Sadness makes the heart grow fonder

Dear Maria,
Good morning, it's Saturday, and in my preparations for work I've been pondering the interesting question you posed. We do seem to be drawn towards sadness and tragedy. Are we all just so cynical that we can't stop to notice the positive (albeit small) things in life? Do the positive things even exist anymore?

We don't live in a world where we step out the door and proceed to only run across negativity. The trouble is, we live in a world where it's okay, encouraged even, to see things in a negative light. I can't remember the last time I heard someone tell me to "stop and smell the roses" in a non-sarcastic way. The hardships in life resonate with us way more than the things we take for granted. Take last night for instance. I went to a Christmas party with my father and we ran into a woman who had watched me and her daughter frolic about in an indoor playground and have a fantastic time. I barely remember this afternoon (granted, I was five years old). Yet I could give you a shot by shot analysis of the uncomfortable moments of my life. I don't know how many times I've recited the skiing story, but it seems to be a favorite at dinner parties. If I was, y'know, invited to dinner parties.

So not only do we dwell on tragedy, but we connect through it. Through something tragic, we take the time to put our daily lives aside and tell our family and friends how much we love them--and to hope and pray for those affected by the tragedy. 9/11 was one of the most horrific tragedies we've witnessed in our generation; at the time, I didn't really understand what was happening, but I remember sitting in meeting for worship that Friday morning in school, and I felt one of the strongest connections with those around me. I felt a vibe of understanding with people I'd never met before. As a second grader, I couldn't truly grasp why people were sad--all I really got is that they were sad, and that having fellow humans around you can be one of the most comforting things in the world.

Even as there are raging political debates in the face of tragedy--most recently, the shootings in Connecticut, people come together to mourn the lives lost and the families suffering. Through this suffering, we find common ground.

In the midst of tragedy, it seems we are more willing to set aside our differences and just relate to one another. And that's one thing that's on many of our top priority lists: To have people understand what it means to feel the way we do, to think the way we think, to view the world in our eyes. Why do you think depressing songs become so popular? It's not like Hinder's "Better than Me" lyrics are horribly original, nor do they evoke grand philosophical thought; rather, everyone can relate to that feeling when someone is "so much better than me." In a time when you think you're the only one with that feeling, it can be relieving to realize that actually, everyone and their brother has that feeling.

But what I wonder is, at what point is it acceptable to turn tragedy into comedy? There are a few "tragic moments" that are a common theme amongst comedians--adolescence, mainly. The teenage years certainly didn't seem like something to laugh at at the time, but since everyone's gone through it and eventually pulls out of it with only a few battle scars, it's nice to share the memories of hell-ish experiences. Crushes, test taking, and acne battle stories don't cause any resentment. We're all just relieved that it's finally over.

But if I hopped up onto a stage next to Ellen D and Tosh.0 (I love this imaginary me) and started joking about eating disorders, there would be many more mixed reactions. Is this because not everyone goes through it? Or perhaps the adolescence thing works so well in comedy because the jokes are geared towards an adult audience--not people who are in the throes of adolescence. With eating disorders, there is no specific age where you're unable to experience that illness. You're more likely to hurt one part of the audience while only making another small section laugh.

So do tragic moments only require a grace period and target audience to create comedy? Where is the line drawn? We are drawn to laughter--but at what point to we stop laughing?

Peace and Ponies,
Kira

Tragedy Sells

Dear Kira,

To answer your question, I think that literary humor can be just as quote-unquote serious as regular, serious literature. I mean, I don't think I've ever laughed so hard as when I read Shakespeare's Midsummer's Night Dream (but maybe that's just me being a nerd). I mean, whoever said literature couldn't be funny? But I tend to disagree with you when you say that only humorous literature gets any attention; I'd like to point your attention the numerous succesful superhero film franchises. I mean, there's nothing funny about Superman, certainly not about Captain America, and the list goes on. And yet, there is something so universal about superheros. I mean, there's a reason little boys dress up as Spiderman for Halloween.

Of course, the typical superhero story is the hero quest or something of the like. In the typical superhero story, the hero has some sort of tragedy in their past that compels them to take up the mantel of righteousness or what-have-you. This has been a theme in literature since like, forever, and it's not funny either. If anything, it's tragic. In fact, I'd venture the opinion that tragedy sells even better than humor.

Not to be insensitive, but take a look at the average news channel. Whenever something horrible happens, it's plastered all over the television and everyone watches it. It's like a car accident, you can't look away. So, I pose a question to you. What is it that is so appealing about tragedy, in literature or otherwise. What makes a man in spandex tights such a cultural icon?

Merry Christmas,
Maria

Your Horse was so High, it was up in the Sky

Dear Maria,
good evening, it's Wednesday, and I must admit, I'm slacking on the reading front. I open up Atonement with this grand intention to indulge myself in intellectual thought, when one of two things happens:
1) I realize my stomach is growling very loudly at me, and I must go and hunt for pudding. Except, wait, there is not pudding left at the convenience store. So then I have to drag my feet ALL the way downtown to buy an insatiable amount of dessert at Mclanahan's and everyone just looks at me like they know I'm wasting my life away in calories and sugar. Or...
2) How I met your Mother looks ever so tempting on Netflix, and my evening turns into a black hole of television.

Perhaps this is why I didn't accomplish as much as I'd have liked in high school. And while I agree that you were on your high horse whils't reading Shakespeare and Dickens while the rest of us subjected our friends to long and painful rants about boys (my humblest apologies), I realize it's not an entirely bad thing to be on your high horse. It just means you were past all the petty arguments and obsessions that most immature teenagers are in the midst of, and put your time to better use. And for that, I admire you.

