Today I declared my major in the field of English, with a creative writing emphasis. The world feels like it's fallen into place. It's new, fresh, and ready for me. Looking at the classes I have to take, I'll only be graduating about a quarter late for the typical four year bachelor's degree - which is a big deal considering the fact that I thought I would be two or three years late after three years of dinking around, thinking I was going into physics.
So what does this new major mean for me?
Well, let me give you a low down of the classes I have taken, am going to take, or will have to take at some point - just to give you an idea. Right now, I'm finishing up English 351 - Introduction to Fiction Writing. Next quarter, I'm signed up for three classes (this sometimes shocks people from different parts of the US or from outside of the country - my school is divided into four quarters - Fall, Winter, Spring, and an optional Summer that has two much shorter sessions that students can choose from. A full time quarter is between 12 and 18 credits. Classes are generally 2-5 credits. I tend to take three 5-credit classes). Those classes are: 338 (Women and Lit), 312 (Film/Culture: Japanese Anime), and 353 (Introduction to Poetry Writing). I will also have to take, at some point, 347 (YA Lit), 423 (Major Authors: emphasis on specific author), and another 300 or 400 level lit class; with that, I will have to take: 451 (fiction writing seminar), 456 (special topics in fiction), 459 (editing and publishing), and 460 (multigenre explorations). To finish the whole thing off, I'll need to nab a 370 (Introduction to Language). Then I'll have completed my major. Most of those classes are options from a list of possible classes, and those just happen to be the most appealing options to me. As you can see, I'm still undecided on one of those classes.
This whole business of declaring a major, dealing with actually getting through my bachelor's degree, and everything involved in that, has got me thinking about a question that I frequently ask myself, always answer, but never keep to that answer.
The question: How long should I wait before trying to get one of my books published?
The answer: I shouldn't; I've waited enough. It's time to get started.
Only once before in the past have I taken this advice. That's right, folks, I've querried an agent before. Since I've made no mention of being a published author, you can probably figure out the outcome. To be fair, I was sixteen or seventeen at the time.
Now I'm older, better at writing, and would like to start trying again. I've been actively editing one of my books, but it's more of an editing/rewriting thing, and I don't have much time for it. I intend to take full advantage of summer and I'm hoping to start querying again sometime next year.
I've ordered several books on writing, and I've decided that I want to expand my collection of resources in my library so I think I'll continue to order books on writing. The nice thing about Amazon is that you can get books for amazingly cheap prices. Anyway, I think I'll start posting here more often again, probably with things that relate to the editing process, the reading I've been doing and the ideas presented in the books, and starting next Fall - on my major. A friend of mine got on my case a little while ago about not updating here, so I'm back. And look, today's even a Friday - one of my scheduled days for writing.
I hope you enjoy this disjointed blog post, John. And the same to anyone out there who's reading. TTFN.
Friday, May 28, 2010
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Copy pasta from OD:
That's right, eventually I do get around to entries I intended to write over a month ago. Like the entry I intended to write about how I believe that smileys sometimes work really well in conversations in lieu of punctuation. I briefly covered it, but there's more of an argument there than just what I wrote. I intend to cover the "more".
First, to clarify, I'm referring to the kind of smiley or emoticon that I have in my entry title. I'm referring to the textual smiley, not the cartoon bubble smiley. Those smileys are good if you're trying to amuse someone online outside of a conversation, but pictures don't really work in lieu of punctuation. They detract from whatever you're trying to say. My friend and I, between topics, occasionally regale each other with cute emoticons - bunnies, or goats, or "What is this thing doing!?" We don't use them as punctuation.
However, textual smileys or emoticons, I feel work well for punctuation in internet conversations, private messages through websites, inside of entries, or in emails. I will now tell you why I feel this way.
Let's use a very simplistic, easy to cover example. Say you're talking to someone about something. It doesn't matter what, but it's kind of complicated. Assume the conversation goes something like this: they say something, you're confused, they explain it better, and you say, "Ah, I see." This can come out in several ways. There's the "OH I GET IT NOW THAT'S AWESOME!!!" version, there's the "Oh, I get. Cool," version, and there's the "Uh-huh...I'm going to say 'I see' because I don't really know what else to say. You're kind of pathetic..." Your friend can tell which "Ah, I see," you're using based on your intonation, the look on your face, how enthused you seem, etc. But what if the same conversation happens over instant messaging? There are a number of things that, when said, can be taken in different ways. How you take it depends on those things I mentioned above. In IM, email, or any other online form of conversation - you don't have the luxury of sight and hearing. You have to textually convey the emotion behind what your'e saying.
Now, as a writer II have to do this anyway, all the time, through my books and short stories. Every time a character speaks, I have to find a way to convey that dialogue in such a way that the reader understands how character is speaking. However, I have one tool at my command that online conversations do not: dialogue tags. If I want to convey that something someone just said was spoken with an air of nervousness, I can write...
