Gillian Polack's Blog, page 58
July 31, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-07-31T22:38:00
I'm watching the weather. We're about to get a nasty change. Since vicious wind has swept through my bones for nearly three days, I'm ready for it. In about an hour the worst will start and after that I shall get more work done.
In the meantime, I'm working through the simpler things. I've washed dishes already and am now drinking coffee. Then I shall tackle the easy things for tomorrow and the ones that can be done today and from home. When teh weather has settled, I shall sleep, and wonder where the day went.
In the meantime, I'm working through the simpler things. I've washed dishes already and am now drinking coffee. Then I shall tackle the easy things for tomorrow and the ones that can be done today and from home. When teh weather has settled, I shall sleep, and wonder where the day went.
July 30, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-07-31T10:51:00
I didn't blog yesterday because the day escaped me. My class nearly doubled in size, which meant teaching was unexpected. I still taught the material I had intended, but we didn't have time for excursing into odd patches of understanding and I had to start the new students on the basic ground rules (which involve no-one occupying the floor for too long except me and that everyone accept the existence of Evil Gillian, basically).
Fourteen students and their work is a lot of reading aloud, and it was instantly obvious which of the new students were best at paying attention to and following instructions. This was quite good, for it gave me a chance to explain to people that they don't need to explain their writing: that their writing will do nicely by itself (people tend to fall back on excuses when they don't want to say "I missed what you said."). It's very difficult to teach students not to apologise. Although I do notice that my male students tend to explain (as if we can't work things out for ourselves) and my female to apologise (as if they shouldn't even have written the pieces). Both are really apologies, however. I shall work on both, for neither are good habits. What do they do when they get into print and don't have 3 minutes to tell us how to interpret their work or to skip theirs because it's not quite right but this is what they meant?
One of the new students exclaimed aloud when I said "And for homework" and everyone pulled out their pens. The exclamation was astonishment at so many people being enthusiastic about homework. Said homework is people using emotion to centre short pieces of writing. This was something one of the students asked for ("expressive outbursts" he called it) when I did my survey of students' needs and wishes last time, and it's proven a very handy exercise for so many reasons. Hence the homework.
I also went back to the groundwork for telling stories. The students who were trained to respect writing books and studies of literature were astonished, which, I'm afraid, amused me. New students are easily surprised. Apparently one is expected to be superior and literary with PhDs. I told them that I can be, but I'd rather teach them how to write good stories.
Literary theory doesn't really help people who are sorting out the absolute basics. I will bring it into my teaching when the students are ready and today was not even close to that day.
This is my secret for getting so much advanced work done by a class that's not supposed to be able to manage it - I introduce ideas in careful order so that they *can* manage it. I suspect we might do some Derrida eventually, but not for a fair while, for I want them comfortable with basic narrative structures first, and that means much practice until I'm happy they have them. It also means that all the new students are on the same page as the older ones (for whom the basic narrative is a revision), which is good, because yesterday's class included more people who were entirely new to writing than it included long-time students.
If my mind is a bit awry today, it's due to a combination of roaring wind and mild virus. This is the first of my full days for Dealing with Things before i go. Mostly my days are chockers with meetings and much etcetera, but I have two full days and one half day at home, just working through what must be worked through. My first thought was to spend this day in bed, but it can't be done. They're still long days, just long days when I plough through paperwork and send stuff off to deadline and etc. Much etcetera.
And now, coffee beckons. I forgot my coffee yesterday and I littered the intarwebz with tyops. It was very exciting.
Fourteen students and their work is a lot of reading aloud, and it was instantly obvious which of the new students were best at paying attention to and following instructions. This was quite good, for it gave me a chance to explain to people that they don't need to explain their writing: that their writing will do nicely by itself (people tend to fall back on excuses when they don't want to say "I missed what you said."). It's very difficult to teach students not to apologise. Although I do notice that my male students tend to explain (as if we can't work things out for ourselves) and my female to apologise (as if they shouldn't even have written the pieces). Both are really apologies, however. I shall work on both, for neither are good habits. What do they do when they get into print and don't have 3 minutes to tell us how to interpret their work or to skip theirs because it's not quite right but this is what they meant?
One of the new students exclaimed aloud when I said "And for homework" and everyone pulled out their pens. The exclamation was astonishment at so many people being enthusiastic about homework. Said homework is people using emotion to centre short pieces of writing. This was something one of the students asked for ("expressive outbursts" he called it) when I did my survey of students' needs and wishes last time, and it's proven a very handy exercise for so many reasons. Hence the homework.