However, as any good revelation tends to be complex, there are two parts to my epiphany: There is absolutely a necessity to catch up on the classics (in which I am sorely lacking knowledge of). So that is the answer to why I'm putting so many classics on my reading list. I mean, I'm fairly certain I'll enjoy them (thus far, Jane Eyre has been a quality read), but it also serves the purpose of being educated and thinking about the world. But I also know my taste in reading: I enjoy modern literature about people and their lives far more than older literature, and because of that, I am not totally depriving myself from John Green and Jodi Picoult. There is a time and place for modern literature, but it can't always be waved off as unimportant or "easy reading." There are many complex themes in John Green's books, and my understanding of humankind has been immensely wider after reading The Fault in Our Stars. So after much thought, I've created this lovely little reading list that may or may not be fully checked off after many nights playing Angry Birds:

1) Jane Eyre
2) Pride and Prejudice
3) Sense and Sensibility
4) Looking for Alaska
5) An Abundance of Catherines
6) The Vampire Lestat
7) Oliver Twist
8) Great Expectations
9) Slaughterhouse Five
10) Candide
11) Wuthering Heights
12) Midsummer Night’s Dream
13) The Sun Also Rises
14) The Member of the Wedding
15) The Scarlet Letter
16) Uncle Tom’s Cabin
17) Emma
18) Anna Karenina
19) Les Misérables
20) Tuck Everlasting
21) The Casual Vacancy
22) Persuasion 

 Wow. Not gonna lie, that looks slightly intimidating. My attention span better start kicking itself into high gear. 

Speaking of avoiding work, I took a lovely yoga class yesterday in attempts to ignore my finals, and I stumbled upon this lovely little poster:

At first, I was all, "why would they spend all that time creating a poster with a made up chart?" After sharing this picture on facebook, I got my answer. A lot of people think to share more humorous things, stuff that will make people giggle--maybe because it's easy to comprehend, maybe because people need in their lives, but whatever the case, it's more smart advertising. So that got me thinking. What is it about humor that is so striking? Obviously tragedy evokes plenty of emotion too, but in the busy-ness of our day to day lives, something funny seems to stop us in our tracks more than something sad. Does the kind of effect this poster has on us work in writing as well? When I'm browsing through books, trying to decide what to read next, I'm more likely to pick up a book that begins with something amusing, or witty. This could just be due to personal taste, but it seems that humor brings a strong resonance in our lives.

But then again, laugh-out-loud books are regarded less as fine literature and more as casual, easy reads. A lot of the memoirs I've been reading, such as David Sedaris' Naked and Tina Fey's Bossypants are enjoyable, but they aren't serious literature.

So would it be smart to sacrifice one's reputation in order to catch the common reader's eye? Or is serious literature just as catchy?

Peace and Ponies,
Kira

Summer Reading and Why Break Isn't Really a Break

Dear Kira,

To answer your well posed and, admittedly, well sourced (I like Briony from Atonement too) question I refer you to "What is Literature" by noted French person, Jean-Paul Sartre (which you'll probably have to read in a few weeks anyway). Sartre makes an argument that I happen to find very appealing; he says that every work, fiction included, only exists as the reader perceives it, which means it communicates a different thing to every reader. Thus, the reader must enter into reading the book as an act of free will; in writing fiction, the author's primary purpose is to appeal to freedom. 

What you are seeing is a selfish shellfish

Now, I know what you're thinking, you're thinking "this is a lot of intellectual mumbo jumbo that doesn't even really make sense anywhere besides your head and your head is a really strange place", while I agree with you that my head is extremely weird, this idea is simpler than it seems. It is a manifestation of the idea of "art for life's sake" as opposed to "art for art's sake" which, in no uncertain un-intellectual terms, is SELFISH art. Don't be a lobster, write art with a purpose. To paraphrase Sartre (who is without a doubt my most favorite French person), freedom is the act of recognizing the freedom of others. No one writes in a vacuum, so, when you write you must give people the freedom to interpert your work and understand your work in ways that you didn't really intend it to be read and that's what literature is all about: freedom.

While that is lovely sentiment, however, it is not the reason I'm going to be reading a whole lot of literature this winter break/summer. Now, I don't know if you recall, but I kind of got on my high horse back in high school because I read some classics; while the rest of the world was having obsessive crushes and covering up their acne I was reading Shakespeare and, I might add, getting the jokes! Weird as that is, I've realized that this isn't so impressive in college where most people have to read all these books anyway. So, the homework I am giving myself over break is to find and read obscure literature and to get the jokes. My theme for this year is ancient Greek drama, ancient texts in general, and other non-related things. Actually, I'm not sure how many jokes there are going to be to get in Greek tragedy so, we'll see about that. But, regardless, here is my reading list:  

1. The Aeneid by Virgil
2. Argonautica by Apollonius Rhodius
3.  Lysistrata  by Aristophanes
4. The Divine Comedy by Dante
5. On the Road by Jack Kerouac
6. Paradise Lost by John Milton (again, because I'm not sure I understood it the first time)
7. Faust by Goethe
8. Doctor Faustus by Marlowe
9. The Enemies of Women by Vicente Blasco Ibáñez (and everything else this author ever wrote because his novels have some seriously interesting titles) 
10. Out of Africa by Isak Dinesen
11. The Crucible by Arthur Miller (because once is never enough)
12. A Dance with Dragons (because A Song of Ice and Fire is a song I like to listen to) 
13. The Magicians by Lev Grossman
14. American Gods by Neil Gaiman
15. Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman
16. Persians by Aeschylus
17. Oresteia by Aeschylus
18. Medea by Euripides
19. Trojan Women by Euripides
20. The Gods of Our Fathers by Herman Stern (for some good, old-fashioned, healthy non-fiction)

If I actually read all those books, I'll let you know. So, Kira,  I pose you the question, feel free to answer it however you like, what are you reading and why?