"__________," he said, tugging on his collar. He shifted feet.
When you're writing an email, speaking over IM, or writing an entry like I am now - you don't have that luxery either. No sight, no hearing, and no dialogue tags. You have to find some way to make the words themselves, and the punctuation, convey what you mean.
Enter the smiley. Again, I don't like the cartoonish faces - I feel they detract from the actual statement when they're placed alongside words, they often create a clunky offset from the rest of a paragraph when coming in at the end of a sentence (as in, the line spacing between lines...the actual picture length of a smiley is often longer than the character space a letter requires, so you'll have three lines of a paragraph tightly packed together and then the fourth line set of by almost twice that because of the emoticon. I also find them distracting in general, but that's just me.
However, the characters that make up a textual smiley are all normal punctuation marks, or sometimes letters themselves. ^_^ is a smiley someone I used to know from Germany used to use. Aside from the fact that it was immensely cute, it sometimes cut some of the things he said that could otherwise have been taken as cruel remarks, and showed me that he was either joking, or else meant it in the non-cruel manner. Sometimes, it served just to show me that he was smiling, which has a greater effect than just, "I'm smiling right now. I thought you should know."
Because these smileys are textual, they fit in with the rest of the sentence naturally, but at the same time they serve in the same way a dialogue tag or a smile in real life might. We're a very visual species...especially since the rise of television over books as an entertainment form. These visual clues in our online dialogue, where we lack any other visual image, helps clarify our speech.
We have visual clues in our writing already to show whether something spoken in a normal manner ( . ), whether it's spoken with a slight uptilt at the end that denotes curiosity (?), or whether it's spoken with a tone of excitement (!). We also have punctuation that denotes something that is said almost as a side note (these parenthases I've been using in this paragraph are the punctuation I'm referring to), or something that trails off (...), or something that pauses for a brief moment ( , ), or something that is cut of (— <--the elongated dash here, when it comes half way through a sentence and the next thing stated occurs in a new paragraph, shows someone either being cut off or cutting themselves off; it can also be used in the same way a set of commas or parenthases are used if it comes in the middle of a sentence, setting something off from the rest of the sentence - I've been using a space, dash, space as I just used there because on OD, you have to look up in the "insert special characters" menu in order to use that long dash). And then, we also have punctuation that denotes speaking ( "___").
We have a plethora of visual images already that serve the same purpose a simple pause in breath or change in voice might serve if we were speaking face to face with someone. These are used daily by authors of all types. But again, authors have dialogue tags that help with more complex emotions; IM, email, blog postings, etc., don't have dialogue tags.
A smiley can help with this situation. Take a look at the example above again. "Ah, I see." When I see it plain like that, I always think it means, "Uh-huh...I'm going to say 'I see' because I don't really know what else to say." But I always type it plain like that. I have a friend who then apologizes as if whatever he said was unimportant or bothersome in some way. I assume that means he views it the same way. It's easy to say, "Ah, I see" in an "OMG that's so cool!" manner...just put an exclamation mark or three after it. But what if you don't want to appear over enthusiastic, but don't want it to be misconstrued as you not giving a shit?
"Ah, I see =)"
It's toned down a bit from the exclamation point, but the smile shows that it's meant in a good way.
I wouldn't suggest that everybody must, should or even that I'd like to see everybody use smileys/emoticons in lieu of punctuation, but I do feel that they make certain statements less ambiguous, and I like that.
This is why I feel that smileys work quite well as punctuation in certain types of conversations. I would never suggest it for fiction or even creative nonfiction or official school or work based papers, but I do think that smileys have something to offer informal online conversations between friends.
My argument is done now. I hope you all have a good night =)
(See what I did there? The smiley shows that that last line was meant personally for you guys and said all in good fun, rather than being a more cold, aloof, official statement. I love how that worked out ^_^ )
That's right, eventually I do get around to entries I intended to write over a month ago. Like the entry I intended to write about how I believe that smileys sometimes work really well in conversations in lieu of punctuation. I briefly covered it, but there's more of an argument there than just what I wrote. I intend to cover the "more".
First, to clarify, I'm referring to the kind of smiley or emoticon that I have in my entry title. I'm referring to the textual smiley, not the cartoon bubble smiley. Those smileys are good if you're trying to amuse someone online outside of a conversation, but pictures don't really work in lieu of punctuation. They detract from whatever you're trying to say. My friend and I, between topics, occasionally regale each other with cute emoticons - bunnies, or goats, or "What is this thing doing!?" We don't use them as punctuation.
However, textual smileys or emoticons, I feel work well for punctuation in internet conversations, private messages through websites, inside of entries, or in emails. I will now tell you why I feel this way.
