Gillian Polack's Blog, page 67
May 6, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-05-07T13:23:00
Today in class we managed to work out what kind of story someone could create about themselves so that they could tell lies all the time and still have a career. We also worked on what kinds of stories we could use our own lives for and why authenticity was an important component. One of my students brought us all chocolate. I decided it was very important to have everyone writing about chocolate in a way that resonated and had authenticity. So much writing! If most themes tap into wells, this one tapped into a geyser.
This afternoon is, I fear, about taxes and this evening about forms. Thank goodness there was chocolate this morning.
This afternoon is, I fear, about taxes and this evening about forms. Thank goodness there was chocolate this morning.
May 5, 2014
Linkage!
I'm going to give a series of links, just because. I used to do link posts all the time, and today I have just two links and am thinking "Why haven't I done this in so long?"
First the Lanagan interview. It's here. Cristian Tamas sorted my style errors for the site, for which we should all be truly grateful. I have a great desire to thank him in person, which leads me to my next link, which is self-explanatory (and besides, all of you who are interested or eligible have probably already acted on it) : the GUFF race.
Now for a couple of my favourite websites. The UK Institute of Historical Research offers online courses on some very interesting subjects. There are other places where one can learn palaeography and so forth, but these are accessible, which is important. Some of the courses are free. Some are less so.
One of my favourite sites for reading. I love TEAMS. These people are so much my heroes - they make Middle English texts accessible to everyone. It bugs me when readers think that Shakespeare is ancient (or when popular TV series talk about Middle or Old English when they really mean Modern) - with the TEAMS' work it's possible to read literary works that go back significantly further. What I love especially, of course, is the pop literature in there. It's not pop in modern terms, of course, but it is not all terrifically highbrow. Some of it, in fact, is terrifically the-opposite-of-highbrow.
Some of my SF-writerly friends need their own planet generator. Now they have one. Although they probably had one already, which means now they might have two. If any of you get a God complex due to ownership of too many planet generators, I shall take note.
The last link is concerns typography. You get it purely because my mind drew a blank on Sunday night when I saw the credits for Flash Gordon. I used to be able to identify all fonts, always. It appears I cannot anymore.
I'm almost caught up on my emails, but I'm still very slow on things. Don't panic if I don't reply to posts and am generally tardy in my responses for a few days. It appears that all of you who said that I needed more recovery time were right, and that I was wrong. I'll maintain my leave of absence from LonCon work until I'm actually back to normal and, in the meantime, I'll prioritise things. I'll also take time out today - I need to go to the chemist today and that's up the street, so I ought to take the extra time and have a cuppa with Elizabeth and see Captain America (which I never *did* get to see on my birthday, because all my friends were either busy or had seen it) and then I'll come home and rest a bit and *then* I'll address some more of my looming paperwork. I know that this is all wrong in the Gillian order of things, to take time out for fun when one can overwork, but today, I shall do it. It's the only time I can before Saturday, to be honest.
And now you're up to date and full of links and I have papers that need tackling.
First the Lanagan interview. It's here. Cristian Tamas sorted my style errors for the site, for which we should all be truly grateful. I have a great desire to thank him in person, which leads me to my next link, which is self-explanatory (and besides, all of you who are interested or eligible have probably already acted on it) : the GUFF race.
Now for a couple of my favourite websites. The UK Institute of Historical Research offers online courses on some very interesting subjects. There are other places where one can learn palaeography and so forth, but these are accessible, which is important. Some of the courses are free. Some are less so.
One of my favourite sites for reading. I love TEAMS. These people are so much my heroes - they make Middle English texts accessible to everyone. It bugs me when readers think that Shakespeare is ancient (or when popular TV series talk about Middle or Old English when they really mean Modern) - with the TEAMS' work it's possible to read literary works that go back significantly further. What I love especially, of course, is the pop literature in there. It's not pop in modern terms, of course, but it is not all terrifically highbrow. Some of it, in fact, is terrifically the-opposite-of-highbrow.
Some of my SF-writerly friends need their own planet generator. Now they have one. Although they probably had one already, which means now they might have two. If any of you get a God complex due to ownership of too many planet generators, I shall take note.
The last link is concerns typography. You get it purely because my mind drew a blank on Sunday night when I saw the credits for Flash Gordon. I used to be able to identify all fonts, always. It appears I cannot anymore.
I'm almost caught up on my emails, but I'm still very slow on things. Don't panic if I don't reply to posts and am generally tardy in my responses for a few days. It appears that all of you who said that I needed more recovery time were right, and that I was wrong. I'll maintain my leave of absence from LonCon work until I'm actually back to normal and, in the meantime, I'll prioritise things. I'll also take time out today - I need to go to the chemist today and that's up the street, so I ought to take the extra time and have a cuppa with Elizabeth and see Captain America (which I never *did* get to see on my birthday, because all my friends were either busy or had seen it) and then I'll come home and rest a bit and *then* I'll address some more of my looming paperwork. I know that this is all wrong in the Gillian order of things, to take time out for fun when one can overwork, but today, I shall do it. It's the only time I can before Saturday, to be honest.