I also went back to the groundwork for telling stories. The students who were trained to respect writing books and studies of literature were astonished, which, I'm afraid, amused me. New students are easily surprised. Apparently one is expected to be superior and literary with PhDs. I told them that I can be, but I'd rather teach them how to write good stories.
Literary theory doesn't really help people who are sorting out the absolute basics. I will bring it into my teaching when the students are ready and today was not even close to that day.
This is my secret for getting so much advanced work done by a class that's not supposed to be able to manage it - I introduce ideas in careful order so that they *can* manage it. I suspect we might do some Derrida eventually, but not for a fair while, for I want them comfortable with basic narrative structures first, and that means much practice until I'm happy they have them. It also means that all the new students are on the same page as the older ones (for whom the basic narrative is a revision), which is good, because yesterday's class included more people who were entirely new to writing than it included long-time students.
If my mind is a bit awry today, it's due to a combination of roaring wind and mild virus. This is the first of my full days for Dealing with Things before i go. Mostly my days are chockers with meetings and much etcetera, but I have two full days and one half day at home, just working through what must be worked through. My first thought was to spend this day in bed, but it can't be done. They're still long days, just long days when I plough through paperwork and send stuff off to deadline and etc. Much etcetera.
And now, coffee beckons. I forgot my coffee yesterday and I littered the intarwebz with tyops. It was very exciting.
July 29, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-07-30T08:40:00
I'm so very happy about being a guest for Liburnicon. I will probably say this again, but it gives me a chance to introduce Australian spec fic to new readers. It's another of those places - usually so rare - where I get to be all the different parts of myself at once.
I have a reading at FantasyCon, too, which is wonderful. I've decided to share a bit of the cursed novel. No-one was ever hit by a hurricane after a reading from it, after all. And my new publisher doesn't live in Hurricane Alley. And I'm just so very, very happy that people will finally get to meet Fay. This is a portal novel, and a quest novel (only inside out) and it's about power and friendship and romance and loneliness and living in entirely the wrong place. None of these things is why it contains dead morris dancers.
And now it's time to teach. Pity my students, for they may well encounter Evil Gillian. We have a list of skills and knowledge they wanted to learn in the next two weeks and Evil Gillian creates learning in her wake. I have no idea why this is so, but it's a steady pattern with this group.
I have a reading at FantasyCon, too, which is wonderful. I've decided to share a bit of the cursed novel. No-one was ever hit by a hurricane after a reading from it, after all. And my new publisher doesn't live in Hurricane Alley. And I'm just so very, very happy that people will finally get to meet Fay. This is a portal novel, and a quest novel (only inside out) and it's about power and friendship and romance and loneliness and living in entirely the wrong place. None of these things is why it contains dead morris dancers.
And now it's time to teach. Pity my students, for they may well encounter Evil Gillian. We have a list of skills and knowledge they wanted to learn in the next two weeks and Evil Gillian creates learning in her wake. I have no idea why this is so, but it's a steady pattern with this group.
July 28, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-07-29T12:25:00
It's delightfully warm today, and I'm delightfully achy. This is because the delightful warmth (it was nearly 16 degrees outside when I went to run my day's worth of messages) is due to an even more delightful weather system.
So my messages are all done and my appointments all finished and all that remains in my day is work and housework and housework and work. And coffee. And pain relievers. And more coffee. And possibly more pain relievers.
Despite my current aches, I'm boppy. A webpage explains it: http://www.poslovni.hr/after5/liburnicon-upisao-opatiju-na-kartu-destinacija-za-ljubitelje-sf-a-i-fantasyja-276344 I'm not translating it, for I have no Croatian. I know what it's about, though, and why my name is on the webpage. It's the icing on the cake for my trip, to be able to talk about things I love with people who share that love and to be given a guest of honour status for so doing. I've already prepared a slide show that includes everything from writers attacking each other to kangaroos trying to stare me down. I'm honoured and excited and totally chuffed, all at once. I will have various celebrations (for being a con guest deserves celebration), some online - watch this space.
And now I need to finish getting my work done before I go!
So my messages are all done and my appointments all finished and all that remains in my day is work and housework and housework and work. And coffee. And pain relievers. And more coffee. And possibly more pain relievers.
Despite my current aches, I'm boppy. A webpage explains it: http://www.poslovni.hr/after5/liburnicon-upisao-opatiju-na-kartu-destinacija-za-ljubitelje-sf-a-i-fantasyja-276344 I'm not translating it, for I have no Croatian. I know what it's about, though, and why my name is on the webpage. It's the icing on the cake for my trip, to be able to talk about things I love with people who share that love and to be given a guest of honour status for so doing. I've already prepared a slide show that includes everything from writers attacking each other to kangaroos trying to stare me down. I'm honoured and excited and totally chuffed, all at once. I will have various celebrations (for being a con guest deserves celebration), some online - watch this space.