Let's use a very simplistic, easy to cover example. Say you're talking to someone about something. It doesn't matter what, but it's kind of complicated. Assume the conversation goes something like this: they say something, you're confused, they explain it better, and you say, "Ah, I see." This can come out in several ways. There's the "OH I GET IT NOW THAT'S AWESOME!!!" version, there's the "Oh, I get. Cool," version, and there's the "Uh-huh...I'm going to say 'I see' because I don't really know what else to say. You're kind of pathetic..." Your friend can tell which "Ah, I see," you're using based on your intonation, the look on your face, how enthused you seem, etc. But what if the same conversation happens over instant messaging? There are a number of things that, when said, can be taken in different ways. How you take it depends on those things I mentioned above. In IM, email, or any other online form of conversation - you don't have the luxury of sight and hearing. You have to textually convey the emotion behind what your'e saying.
Now, as a writer II have to do this anyway, all the time, through my books and short stories. Every time a character speaks, I have to find a way to convey that dialogue in such a way that the reader understands how character is speaking. However, I have one tool at my command that online conversations do not: dialogue tags. If I want to convey that something someone just said was spoken with an air of nervousness, I can write...
"__________," he said, tugging on his collar. He shifted feet.
When you're writing an email, speaking over IM, or writing an entry like I am now - you don't have that luxery either. No sight, no hearing, and no dialogue tags. You have to find some way to make the words themselves, and the punctuation, convey what you mean.
Enter the smiley. Again, I don't like the cartoonish faces - I feel they detract from the actual statement when they're placed alongside words, they often create a clunky offset from the rest of a paragraph when coming in at the end of a sentence (as in, the line spacing between lines...the actual picture length of a smiley is often longer than the character space a letter requires, so you'll have three lines of a paragraph tightly packed together and then the fourth line set of by almost twice that because of the emoticon. I also find them distracting in general, but that's just me.
However, the characters that make up a textual smiley are all normal punctuation marks, or sometimes letters themselves. ^_^ is a smiley someone I used to know from Germany used to use. Aside from the fact that it was immensely cute, it sometimes cut some of the things he said that could otherwise have been taken as cruel remarks, and showed me that he was either joking, or else meant it in the non-cruel manner. Sometimes, it served just to show me that he was smiling, which has a greater effect than just, "I'm smiling right now. I thought you should know."
Because these smileys are textual, they fit in with the rest of the sentence naturally, but at the same time they serve in the same way a dialogue tag or a smile in real life might. We're a very visual species...especially since the rise of television over books as an entertainment form. These visual clues in our online dialogue, where we lack any other visual image, helps clarify our speech.
We have visual clues in our writing already to show whether something spoken in a normal manner ( . ), whether it's spoken with a slight uptilt at the end that denotes curiosity (?), or whether it's spoken with a tone of excitement (!). We also have punctuation that denotes something that is said almost as a side note (these parenthases I've been using in this paragraph are the punctuation I'm referring to), or something that trails off (...), or something that pauses for a brief moment ( , ), or something that is cut of (— <--the elongated dash here, when it comes half way through a sentence and the next thing stated occurs in a new paragraph, shows someone either being cut off or cutting themselves off; it can also be used in the same way a set of commas or parenthases are used if it comes in the middle of a sentence, setting something off from the rest of the sentence - I've been using a space, dash, space as I just used there because on OD, you have to look up in the "insert special characters" menu in order to use that long dash). And then, we also have punctuation that denotes speaking ( "___").
We have a plethora of visual images already that serve the same purpose a simple pause in breath or change in voice might serve if we were speaking face to face with someone. These are used daily by authors of all types. But again, authors have dialogue tags that help with more complex emotions; IM, email, blog postings, etc., don't have dialogue tags.
A smiley can help with this situation. Take a look at the example above again. "Ah, I see." When I see it plain like that, I always think it means, "Uh-huh...I'm going to say 'I see' because I don't really know what else to say." But I always type it plain like that. I have a friend who then apologizes as if whatever he said was unimportant or bothersome in some way. I assume that means he views it the same way. It's easy to say, "Ah, I see" in an "OMG that's so cool!" manner...just put an exclamation mark or three after it. But what if you don't want to appear over enthusiastic, but don't want it to be misconstrued as you not giving a shit?
"Ah, I see =)"
It's toned down a bit from the exclamation point, but the smile shows that it's meant in a good way.
I wouldn't suggest that everybody must, should or even that I'd like to see everybody use smileys/emoticons in lieu of punctuation, but I do feel that they make certain statements less ambiguous, and I like that.
This is why I feel that smileys work quite well as punctuation in certain types of conversations. I would never suggest it for fiction or even creative nonfiction or official school or work based papers, but I do think that smileys have something to offer informal online conversations between friends.
My argument is done now. I hope you all have a good night =)
(See what I did there? The smiley shows that that last line was meant personally for you guys and said all in good fun, rather than being a more cold, aloof, official statement. I love how that worked out ^_^ )
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