María

The Write Place

Dear Maria,
So, ironically enough, I'm procrastinating a horrid English essay as I type this. I can't help but think this essay looks like I just ranted all over the place because I'm having the end of semester blues, and just want to go back to writing YA Vampire novels, like a normal person. That's most likely my main problem for filling five pages with clichés, simplified claims, and quotes that could easily fill up a page. Yet I've also been feeling dull and un-inspired due to constantly sitting at my desk, seeing the same five pictures, the same pillow pet that makes it almost impossible to not want to nap, and the same lamp with dangly things that would make any "attention defecit ooh shiny!" disordered sort want to procrastinate up the wazzoo.

Would this not keep you from writing all day long?

So I'm thinking it's time for a change of pace. I normally choose to right on the same desk, or, more likely, on the same bed. But as Charlie McDonnel points out, inspiration often comes from outside encounters, people you meet, places you see. I guess this is similar to our introvert/extrovert chats. As an intro-extrovert, I can see how inspiration can come from within, especially if an emotional dilemma is so present in my own life, I just have to write it out, but not in a whiny, "my life is over!" sort of way. But my extroverted side needs some sort of place, even if it's not filled with people, to get me in the writing mood. For me, natural atmospheres seem to work best for inspiration. It could be because most of my "growing experiences" have happened in more secluded areas, or I'm just more aware of such internal growth in natural environments. Whatever it is, get me near some mountains, and I'm writing up a storm. At Shoshoni, I never felt a lack of inspiration. Even when I wasn't actively writing, I was thinking about how I could incorporate the Rocky Mountains into a story, or how the dynamics between characters in an ashram may work. But seeing as I can't book a flight to Colorado every time I need to put a few words on a page, I guess I should re-think my writing inspiration place.

It's never going away, but I won't always be there when I need it

Do you get inspiration from a place, or is it solely internally that you gain your inspiration? Maybe it's the lack of distraction mountains bring, and I didn't have to worry about everything beeping and tumbling and tweeting at me, but nature seems to bring out the inquisitive side of me. Below is a poem I wrote at Shoshoni about a mountain called The Sleeping Giant:

The quietest to demand attention,
the Sleeping Giant stretches his nose
into soft cotton ball clouds.
He settles into the Ponderosa’s sigh,
lets her branches tickle him into deep
slumber.
A patient rest, no shifting positions,
he sniffs the clouds’ hopeful scent of rain,
for the browning grass to soak,
for  the crickets to drink,
as they happily chirp with the sun’s rays.
The pink rays glide across the giant’s forehead,
sinks into the crevices of sister mountains,
until only suggestion of color mists onto the moon.
Giant bids goodnight--
to Long’s Peak, to the weary hikers,
stomping to the base for rest and awe
at the thousand year dance led by the
mighty push of glaciers.
Blanketed by the sheath of black sky,
Giant sleeps.
Awakened by no force of movement,
his sighs sent into the tranquil forest.
He sleeps. 

 For now, I'll have to ponder this inner versus outer inspiration in the walls of my dorm room. But I hope to eventually trek back through the mountains to add some more natural writing into my repertoire.

Peace and ponies,
Kira

To identify with, or to yearn to become?

Dear Maria,
I doubt the success rate of first time NanoWriMo-ers is terribly high. I mean, first you have get comfortable with just thinking about scribbling out 50,000 words; only then can you jump over those obstacles. Without the preparation, it's difficult to attain the success. Honestly, the point of NanoWriMo doesn't seem to be to win (even if that free certificate is pretty darn enticing)...it's to get people excited about writing.
Sadly, my December thus far has been sorely lacking in all things creative. Mainly I'm just pounding out blog posts and pretending to study while we have an America's Next Top Model marathon or two (or five). But I have been getting much more into reading, recently, and I pretty much devoured John Green's The Fault in Our Stars in an entire night. That usually only happens when the book's about French people. Or cheese. I've always been a big appreciator of cheesy literature (see what I did there? Heh...heh). But just because I've never had cancer before, nor have I ever ventured anywhere near video games, I could still identify with Hazel and Augustus because they carried so many traits that we find in almost all of human kind. I mean, when I first started reading Green's novel, I was all, "who is this Augustus and why on Earth was he stuck with such an unfortunate name?" By the end of the book, I was sobbing my eyes out and felt as though I'd known Hazel and Augustus for years.
I know this is where we start to differ--I've always drifted towards realistic fiction whose characters are similar to someone you'd see walking down the street, while your holiday reading is The Illiad (which I'm still heavily impressed by). And I don't think there's a right or wrong way to view a book or which genre they should enjoy--I'm just wondering, what is the ultimate goal of fiction? Is it to give people an escape? To make us better informed citizens of society? Or is it simply to just...tell a story?