And now you're up to date and full of links and I have papers that need tackling.
May 4, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-05-05T16:06:00
Today is full of little things going wrong. I pulled a neck muscle and decided that what I needed for it was a bath full of nice, relaxing bath salts, for instance. Thee was no water. The lovely cool night (-2.6, because I'm keeping track) meant the block of flats had a burst water pipe and the plumber forgot to knock on our doors and tell us the water was going off. So I had a cup of coffee, instead. The coffee was terribly weak, for no good reason.
I've made a solid start on today's work, but things keep going wrong there, too. Passwords mysteriously don't work or my brain fails to function. I'm precisely 25% through today's pile of papers. I have eight hours for the remaining 75%, for it's easier to shift most of the work to evening than to throw my hands up in despair at the small idiocies of the day. I'll finish everything, but it might be a bit of a long day.
All I can think is that it must be Monday.
The water is now restored, so I'm going to have that bath, have more coffee, then get back to what I was doing before everything went awry.
I've made a solid start on today's work, but things keep going wrong there, too. Passwords mysteriously don't work or my brain fails to function. I'm precisely 25% through today's pile of papers. I have eight hours for the remaining 75%, for it's easier to shift most of the work to evening than to throw my hands up in despair at the small idiocies of the day. I'll finish everything, but it might be a bit of a long day.
All I can think is that it must be Monday.
The water is now restored, so I'm going to have that bath, have more coffee, then get back to what I was doing before everything went awry.
May 3, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-05-04T13:26:00
Today there are many exciting things happening. I have friends who are apparently attending a Pumpkin Festival, for instance. These exciting things are not happening chez Gillian, however, for Gillian keeps falling asleep. Healing, I call it.
I have about four hours of work that still must be dealt with, regardless, plus I've finished with 100 emails today and have forty more to deal with. This also needs to be a part of healing, for I have no choice.
I also can't go outside at all, for even inside the air is sharp enough to remind me my breathing is still fractious. This would be why I need to sleep so very much. The inflammation is not dangerous, but I still have a rather nasty chest infection and eight more days of antibiotics to deal with it. It was the same chest infection that set everything off, so I must respect it and put it in its place and not let it get the upper hand and...
My duck soup is nearly halfway ready, I think. Yesterday I was so tired it took me 3 hours to put the carcass in the pot, add water, add onions, add spices. Today I managed to get rid of the accumulated debris (and lunch was the meat from it) in a mere half hour.
This means that today the interview with Margo will go live (and I'll link to it here) and the pile of papers staring at me accusingly will be done and dusted and I can move onto the next set. I have three sets of accusing papers to handle in the next 48 hours, for those who keep track. I also have a tax deadline.
Right now, though, my body informs me, wearily, that it needs a bit of a rest. It's very sorry. It will try harder next time I get up. But just a few minutes, please...
I have about four hours of work that still must be dealt with, regardless, plus I've finished with 100 emails today and have forty more to deal with. This also needs to be a part of healing, for I have no choice.
I also can't go outside at all, for even inside the air is sharp enough to remind me my breathing is still fractious. This would be why I need to sleep so very much. The inflammation is not dangerous, but I still have a rather nasty chest infection and eight more days of antibiotics to deal with it. It was the same chest infection that set everything off, so I must respect it and put it in its place and not let it get the upper hand and...
My duck soup is nearly halfway ready, I think. Yesterday I was so tired it took me 3 hours to put the carcass in the pot, add water, add onions, add spices. Today I managed to get rid of the accumulated debris (and lunch was the meat from it) in a mere half hour.
This means that today the interview with Margo will go live (and I'll link to it here) and the pile of papers staring at me accusingly will be done and dusted and I can move onto the next set. I have three sets of accusing papers to handle in the next 48 hours, for those who keep track. I also have a tax deadline.
Right now, though, my body informs me, wearily, that it needs a bit of a rest. It's very sorry. It will try harder next time I get up. But just a few minutes, please...
gillpolack @ 2014-05-03T22:10:00
This morning was full of many good things. I rugged up, for I promised everyone I would take care (and this weekend is tricky) and I slowed down and we did everything we had planned. This was basically Free Comics Day and shopping, but it also included the latest episode of Orphan Black and some DS9.
My freezer is restocked with basics and my special treats for this week are duck liver and a tiny, tiny piece of smoked roo, for we found the specialist meat shop. I was not tempted by crocodile, the staff had no notion of how their pheasant was treated after death (which makes a difference to the cooking - and it was frozen, so prodding it would not have helped me at all - how do people cook game if they don't know how tender it is?) and the single goose they had cost $100. This limited my depredations. I did manage to get 3 duck carcasses, however, and am making duck and white onion and pimento and Dorrigo pepper* portable soup to match my spiced beef portable soup. This should see me through more emergencies, and requires no attention at all until late tomorrow, by which time I should have the energy to deal with it.