And now I need to finish getting my work done before I go!
gillpolack @ 2014-07-29T00:21:00
Tonight is full of logistics. Loncon is full of people who are very good at logistics. Also who are very kind. This means that my next week will be less fraught and I can keep on knocking down tasks one at a time. What this means (for everything is sequenced here right now) is that I have diminished the vile piles of paper massively and only have three to tackle by the end of this week. They're three important and big things, but they're only three. Only three big things and about fifty small ones (not represented by piles of paper). Plus meetings. This is the week of the great Catch-Up.
July 27, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-07-28T16:12:00
I'm bubbling with news.
First, my flat is going to undergo the first stage of fixing, starting next week. The builders get a careful guided tour on day 1, then put up scaffolding either later on day 1 or on day 2 and everything progresses gently from there. The first stage should be finished (all going well) by the end of September and then there'll be a couple of months to let things settle and find out what needs to be done next. The perfect situation is for it all to work like magic, in which case stage 2 is fixing my interior. I don't want to think about the worst possibilities.
Second, there will be a Medievalish speccy fic novel by me at the Loncon fan auction and, instead of just auctioning the autographed book, we'll be selling the book along with a consultation by me on things Medieval for writing. The consultation can be taken any mutually convenient time during my fan trip, so it's possible in England, Dublin, Finland and Croatia. It doesn't have to be background for a novel or for fanfiction, either. I'm quite happy to meet someone at a castle and explain how castles operate, for instance. I'm happy to share the lurid Middle Ages or the cool Middle Ages or ... basically, what you need and enjoy (Western Europe, though, and only from the middle 11th century - I am not a universal expert, alas!). So if you are interested (or know anyone who would be interested) in either the book or the consultation or both of them, either send them to the Loncon auction or make sure they have a representative there with license to bid.
Third, (and this is probably a repeat) I will have toffees and chocs to give out at Loncon and Shamrokon and possibly elsewhere (depends on how long they last and how much I can carry various places - the first two are certain, however). Please feel free to encourage intrepid souls to come up to me (as happens in Aussie conventions) and say "Gillian, I have no idea who you are or what you have done, but I believe you have food to give me" or words to that effect.
First, my flat is going to undergo the first stage of fixing, starting next week. The builders get a careful guided tour on day 1, then put up scaffolding either later on day 1 or on day 2 and everything progresses gently from there. The first stage should be finished (all going well) by the end of September and then there'll be a couple of months to let things settle and find out what needs to be done next. The perfect situation is for it all to work like magic, in which case stage 2 is fixing my interior. I don't want to think about the worst possibilities.
Second, there will be a Medievalish speccy fic novel by me at the Loncon fan auction and, instead of just auctioning the autographed book, we'll be selling the book along with a consultation by me on things Medieval for writing. The consultation can be taken any mutually convenient time during my fan trip, so it's possible in England, Dublin, Finland and Croatia. It doesn't have to be background for a novel or for fanfiction, either. I'm quite happy to meet someone at a castle and explain how castles operate, for instance. I'm happy to share the lurid Middle Ages or the cool Middle Ages or ... basically, what you need and enjoy (Western Europe, though, and only from the middle 11th century - I am not a universal expert, alas!). So if you are interested (or know anyone who would be interested) in either the book or the consultation or both of them, either send them to the Loncon auction or make sure they have a representative there with license to bid.
Third, (and this is probably a repeat) I will have toffees and chocs to give out at Loncon and Shamrokon and possibly elsewhere (depends on how long they last and how much I can carry various places - the first two are certain, however). Please feel free to encourage intrepid souls to come up to me (as happens in Aussie conventions) and say "Gillian, I have no idea who you are or what you have done, but I believe you have food to give me" or words to that effect.
gillpolack @ 2014-07-28T12:41:00
I keep starting things today and not finishing them. I suspect that this means that tomorrow I will keep finishing things and not starting them. Or maybe I'll switch over tonight, after dinner, and go to bed with the sense of tasks complete.