In Ian McEwan's Atonement, Briony is a girl who primarily lives internally. She focuses on the world of the characters in her plays, consequently, she has a strong hold on what motivates many different personalities and what makes people tick. However, she is not interested in indulging in any character studies; rather, she'd much prefer to work on plot twists and intense stories: "Wasn't writing a kind of soaring, an achievable form of flight of fancy, of the imagination?" (147). Briony prefers to harp on  dramatics, which is essential to any story whose goal is to entertain, but without a deep focus on character study, the story can fall flat. So should the two modes of fiction bounce off each other, or does one take precedence? Is writing more about creating personalities and human characteristics, or exposing them? 

Personally, I dive into stories with characters I can relate to, but I understand the appeal of devouring novels about war heroes and firey chasms of death (cough, cough, Twilight, cough).

Peace and Ponies,
Kira

Failure is Sweet

Dear Kira,

So, as you've probably guessed, I did not finish NaNoWriMo. Now, this is a good and a bad thing. It's a good thing because I did not totally ignore all of my classes for a month and fall completely behind in everything just in time for finals. So, that was a positive thing. But, of course, I didn't win, which in most cultures is considered negative.

Not to say that I didn't do well; I wrote about 40,000 words but, the truth is, I had a choose between NaNoWriMo and good grades and I choose grades. Now, I know that you didn't finish either, but what I've been thinking about is if it is really possible to write a novel of 50,000 words in a month and, what's more important, to make it good. This is not to say that I don't think NaNoWriMo is a good idea or that I'm not going to do it again, it's just that the creation of the best books, it seems, includes a lot of introspection and planning. I suppose, in all fairness, you could plan out your novel before NaNoWriMo, but even then, is it fair to you or to your work to try to create a piece of literature in a month?

I totally would have finished too if it wasn't for those blasted finals.

Maria 

Classically Confused

Good morning, Maria it's (early) on Friday, and let me just say, after our 1AM writing sprints last night (this morning?), I'm feeling this major resistance (read: kicking and screaming) to any kind of writing, so excuse me if this post is some sorry rambling about things.

So, as you might have gathered from my Growing Pains post, I wasn't a huge fan of the classics, nor did I give myself any motivation to read them until recently. But instantly I realized I was living in some void that was filled by clichéd plot lines and characters that go, "you f***ed my wife? You f***ed my wife?" "I AM your wife!" (yay Eddie Izzard). So pretty quickly, I'm learning the importance of classic literature.

But then again what are the true classics? An interesting point. We have our basics: Shakespeare, Dickens, and obviously Lemony Snicket, but there are plenty of other well known books that aren't yet classics: Harry Potter and The Hunger Games, to name a few. For a few years, I was off bemoaning the fact that a book couldn't be reputable unless you threw a few "thee" and "thous" in there, and if the author had been dead for a few hundred years.

But then, senior year of high school, I took a class called Modern Classics, and I was basically through the roof that I could read a Jodi Picoult novel and call it classic literature. Whether or not anyone else believed me is another story. But only then did I realize that you can't just have "classics" and, for lack of a better word (I'm running on 6 hours of sleep, cut me some slack), "non-classics." Within a certain genre, you can have some books that are better known and more respected than others. Genre classics aren't just a cop-out; they're simply just a result of humans loving to categorize stuff.

It seems like the authors of classics locked themselves into their writing lairs, not letting anyone see a single word until the emerged back into the real world. I'm just basing this off speculation, but most of the great writers seem like very private people. It pays off when their writing is un-touched by any other personality; it's their own heart in the purest form (other than, y'know, their actual heart). Yet modeling your own writing methods is difficult for someone who announces it to the world when her toe itches. Plus, after showing some of my un-finished work with family and friends, I get ideas from them I would never think of on my own. I see awkward sentences I never would have caught on my own, not that I would ever let myself write a run-on, that's just stupid, hey do we have any chocolate left? My writing seems cleaner after showing it to the outside world, and it puts me in a better position to face the rest of my novel (poem, script, screenplay, etc).

So my question is this: Do you think it's better to let your writing simmer and cool (careful, it's hot!) and keep the public eye from it for a while, or can it be helpful to have others edit your work and give suggestions as you go?

Gotta go write a bajillion more words about vampires. Or something.

Peace and Ponies,

Kira

I'm a Cliche & You Can't Judge a Book by It's Cover

Dear Kira,

First off, let me take a moment to address the sad state of my NaNoWriMo affairs. As you know, I am lagging behind by, count them, nearly three thousand words. That's almost a thousand more words than there have been years in the common era! But, I digress.

I think the point you brought up in your last blog is very important because, let's face it, we all have that moment when we're sitting in English class and the teacher is asking us, "what does this sentence mean? What is this a symbol for? Is Gatsby actually a murderer? Aw! The ambiguity". It bothers me that English teachers are all fine and dandy when famous authors write something vague, but if I write something vague or ambiguous in a short story, they're all like "um...I think you need to clarify this..." and I'm all like "but actually, I did that deliberately."

:P

So, to answer your question, I don't think there is any wrong or right way to write a novel. There is only the "write" way. Wow, that was a pun. Anyway, I think it's important to remember that most of the great writers are only great because they took risks and wrote in a way no one expected and no one had ever seen before. Sure, there's certainly bad writing out there (cough, cough Twilight), but I think there's more good writing than people think.

I think it's kind of unfair how some books are designated as "classics", as if they are some how better than other books. I think we already discussed this when I told you that my favorite book was Ivanhoe. To me, Ivanhoe is one of the best books ever written, but to another person it might just be obnoxious (sorry that I made you read it). And, conversely, there are a whole bunch of books I wish I could add to the canon of classics. So, really, what is "good" writing, is all a matter of taste. Don't get me wrong, the "classics" are classics for a reason, but I think there should be a little more wiggle room when deciding the merit or quality of a book. What do you think? Are the classics concrete or is there room to mix and match?

