a 4 word comment in 75 seconds and I lost control when I got to the exclamation points and you didn't like it. I may never write again!!!
On the other hand, I have nothing better to do------------sooooo, I will try to get a smile from you again.
Bob

 

[digs]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

My take on the punctuation debate is more or less the same as Teresa's. When I've only got one vote and many stories deserving of a vote, a piece with errors has to work so very much harder to convince me it's the right one. This can happen -- and did, last month with Chris's -- but all other things being equal, mistakes of grammar/spelling etc would usually make me favour another piece.

That's pretty much how I feel too, even down to voting for Chris' story, which had one or two little mistakes but was powerful enough to overcome them. I hope that doesn't seem like I'm ragging on Chris, because it's actually a compliment!

Depending on my mood, sometimes when reading I'll value the structure and language of a piece as highly as its content. I would quite happily read a beautifully written story about nothing in particular. Grammatical/spelling errors will generally knock me out of the flow of the story, or worse, prevent me from getting into the flow at all.

 

[TheDustyZebra]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

Well, yes, that's how I feel about spelling, punctuation to some degree and grammar to a lesser degree. There are people saying "if it's distracting," but that doesn't make any sense to me because it automatically distracts me!

Punctuation and grammar can be shifty things in these short stories, so most things get a fair amount of leeway from me in those areas. Poetic license and all that.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

So after about a week of bits and pieces from Kipling's lesser-known poems jingling around in my mind, something like a story started to emerge. And it looks like it is going to be Science Fiction.

Science Fiction. Moi?

(I have written less SF than I have poetry. And that's not much.)

Although I suspect that when I get through with it, it won't be so much like Science Fiction as all that.

 

[TheDustyZebra]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

Talk about expanding your horizons!

I'd settle for a good fantasy idea right at the moment, so I know how you feel. Heck, I'd settle for a good urban paranormal romance right now!

I'm still working on my Kipling immersion course, though, so I'm not even fishing around in my head for an idea yet. I think I've made it more than halfway through the collected works now.

 

[GreenKidx]

Re: DISCUSSION the 75 Word Challenge JUNE 2011

Now, only after I have ventured into and returned from the lands of Kipling, do I discover my true foe this month. I have never before attempted another writer's style. And I haven't the faintest ideas as to where to begin. So, I have penned a tale, most assuredly, inspired by Kipling, but I am left wondering if it also mimics Kipling.

Which, also, brings forth another personal concern: Can I honestly vote for "The most Kipling like tale told in 75 words or less on the subject of Nourishment"? I will definitely post an entry. However, my conscious may prevent me from voting this month.