July 26, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-07-27T15:08:00
My reading for today and tomorrow is just one book: Alexis Wright's Carpentaria*. I don't have much time for recreational reading right now, which is why it's only one book. And I'm still puzzled as to why I've not read this particular book before. I keep encountering amazing books I should have read before but that I somehow never did. At least it means I'm never likely to be bored, but... it bugs me when there's a work this good and I want to have read it five years ago. I've checked the usual places I look for books and it seems to not have touched the spec fic community until about 18 months ago. This is odd, and I need to think about why, because I rather suspect it's a gatekeeper issue. I also suspect it's related to issues I touch on in my Loncon paper. Either way, it means that a book becomes more than a book and that this novel ceases to be simply recreational reading. Which means I have no recreational reading this week, just a time travel anime (Steins;Gate). Serves me right for thinking I could take time out, I suppose.
Kaaron Warren gave me a trip to the shops and library today, when she delivered a rather-interestingly-annotated copy of Slights for the Loncon fan auction. I have also 6 writer-idea packs to deliver. My suitcase won't fit a whole heap more! It's 50% full of fan auction stuff, and there's more to arrive this week. It's great - but I need to reconsider the mechanics of getting everything from one place to another, when I arrive in London.
Now I'm procrastinating again. I have a list for today and it's all stuff that can't be put off and yet I'm delaying. Let me heave a huge sigh and maybe find my list and diminish it a little.
*Note to
desperance
you should read this book just to find out what a novel set in him is like. I've always meant to visit Desperance-the-place on day and I keep forgetting.
Note 2: I have corrected a couple of typos in this post. I have also banned myself from doing serious work until the temperature has stabilised long enough for me not to make idiot mistakes. In the meantime, I'm sorting much paper. My table is visible, which is possibly a concern, for it means I am winning the paper war. I don't know what it means to win this war.
Kaaron Warren gave me a trip to the shops and library today, when she delivered a rather-interestingly-annotated copy of Slights for the Loncon fan auction. I have also 6 writer-idea packs to deliver. My suitcase won't fit a whole heap more! It's 50% full of fan auction stuff, and there's more to arrive this week. It's great - but I need to reconsider the mechanics of getting everything from one place to another, when I arrive in London.
Now I'm procrastinating again. I have a list for today and it's all stuff that can't be put off and yet I'm delaying. Let me heave a huge sigh and maybe find my list and diminish it a little.
*Note to
desperance
you should read this book just to find out what a novel set in him is like. I've always meant to visit Desperance-the-place on day and I keep forgetting.Note 2: I have corrected a couple of typos in this post. I have also banned myself from doing serious work until the temperature has stabilised long enough for me not to make idiot mistakes. In the meantime, I'm sorting much paper. My table is visible, which is possibly a concern, for it means I am winning the paper war. I don't know what it means to win this war.
Happy dancing
My news is of a totally botched delivery of the pre-release copies of Langue[dot]doc 1305, saved by a friend who spent a chunk of her day chasing the copies until she got them. It's a very exciting story, and I'm very grateful to her for it really should have been a straightforward matter of being home at the right time and accepting delivery. She has an account of the book's voyages here: http://owlfish.livejournal.com/1265566.html
This novel is much voyaged, for a story that I thought I'd never write. One day I'll present it as one of those Medieval Irish saints' voyages, but today I'm thinking about the first step and about today's delivery.
The first step is a little embarrassing. I told everyone "I do not write hard science into my novels, though I might play with it for a short story" and yet Langue[dot]soc 1305 was checked by CSIRO and had advice from an astronomer and a time travel expert and others. I also said that I would always keep a firm barrier between history-for-fiction and history-for-history and lo, this I have not done here either. What I might do, in fact, when the book comes closer to actual launch date, is talk about a couple of the techniques I used to bring the history side of me and the fiction side of me closer together. An essay, maybe. And, to make it worse, I said "I'm not going to write a time travel novel that takes modern people into the 14th century. Never. Ever." Van Ikin somehow persuaded me to do otherwise.
So much egg on face! And in such a good cause!
In a few minutes I am catching up with Karon Warren. She's giving me an annotated copy of Slights for auction at Loncon, and some rather interesting "Where do you get your ideas from?" packs for writers, also for auction. I'm hoping we have a cuppa, and with any luck I'll get all my messages done. That will free up the desk for work. I do not know why I celebrate novels with work, but I do. I get a rush of energy and want to finish my next project. Today, that's easy. I have just to hours work to do on one article. Today I am an adrenaline junkie... an adrenaline junkie with a novel that is only one step away from its first meeting with its public.
This novel is much voyaged, for a story that I thought I'd never write. One day I'll present it as one of those Medieval Irish saints' voyages, but today I'm thinking about the first step and about today's delivery.