Maria

P.S. I know that was a cop out question, but I had to hurry up and write this so I could work on my NaNoWriMo; heavy sigh.

The finish line

Good morning Maria, it's Tuesday, and let me just say...

Happy (almost) two weeks into NanoWriMo!

Sigh.

Maybe it's a human thing to get about a third of the way through something, and just...stop. No more. Halfway through, we can see the light, we can run to the finish line. But a third? Crap, there's two more thirds that haven't even been covered yet. And that's just too much for any human to handle when they have homework, friends, and how much mashed potatoes they're going to stuff in their face to think about. But if you're riding the strugglebus, I'm the driver, and my brain seems to think 16,000 words equals 50,000 or something. Because clearly the act of writing this story is torture, says my mind. It's not like I'm not able to write, and I still want to. I mean, I've been blogging up a storm because I didn't make it my job, my obligation. I blog at free will. Because I have deadline for my Nano story, it's turned into a chore.

That, and I have a really short attention span. I think my display of unfinished stories speaks for itself:

I had a whole outline for this thing. Gosh darnit.

So how am I going to finish? Well, to be honest, if this wasn't NanoWriMo, I probably wouldn't. My story is crap, plain and simple. It has potential to be good, with TONS of revision. But normally, if I start off writing an awful first draft, I usually get frustrated and give up. Out of like, ten stories, I've finished three. 30%. Ugh. But here's the thing: This novel writing has turned from an isolated hobby to do only when I'm feeling inspired (I remember a friend telling his mother that I wrote novels when I was "bored"...not gonna lie, I kinda wanted to punch him in the face at that point), to a competition. And I cannot lose a competition. If there's a finish line, I must reach it, even if I die trying. Death by words...How depressing. But if I can "win" something, I'm gonna do my darndest to get there. I know, not the best motivation for writers; the pride should come internally and you shouldn't compete about something so personal, but still.

Winning.
Winning.
Are you liking the sound of that? It has a warm, fuzzy sound. Not that sounds can be warm or fuzzy, but you know what I mean.

Which brings me to my next question: Do you think writing is something that should be a "competition"? Sure, there are lots of writing contests, but how do you truly judge the merit of someone's novel? There's well written and poorly written, but in the mix of well-written books, there could be a writing style that one judge thinks is new-agey and completely worthless, but that another judge loves. There could be a character that someone finds totally relateable, that another person could find unreliable and flat. Sometimes, judging someone's writing is about personal taste. Within the realm of good, clear writing, there's no "right" or "wrong" way to write a novel. Unique writing is what makes the huge collections of books out there so exciting.

Happy writing! I must go search for some inspiration. Or coffee. Yeah, coffee works too.

Peace and ponies,

Kira

The Trouble with NaNoWriMo

Dear Kira,

So, as you know I've been doing NaNoWriMo (national novel writing month) for the past thirteen days, and let me tell you, its a strugglebus. As it stands, I'm almost six thousand words and I'm not projected to finish until December 9th. The trouble, I suppose, is that it's really hard to write a novel in a month. This is, of course, coming from someone who has finished multiple manuscripts (let's disregard quality of said manuscripts). So, I know I can complete a long document if I have enough opportunity and the inclination to do so.

The trouble is, right now I don't really have the inclination. I'm running out of material for my story, I've started to resort to personal drama to stretch the word requirement (gasp!). And even so, I just don't feel like working on my NaNoWriMo. I know that you sometimes I have some trouble finishing stories as well, so I wonder what you are doing to insure you finish your NaNoWriMo. While I have every intention of finishing this project, it seems I have just reached a standstill.

Maria

NanoWriMo...re sleep

Dear Maria,
I am in complete agreement that one of the most fantastic parts about November is pumpkin pie. I mean, getting together with family and being thankful is great and all, but here's a little secret for you: I freaking love food. Why do you think there's a bajillion Cadbury creme eggs in our fridge? To be generous to visitors? Psh.

This has quickly gone from writing about writing to writing about food. I think I need a snack.

Alright, five million cream eggs later, and I'm ready to be all academic and whatnot (ish). This will also be my first year of doing NanoWriMo, even though for years and years, Kristina Horner has told me it's the greatest thing since coffee. And if this isn't fantastic inspiration, I don't know what is:

So while I'm freaking out a teensy tiny bit about having to pound out 50,000 words in 30 days, I realize that I won't necessarily be a failure if I don't get to the ultimate goal. As a wise friend said to me once, "it's still so many more words you had than when you started." And as a highly competitive person, sometimes it works just to have a set goal that will make me feel like this if I don't reach it:

I may have said I wouldn't be a failure. But I sure as heck would be disappointed. I think having a support group of writers who are in the same insanity-driven boat will help us not lose hope, or at least maintain some sympathy when we say "no, no I swear I'm not tired..." then crash into a wall. As the spazz of the century, that happens on a daily basis, so if you see a set of black and blue spots where my legs used to be this next month, you'll know why. I find my outer self already yelling at my inner self for even considering waking up at 6:30 just to write for an hour, but damnit, I want to skip in front of those other English majors who are scrambling to write an essay for class the night before, and go, "I have my essay, and a freaking novel [disregard quality of novel here], na na na boo boo!"

...Sometimes, I am a terrible person.

