Last day of the year
Dec. 31st, 2005 01:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ksmithBought the accordion folders for my 2006 records, and nabbed a new check register from the bank. Still haven't gotten 'round to clearing out the box of stuff I cleaned off my desk last week--have I mentioned how much I hate filing?
I hate filing.
Still working on finishing up one of the will-it-never-end chapters. One problem was simply that fact that the blasted thing was too long--25 pages, with too much happening after a climactic decision had been made. So, last night I lopped off the end of the chapter, a bit of surgery that cost me close to 1500 words. Luckily they weren't new words, just old ones that had worn out their welcome. The surgery still hurt, but the pain passed quickly.
So we're left with a Jani-Dieter chapter of buildbuildbuild/climactic decision/mutual tearing-up/followed by Jani going off and running into Niall. This section needs to move, and to end with conflict, which means a fight. Niall opens their conversation with--tada--a quote from Henry IV Part 1. The thing that complicates all this is the fact that as a possessor of an MA from the future equivalent of the University of Chicago, Niall knows his Shakespeare. Author, meanwhile, who took an Intro to Shakespeare class in undergrad a quarter-century ago, does not possess that same level of knowledge.
That's the biggest problem with writing characters who know what they're doing. Sooner or later you need to write their competence into the story, and that means research, or at least a self-imposed reading assignment.
In this case, I think I'll need to read the Henry plays to pick out ways that they fit with this book. Niall cribs a speech from Part 1 in an earlier chapter, and the speech is applicable not only because the actions described parallel to some degree actions that Jani took almost 20 years before, but because the character taking those actions is in approximately the same place that Jani is now. The same sorts of turning points. The same types of decisions needing to be made. It isn't enough that the quotations Niall uses make sense within the context of the scene itself--it and other quotations need to make metasense, need to serve as a guide to illustrate the issues Jani is dealing with, and also indicate if and when any divergence occurs.
This all started last night as I leafed through my Oxford Dictionary of Quotations looking for something applicable to the Jani-Niall verbal sparring match, then reading the scene in my old Shakespeare text, and realizing where the line fit. We actually did study Henry IV Part 1 during the class. My handwritten notes--when did I ever write that small?--can be seen in various margins. Some of them even make sense.
This could all end in one big pile-up.
In other news, we actually saw some sunshine for only the second time in about two weeks. Guess that was our weekly allotment.
Happy New Year to one and all. Let 2006 be the best year ever for everyone.
I hate filing.
Still working on finishing up one of the will-it-never-end chapters. One problem was simply that fact that the blasted thing was too long--25 pages, with too much happening after a climactic decision had been made. So, last night I lopped off the end of the chapter, a bit of surgery that cost me close to 1500 words. Luckily they weren't new words, just old ones that had worn out their welcome. The surgery still hurt, but the pain passed quickly.
So we're left with a Jani-Dieter chapter of buildbuildbuild/climactic decision/mutual tearing-up/followed by Jani going off and running into Niall. This section needs to move, and to end with conflict, which means a fight. Niall opens their conversation with--tada--a quote from Henry IV Part 1. The thing that complicates all this is the fact that as a possessor of an MA from the future equivalent of the University of Chicago, Niall knows his Shakespeare. Author, meanwhile, who took an Intro to Shakespeare class in undergrad a quarter-century ago, does not possess that same level of knowledge.
That's the biggest problem with writing characters who know what they're doing. Sooner or later you need to write their competence into the story, and that means research, or at least a self-imposed reading assignment.
In this case, I think I'll need to read the Henry plays to pick out ways that they fit with this book. Niall cribs a speech from Part 1 in an earlier chapter, and the speech is applicable not only because the actions described parallel to some degree actions that Jani took almost 20 years before, but because the character taking those actions is in approximately the same place that Jani is now. The same sorts of turning points. The same types of decisions needing to be made. It isn't enough that the quotations Niall uses make sense within the context of the scene itself--it and other quotations need to make metasense, need to serve as a guide to illustrate the issues Jani is dealing with, and also indicate if and when any divergence occurs.
This all started last night as I leafed through my Oxford Dictionary of Quotations looking for something applicable to the Jani-Niall verbal sparring match, then reading the scene in my old Shakespeare text, and realizing where the line fit. We actually did study Henry IV Part 1 during the class. My handwritten notes--when did I ever write that small?--can be seen in various margins. Some of them even make sense.
This could all end in one big pile-up.
In other news, we actually saw some sunshine for only the second time in about two weeks. Guess that was our weekly allotment.
Happy New Year to one and all. Let 2006 be the best year ever for everyone.