The first step is a little embarrassing. I told everyone "I do not write hard science into my novels, though I might play with it for a short story" and yet Langue[dot]soc 1305 was checked by CSIRO and had advice from an astronomer and a time travel expert and others. I also said that I would always keep a firm barrier between history-for-fiction and history-for-history and lo, this I have not done here either. What I might do, in fact, when the book comes closer to actual launch date, is talk about a couple of the techniques I used to bring the history side of me and the fiction side of me closer together. An essay, maybe. And, to make it worse, I said "I'm not going to write a time travel novel that takes modern people into the 14th century. Never. Ever." Van Ikin somehow persuaded me to do otherwise.
So much egg on face! And in such a good cause!
In a few minutes I am catching up with Karon Warren. She's giving me an annotated copy of Slights for auction at Loncon, and some rather interesting "Where do you get your ideas from?" packs for writers, also for auction. I'm hoping we have a cuppa, and with any luck I'll get all my messages done. That will free up the desk for work. I do not know why I celebrate novels with work, but I do. I get a rush of energy and want to finish my next project. Today, that's easy. I have just to hours work to do on one article. Today I am an adrenaline junkie... an adrenaline junkie with a novel that is only one step away from its first meeting with its public.
July 25, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-07-25T23:27:00
I had two bits of professional development this week. One has been postponed and the other was today. This was partly for my teaching self, partly for my research self but also (it turns out, by entire happenstance) partly for my speculative fiction self. This latter is because I have a new approach to encoding emotion in novels* thanks to the workshop this morning run by a rather canny expert in seventeenth century theatre. In fact, it was her presentation I went to the day's event for, but I was hoping for a new approach to gesture and emotion that I could test in my novel. Instead I got a bunch of other (equally useful) stuff. Mostly, though, I got a method for helping writers encode emotional reactions in alien (not their own) cultures in a way that readers can decode. it also enables writers to give each and every character their own interpretation, while keeping the overall culture consistent. And it's dead easy to teach. I'm very happy with this. I'm also have happy with Bridget Escolme, for introducing me to it.
At lunch, I sat next to Daniel, who turned out to be another SF writer (we appear everywhere!) - we hadn't met before despite working on the same campus, because he writes his fiction solely in Spanish. I tried to see if his writing was available at Loncon, but he didn't know anything about Loncon. I suspect this says something about the gulf between the English-speaking SF world and everyone else. I'll get hold of his writing somewhere, sometime, somehow. (I didn't tell him I read Spanish, in case you were wondering - I have no idea why I didn't tell him.)
The second session of the day was all about creativity and didn't work for me. Other people walked out moved and inspired, though, so it was obviously good. Just not for me.
During the third session, I had an idea for a short story. I might have to explore this while travelling, because I can't see much spare time for new writing in my near future. It's a bizarre idea, anyhow, and may not work,.
After my story idea and my pages of notes, came a migraine. Not a bad one, but it meant I left at 5 pm instead of waiting til everything was wrapped up. This was a shame, because there was a really interesting panel on practice-led research (which is what 60% of my research is, these days, though not quite in the manner described by the panel).
And I shall finish with tidying my notes and then I shall go to bed, for tomorrow is market day! My aim and ambition is to find more of those wonderful Japanese citrus that we found a couple few weeks ago.
*and a technique for teaching it, so I can teach writers should writers so desire - my poor worldbuilding students next week, in fact, so desire, though they don't know this yet
At lunch, I sat next to Daniel, who turned out to be another SF writer (we appear everywhere!) - we hadn't met before despite working on the same campus, because he writes his fiction solely in Spanish. I tried to see if his writing was available at Loncon, but he didn't know anything about Loncon. I suspect this says something about the gulf between the English-speaking SF world and everyone else. I'll get hold of his writing somewhere, sometime, somehow. (I didn't tell him I read Spanish, in case you were wondering - I have no idea why I didn't tell him.)
The second session of the day was all about creativity and didn't work for me. Other people walked out moved and inspired, though, so it was obviously good. Just not for me.
During the third session, I had an idea for a short story. I might have to explore this while travelling, because I can't see much spare time for new writing in my near future. It's a bizarre idea, anyhow, and may not work,.
After my story idea and my pages of notes, came a migraine. Not a bad one, but it meant I left at 5 pm instead of waiting til everything was wrapped up. This was a shame, because there was a really interesting panel on practice-led research (which is what 60% of my research is, these days, though not quite in the manner described by the panel).
And I shall finish with tidying my notes and then I shall go to bed, for tomorrow is market day! My aim and ambition is to find more of those wonderful Japanese citrus that we found a couple few weeks ago.
*and a technique for teaching it, so I can teach writers should writers so desire - my poor worldbuilding students next week, in fact, so desire, though they don't know this yet