Yet there are quite a few things about this upcoming endeavor that worry me. I mean, as a person who gets greatly inspired by an idea, writes a few lines, then gets an even more easy to write genius idea, I realize my resistance to outlines is gonna make me fall short for any big project. I mean, even if I get to 20-some-thousand words, I'll realize all my characters are happy, that lonely guy fell in love with the shy girl, and I am 100% screwed. Because as quality as I am at padding up an essay to fit word requirements, it would take some serious skill to add 30,000 words of "like," "absurdly," and "ridonculously."

Okay, so ridonculously isn't a word. But it should be.

I hate planning things, but if you want to take on a big writing project, you gotta do your research. You can't become an Olympic swimmer by diving into a pool and deciding the water looked nice and pretty and you have a swimmer's build anyway. Sure, I have the signature social skills and furrowed brow of a writer, but honing in such a skill takes patience, research, planning, and coffee. Lots and lots of coffee. And maybe 5% inspiration, but you're right that writers are inspired about as often as Snooki says a coherent sentence. I'll be kicking and screaming the whole time I pound out that outline, but no pain, no gain baby. It's what Jillian Michaels has always told me anyway. Also, hating sweat is apparently for the weak.

However, my most major concern is sitting down to write, ending up on facebook (why, oh why did I make fb my homepage??), responding to contraversial political statuses (oh, how I love the sound of political bashing in the morning), watching Jenna Marbles poke fun at the male species, and "awww" over pictures of cute puppies. Suddenly, it's two hours later, I'm still in my "text-moosaging" pants, and there are two words on that word document. With technology at our fingertips (literally), it's so easy to get distracted by the stupidest stuff. For some reason, I prefer to act like an old person and longhand my writing, even though it takes a bajillion years to write a page. And then when I type up what I scribbled out on paper, I feel like I'm more productive when I'm chatting with friends about cute boys and laughing at Mitt Romney memes. Remember that shudder-worthy month when I wrote L'amour Shlamore? That was all longhand. So maybe lack of distractions doesn't correlate with quality of work (or I was just an idiot in 10th grade), but it certainly helps with timeliness.

Which makes me wonder. Do I dare longhand 50,000 words? Do I risk the hand cramps and weird stares when I actually have pen and paper? Or do I just get some goshdarn willpower, and type the darn thing?

I'll think about it while I outline it up. Let the pain begin.

Peace and Ponies,
Kira 

P.S. Why Kristina Horner does NanoWriMo:

Movies? Nonsense!

Dear Kira,

I have to agree with you; scripts are vastly underrated. It's like, people don't remember Lindsay Lohan's outfits in Mean Girls (yes, I succeed in relating everything back to Mean Girls) but they sure remember when Karen was like "If you're from Africa...why are you white?". In my view, the movie is no work of art without a well written script (and yes, I'm aware I just offended a lot of people by saying that). But think about it, a book can put clear mental images in your mind without using a single illustration; a picture is worth a thousand words, but a movie needs both.

So yeah, it's kind of unfair that the director and the actor gets all the credit. For example, Leonardo DiCaprio did not create the profound epicness that is Titanic, he just stood around and looked pretty (so very, very pretty).  And yet, he is what everyone remembers about that movie - oh yeah and that redheaded chick too (what was her name? Lily, Lavender, Daisy, something with flowers). But I digress. As my English 200 class would say, this is all about capitalism. It's more fair to acknowledge everyone's contribution to the movie, but in the economic sense, it needs to have a creator. Like toaster strudel needs a creator (last Mean Girls reference, I promise).

But anyway, it's almost November and you know what that means...turkey, wait, no, that's not right, I meant to say pumpkin pie, I mean NaNoWriMo. But actually, pumpkin pie. I'm really excited for my first year of participating in NaNoWriMo; I wish I had started doing it earlier. But, to be perfectly fair, I don't think I would have been able to write a novel in a month a few years ago. This is because I used to have this weird, freaky idea that you needed to be inspired to write (air quotations around inspired). To quote someone (actually, I can't remember who said this but it wasn't me), inspiration is for amateurs. At some point, you just have to suck it up and sneeze something out, you can worry about editing it later, but the most important thing is that you sit down and write. Maybe it's just me, but if I sat around waiting for inspiration to strike I would never have written this blog in the first place.

Peace out, dude, 
Maria

May the forcefulness be with you

Dear Maria,
If you're the Queen of sarcasm, I'm at least the princess, y'know, 'cause princesses are cool and they get to wear shiny things. But I don't at all find sarcasm bad...I mean, I'm still technically a teenager here. I still have a year to revel in my biting sarcastic responses and blame it on adolescence. Now excuse me while I become ever so thrilled in the bills I have to pay.

Yeah, I'm sure every thirteen year old has the same kind of sarcasm...

But I digress. I don't think there is any way to be truly original anymore in writing. When Inception came out, everyone was all "oh my gosh!" about the fact that a plot no one had ever thought of before was in theaters! I mean, a dream within a dream? Clearly that is the most original idea in the history of the universe. No one has ever presented plots about dreams before...

in your dreams. Ha, ha, ha.

