Stuart Aken's Blog, page 305

Writing: 2500 Words This Afternoon

After a morning spent in the somewhat tedious occupation of earning brass, I came home to do some real work. Another 2500 words flowed from the fingertips and into the growing files. One of the protagonists justifying his attempts to grasp power and another fearing he is about to meet a watery end, in the desert! I leave you to ponder on that one.
An early post tonight as it's my evening for the writing group; a must-have stimulous for me.
Managed to schedule another few Word Spot posts and another author interview. Tomorrow sees Ian Alexander explaining his approach to the craft of writing epic fantasy. Certainly worth a visit, I think.
Now, I need a brief rest before I eat something and then travel the meandering English road toward the sea and my writing group. So I'll wish you all, 'Good night'.

Stuart's Daily Word Spot: Bowdlerize

Image via Wikipedia
Bowdlerize: verb – (Thomas Bowdler (1754–1825) was an English editor, who published an expurgated edition of Shakespeare.); to expurgate a text by removing or altering material considered improper or offensive, emasculate.Bowdler's numerous and often silly cuts and edits to Shakespeare have immortalized his name as another word for censorship.
'It seems some people never learn from history: Bowdler did his best to emasculate and sanitise Shakespeare and produced a laughable piece of work as a result. But others continue in his name and Bowdlerize many works, replacing evocative expletives with meaningless euphemisms and chopping out great chunks of text that fail to fall into their peculiar definition of what is or is not acceptable. Idiots; the lot of them. Perhaps these same folk would like to paint clothes on the numerous wonderful nudes? Certainly, there have been those who added fig leaves to classical Greek sculpture in order that 'ladies' would not be offended by the sight of carved genitalia. Such prudishness invariably declares more about the minds of the censors than about those they presume to protect from what they perceive, with their foul interpretations, as offensive or evil.'

Writing: A Mere 1000 Words

After a long and relatively demanding day at the office, only time and energy to write 1000 words tonight. None, of course, last night, as I was, again at the office all day and then dancing last night. But the story moves one and one of the heroes faces another challenge.
Tomorrow, I should be more productive. I must be, if I'm to reach my target. For the moment, though, a rest is definitely what I need.

Stuart's Daily Word Spot: Denouement

Image by National Galleries of Scotland Commons via Flickr
Denouement: noun - unravelling of a plot, situation or mystery; the final resolution of a play, novel, or other narrative.The denouement comes just after a story's climax, but before it actually ends and wraps up any loose ends the author doesn't want leaving unresolved.
'Elle was infuriated by the people in front of her in the queue for the movie, as they discussed in detail the denouement of the film she was about to watch.'
7 June 1811: James Young Simpson was born. This Scottish Obstetrician, who pioneered the use of anaesthetics in the UK, was born in Bathgate, West Lothian. Initially educated at the local school, his obvious abilities persuaded his father and brothers to pay for a college education and he entered the University of Edinburgh at only 14 years of age. He later became Professor of Midwifery (Obstetrics) there and was also Queen Victoria's physician . Although he finished his final examination at 18, he was so young that had to wait two more years before he was licenced to practise medicine. An early advocate of the use of midwives in hospitals, he was also consulted about gynaecological problems by many prominent women. His most noted contribution was the introduction of anaesthesia to childbirth.

Stuart's Daily Word Spot: Habitat

Image via Wikipedia
Habitat: noun - natural environment occupied by a particular organism; area distinguished by the organisms occupying it; such areas collectively; dwelling place, usual surroundings, habitation.
'Many of the world's rarest creatures are facing extinction due to the disappearance of their habitat, often due to the encroachment of man and his activity.'
6 June 1961 – Carl Jung died Carl Gustav Jung  (26 July 1875 – 6 June 1961), Swiss psychiatrist and founder of Analytical Psychology, is thought by some to be the first modern psychologist to state that the human psyche is, by nature, religious. He's also one of the best known pioneers of dream analysis. He considered himself a natural scientist, not a theoretical psychologist, like Freud. Jung used deep observation followed by categorization instead of the opposite process of imagining what categories might exist and then looking for proof of these and deciding which was always correct. He was a practicing clinician, but involved himself in philosophy, sociology, astrology, literature, the arts and even alchemy.   