So although every basic idea has been covered by previous great artists, doesn't mean you can't find a new way to reflect on "boy rescues girl," or "girl finds power," or "everyone in the world sleeps with everyone else and all wreaks havoc." The idea is only a tiny portion of what makes a piece of writing great. I have a strong belief that presenting original characters, dialogue, and voice makes for a new light on an idea that has been written to death. Also, combining ideas can make for originality. For instance, lots of stories about students falling in love with a teacher and their facing morals have been told, as have stories about lesbians facing intolerance, but I recently wondered, "well, would the same consequences hold for a young female student who falls in love with a female teacher? Or would they be more hush-hush about it?" For all I know, this book has already been written, and I'm just fooling myself about this whole combining ideas thing, but I like to think I'm witty and clever sometimes. But only on Thursdays. This idea boils down to conflicting morals vs. love, but the task of the writer is to find a spin on it that will be interesting and thought-provoking for the audience.

Speaking of thought provoking, we've been watching a lot of...erm...contraversial films in our English class, and I found that the director gets a heck of a lot more credit for creating such a masterful piece of art. But--hello--the screenwriter has the idea, she makes the darn contraversy! Last I checked, lighting and costuming was great and all, but it wasn't what made "entering the conversation", like every English teacher in the world wants us to do. The written word makes art in poetry, novels, and even plays, but the art of film seems to be distracted by fancy lighting, special effects, and big celebrity names. So I'm just wondering, can people ever see the art in a script? Or does the art of a film hold elsewhere?

Peace and Ponies,
Kira

Sarcasm is Something That I Do

Dear Kira,

First off, I'm kinda concerned that you think sarcasm is bad. I mean, sarcasm is what I do. You ask me if skydiving from space is a good idea? Oh yeah sure, it's a great idea, not dangerous at all! I think that if everything I said was taken seriously, the CIA would have me in a dark, little room for questioning right about now. But actually.

Anyway...

I guess that the easiest way to answer your question would be to refer you to T.S. Eliot's essay, Tradition and the Individual Talent but I'm not going to do that because that would be cruel and too much like my English 200 midterm for comfort. So, to make a long, long, LONG story short, my answer is no, I don't think it's possible to create a "unique" writing voice because, let's be honest here, every writer is influenced by the writers that have come before them. I don't think that's neccesarily a bad thing, or that you need to be too worried about it because, my experience is that, over time, you develop your own distinct writing style from the bits and pieces of literature you've been exposed to.

Still, I know how it feels to think you're "copying". What really concerns me is that there are supposedly only four "plots" in literary history: tragic, comic, romantic, and ironic. That makes being original hard. What am I supposed to do? Write a story about buying a gallon of milk? That would be a real thriller. I don't know, maybe it's possible to be original in literature. What do you think?

Sigh,
Maria

Hearing voices

Dear Maria,
As I've been writing these blogs, I've noticed that my voice becomes increasingly sarcastic. I mean, I don't walk around the HUB telling people who wish they had more time, "yeah, well I wish I had a pony," but my writing voice gets more of an edge to it. Lately I've been reading memoirs with this sarcastic bite to them, so I'm wondering, is my own style developing as a writer, or am I copying the voice of those I read?

I've found these memoirs to have really strong imagery and it's easy to relate to Tiny Fey when she talks about her ex-boyfriend sucking face with a hot blond, and in Yoga Bitch I nearly fell off my chair laughing when Suzanne Morrison described when her yoga friends in Bali thought it cleansing to drink pee (side note: This did not happen in Colorado, or you would have heard some "get me out of here"s from my end). So, after a quality reading experience, I wanted to evoke that same sort of imagery through my own writing.

But then after reading a classic or two (hey, it happens), I end up writing much more flowery sentences with sophisticated vocab and all that jazz. Sometimes it feels like more of a stretch for me, especially when I'm trying to bang out some poetry that doesn't sound like a freaking soap opera, but then I think "hey, this is feelin' pretty natural. I could get used to this." My keyboard must be so confused, not knowing if I'm a Tina Fey or Ernest Hemingway wannabe. You know what, keyboard? I don't know either. We can both be in this goshdarn identity crisis.

So can you create your writing voice, or is it natural? I guess it goes down to the nature/nurture debate...psychology class, you can't escape me.

Maybe that's why I like blogging so much...It's a socially acceptable form of being outrageously random and sarcastic.

Peace and Ponies,
Kira

To categorize your characters?

Bonjourno, Maria,
Okay, so I don't speak Italian. But I sound a heck of a lot cooler when I announce my presence in a "Mamma Mia! Pizza, pasta!" kind of way (or I'm just hungry and pining for some musicals). While I agree that the writing should be separate from the self, I always find the characters I create to be an extension of myself. Hence my weird need to constantly write about a girl and her life. Doesn't mean I'm planning on becoming a hippie who gets pregnant and has to decide between getting an abortion and losing a friendship with her Catholic best friend, or keeping the baby, but rather, the main character's reactions would be similar to my own.

But self-like or not, these characters seem to develop thoughts and opinions of their own. When I first start to write a book/short story/ambitious few lines that gets abandoned shortly afterward, I stick my characters and all their motives in their respective places, and all is right with the world. My characters behave quite nicely during chapters 1 and 2, then when I decide that so-and-so is going to do some grocery shopping and run into an ex, they tell me that they'd rather walk down a shady alleyway as a shortcut, meet some new badass friends, and get into trouble with the law because a cute guy with dreads told them to.

Well la dee, da, I tell that character, too bad your future is held at my very fingertips. But the character doesn't listen. It's as though her little feet are padding about my keyboard without my permission. Even when I tell her to get her stinky shoes off my computer, does she obey??

No, no she does not.

One of my author idols, Jodi Picoult, says that oftentimes, when she's in the middle of writing a scene, she'll call a friend and go "you won't believe what this character decided to do!" I can relate. I mean, even though I started off with the intent to fit each character into a nice box with clean intentions and they stumble upon a life-changing moral at the end of the book, I realize that would make them flat characters. Because life is messy. People can't be stuffed into nice little categories. As it turns out, characters are people too.

Or maybe I'm just too lazy to write an outline. That's entirely possibly too.

Peace and Ponies,
Kira 

Critics? Pshaw!

Dear Kira,

To respond to your question, yes, I think personal ego is very much separate from writing - not to say that I won't throw a hissy fit if you tell me my metaphors are weak and ineffective. I guess what I'm trying to convey is that, if I wrote strictly about what I knew, it wouldn't be fiction, would it?

To go all collegian and academic, let me just remind you of the New Critics (yes, I'm studying for my English theory class, you caught me). One of the major tenents of their philosophy was that the writer should be divorced from there work - that is to say that, while the author may be inspired by events in their lives, the purpose of writing is to take everyday experiences and raise them to the level of art - far beyond the author's experience.

Maybe I'm not making much sense, but I think that's definitely true. I mean, if you think about it, to the average reader the piece of writing has none of the connotations it has for the author. Like, wouldn't it be weird if we all knew what JK Rowling was thinking when she wrote Harry Potter? When you put a piece of writing out into the world, you're giving people permission to interpret it in the context of their own lives/experiences. So, I guess the long and the short of it is that when someone criticizes a piece of writing, they're not necessarily criticizing the author. The writing stands by itself, which, I think, is one of the attractions of writing fiction.

Not to be philosophical or anything.

Sure, it's difficult to deal with criticism of your writing, but it's not criticism of you. Speaking of criticism, one of the most frequent criticisms I encounter is criticisms of characters. It can be really difficult to create a believable character - especially when you're writing about someone who lives a life very different from yours. Remember when I wrote that book about a Victorian ghost who was seeking retribution for the murder of her one true love? Yeah, I can relate. But seriously, I find that I am constantly trying to squeeze my characters into the great, literary archetypes (I am such an English major), but it seems to be they better serve the story that way. So here's the dilemma, do you let your characters determine there own destines to do what seems natural? Or, are they slaves to the plot?

Cue dramatic music now,
Maria

Leggo my ego?

Hey Maria,
Happy Thursday! While I should be glazing over diligently reading over this philosophical essay on abjection and other vampire-ish things (who knew vampires could be so literary?), I somehow ended up thinking about my essay for our other English class. Normally I'm intimidated by that teacher since she blames all the world's problems on our generation, but today I was doing an internal happy dance--okay, maybe it was a little external too--because she loved my essay. I had no idea what the fudge I was doing, and I just sort of blahhhed on a page (as any quality English major tends to do), but somehow that turned into inspiration ideas of sorts, and I'm kinda feeling like I won the lottery of ego massagers right here.

Trouble is, English, make that college, is not about making one's head swell up to the size of a pumpkin. It's about learning, thinking, and informing the world. I did not create the literary genius that is Nabokov's work, I only analyzed it. But since a professional said my ideas were good, I went from thinking I had written the most crap essay in the history of essays, to running around singing "I believe I can fly!" because I was in one of those moods you only see in cheesy romantic comedies. And it got me thinking--is there any way you can separate your pride/ego from your writing?

I mean, think about it. One of the first things we're told is to write what you know. And I don't make it a secret that most of my work is a reflection of myself. I mean, why else would I write a 200 page bitch-fest about a pitiful crush? You know what, don't remind me. Tenth grade was just weird. Obviously I didn't write about Lolita to reflect upon myself (only to reflect on what grade I wanted), but part of this was to get the whole "why, this is the most insightful piece of literature I have ever encountered!" reaction. Why does it matter what the reader thinks of the author? Shouldn't it only matter that the reader understands what the author is trying to get across? Writing is most certainly not a popularity contest. Yet some of the most vulnerable parts of ourselves get put out there for all the world to see. And thus, the reaction to our writing is seldom separate from the reaction to ourselves.

Peace and Ponies,
Kira

An introduction

Hello, friends from the internet and beyond. I know you're used to seeing our lovely faces stampede your news feed from "coffee, yoga and life's other necessities" and "Just sayin,'" but today we'd like a to announce a NEW BLOG! Don't all caps just make you feel the excitement? No? Grab a cup of coffee then. I'll wait.

Better? Okay, let's try it again. Maria and I are introducing a NEW BLOG! And guess what? You passed the excitement test. You are now one of us, and you win...

Hold on. I just lost my train of thought. Isn't that the weirdest frickin' image right there? I mean, I sure would like to see a train with a bunch of brains riding around it (to be honest right here, I google searched "train brains." No such luck).

So I'm sure y'all are at the edge of your seat, wondering what this thing is about. But before I tell you, let me just advise that you clear the clutter off your chair. You want to have enough wiggle room so your butt doesn't fall off. Just sayin'. But in all seriousness, we decided to write a blog in the form of letters to one another, similar to the vlog Brothers (Hank and John Green). Each post we'll have a new writerly topic that has been bothering us, making us wonder, making us cry, scream, etc (we've all been there). Throughout this blog we're hoping to 1) resolve some of our own struggles that have come about through battling the written word, and 2) reach out to the writing community of Pennsylvania and beyond. Sometimes the writing community can feel a bit scattered, and not that every writer in the universe is bored enough to read this blog (Tina Fey, why aren't you answering my emails, damnit??), but perhaps through each post, we can knit the group of writers a tad bit tighter.

Also, turtles are awesome.

That is all.