Writing: 3,600 Words Today, in Two Sessions

Image via WikipediaSunday, and the traditional time for a lie-in. So, naturally, I was up just after 07:00 and pounding the keys ten minutes later. No coffee, no reading of emails, no side-tracking. Just straight on with the writing of the epic fantasy. I completed around 1300 words before I needed to wake Valerie and Kate for breakfast; quickly prepared but eaten at a leisurely pace. Back into the study and a further 2300 words written, ending ch 35 and starting ch 36. Today, I watched my heroine dance in the desert sands and later present herself to the man who would have her as a slave. I protected myself with the hero against a sand storm; well, actually, I don't yet know how he'll fare there, since I haven't concluded that episode yet.
Lunch, and then into the garden to pot on a few plants whose homes were becoming too confining for them. And the removal of a small flowering bush, the name of which escapes me, which has succumbed to the drought and died. That is now in pieces in the recycling bin to be sent to be turned into compost.
Back into the study to complete 2 character profiles and work on a few more blog posts to be scheduled. Also, a lengthy piece on the organic growth of the English language for a guest spot on another blog. A few comments on some of the groups I belong to and some odd tweets just for fun.
The evening meal, followed by a constitutional and, once I've concluded here, a nice pot of Earl Grey before settling down to relax for what remains of the day.

Stuart's Daily Word Spot: Amount or number

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Amount or number Amount: noun - total to which anything amounts, total quantity or number; quantity or sum viewed as the total reached;  Number: noun - precise sum or aggregate of; abstract entity representing a quantity, used to express how many things are being referred to, or how much there is of something; an arithmetical value corresponding to a particular quantity of something; word, symbol or figure representing an arithmetical unit, a numeral; total, value expressed in figures, a statistic; arithmetical value; person or thing having a place in a series; any of a collection of songs or poems; a song, tune; girl or young woman; full count of a collection of persons or things.Where Amount usually refers to a mass, number generally refers to a quantity.
'An enormous amount of publicity surrounded the death of John F Kennedy.'
'The number of stories relating the death of Elvis Presley could be counted in thousands.'
'The pretty girl was a cute number, dressed in a stylish number, as she listened and danced to the latest number played by the rock band.' 

Writing: 3000 Words in Two Sessions

The first session, before breakfast in bed with Valerie, took me to a little over 1800 words and again moved the story on apace. After the usual morning jobs, we saw the weather forecast for tomorrow and decided our walk would be more pleasant today. And, pleasant it was, though we trod the ground we have covered on many previous weekends.
After lunch, inside, as it was too windy to sit in the garden today, I set to on a second writing session and turned out another 1200 plus words. So, today, the epic fantasy has taken me through a desert, along a track in a rain forest, and into the streets of a city lying on the shores of a lake beneath a smoking volcano. I've been in the company of slave traders, questionable high priests and heroic warriors. Such is the daily life of the writer of fantasy; and it's great fun.
Of course, England (the football team, that is) were playing Switzerland in a qualifying match. The draw was a better result than they deserved, to be honest and I'm pleased I sat through only the second half.
Dr Who entertained us with further adventures and left us cliff hanging until the series resumes in Autumn. Neat trick from the producers, that.
Now, since I've uploaded, edited and 'fixed' the photographs I took in the garden and on our walk, dealt with a multitude of emails and spent enough hours pounding keys and staring at a screen, I think it's time for the rest of that bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon I opened last night, don't you?

Stuart's Daily Word Spot: Bildungsroman

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Bildungsroman: noun - novel dealing with the subject's formative years or spiritual education, also known as coming-of-age stories.
'Among the many bildungsromans extant, I found Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man possibly the most overrated. J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye , though flawed, succeeds in being a lot less boring, but The Kite Runner by Khaled Husseini is one of the best modern examples I've read.'

Writing: 2900 Words; Better.

This morning, the computer was playing up; Excel was slow and the custom dictionary in Word pretended not to exist. I wrote on nevertheless and managed 2900 words of blistering prose, taking three separate story threads further through the tale. After breakfast, I restarted the machine and all settled back to normal, apart from Media Player, which had somehow lost all my music from the playlist. I created a new one and imported all the albums into that; it now works again as well. Bloody computers!
A quick trip to Tesco's for fresh groceries and then lunch under a clear blue sky in the garden.
Kate took a friend off to the coast in the car to 'study' on the beach.
This afternoon I scheduled more posts for the blog to take me to next Thursday. Read some of one of my writing magazines with a great feature about the late great John Sullivan.
After tea, pinched Kate's bike to carry Valerie's bowls bag to the local bowling green, where she had a match, and then cycled back. I'd forgotten how much effort it takes to cycle against the wind and up even a slight incline!
This evening, I've completed 8 character profiles, which leaves another 8 to do. But now I'm going to spend the remains of the day with Valerie, sitting on the sofa and watching comedy on the idiots' lantern, whilst imbibing some Cabernet Sauvignon from the case I got from Naked Wines on my birthday.

The picture shows a villa in Crete.

And I've just noticed I've reached 300 followers on the blog tonight. If you'd care to join them, please do. As a member of Facebook, you just click on the Networked Blogs link, and if you don't belong to FB, just click on the 'Follow' link instead. I'd love to have you along for the ride.