This afternoon I slept off this morning, for I'm getting better, but not quite *that* full of energy yet. It's really reassuring, though, that I have some goods in my cupboard and 6 weeks' worth of meat in my freezer and stock on the way. For a bit, all I need to do is to top up the fresh ingredients in my vicinity and my food needs are fine.
*and cubebs, celery seed, rue berry, for they just found their way in there, unexpectedly.
My freezer is restocked with basics and my special treats for this week are duck liver and a tiny, tiny piece of smoked roo, for we found the specialist meat shop. I was not tempted by crocodile, the staff had no notion of how their pheasant was treated after death (which makes a difference to the cooking - and it was frozen, so prodding it would not have helped me at all - how do people cook game if they don't know how tender it is?) and the single goose they had cost $100. This limited my depredations. I did manage to get 3 duck carcasses, however, and am making duck and white onion and pimento and Dorrigo pepper* portable soup to match my spiced beef portable soup. This should see me through more emergencies, and requires no attention at all until late tomorrow, by which time I should have the energy to deal with it.
This afternoon I slept off this morning, for I'm getting better, but not quite *that* full of energy yet. It's really reassuring, though, that I have some goods in my cupboard and 6 weeks' worth of meat in my freezer and stock on the way. For a bit, all I need to do is to top up the fresh ingredients in my vicinity and my food needs are fine.
*and cubebs, celery seed, rue berry, for they just found their way in there, unexpectedly.
May 1, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-05-02T11:47:00
It's the first Friday of term and my reading group is today. Just this term, I get to introduce spec fic short stories alongside appropriate poems to a group of readers, most of whom have never encountered spec fic before. And I do believe I promised to report on my choice of stories and poems each week, for anyone who wants to read along, get into discussion, or is just curious.
While I was riffing through my stories* and wondering where I should start, I heard that Ann Leckie won the Arthur C Clarke Award. In my state of chuffedness, I realised that Clarke's writing would be a very fine place to start, for it's easy to match up with poetry and his style and writing carries over to non-spec readers.
This week, then, my students are reading "The nine billion names of God" alongside Robert Frost's "Fire and Ice" and Joy Harjo's "Perhaps the World Ends Here."
*and thank you everyone who suggested material and helped me locate it. I have some very, very good options for the weeks ahead.
While I was riffing through my stories* and wondering where I should start, I heard that Ann Leckie won the Arthur C Clarke Award. In my state of chuffedness, I realised that Clarke's writing would be a very fine place to start, for it's easy to match up with poetry and his style and writing carries over to non-spec readers.
This week, then, my students are reading "The nine billion names of God" alongside Robert Frost's "Fire and Ice" and Joy Harjo's "Perhaps the World Ends Here."
*and thank you everyone who suggested material and helped me locate it. I have some very, very good options for the weeks ahead.
Reading for the Hugos - a personal view
I mostly keep my blog reasonably politically neutral, for so many of my friends have so many wonderful views and I love it that you can all meet up here. Today I’m breaking my rule. Again.
I’ve been following the Hugo awards closely this year for so many reasons. I’ve already said that I’ll read everything I can get hold of, regardless of who wrote it. Scalzi suggesting that we all read everything has become a subject of controversy in some circles. I do agree he’s suggesting this from a position of privilege (it’s easier for him, and he is probably aware of this) but I’ll also be reading everything I can get hold of.
The fact that the work has been short-listed and I can get hold of it is sufficient to provoke this reaction. The new article by Foz Meadows has got me thinking, though, that maybe I should explain myself a bit.
Beale’s is not the kind of writing I enjoy, so I generally avoid his fiction. His non-fiction I won’t go near with a barge pole except in very specific circumstances. I checked his blog and some posts out, ages ago, in the interest of fairness, when the SFWA stuff happened. Then I checked it out again (in disbelief) when he said those very strange things about Jemisin and others. I let his own words convince me that he and I live in different universes and that his universe is one I want no part of. I read him because I do try to read people’s own opinions in the shape they give to them in public. I try not to rely on summaries or extracts by other parties. I did this for Hitler (yes, reader, Mein Kampf and I have made intimate acquaintance, albeit in English translation) so it’s only fair I do it for others.
No reader is a fair and dispassionate judge. Craft is not independent of the creator and reading is not independent of the reader. My concept of the perfect work of art bears my interests and my personality like a deep imprint. We share ourselves with the fiction we read. It says something about me that the best-written book out there for me - the gold standard against which others are compared - is To Kill a Mockingbird – this shows what kind of reader I am.
I am, however, a trained reader. I should be able to see the person and culture beneath the writing for myself and to assess the writing and make up my own mind as to the relationship between the two, the quality of the latter and so forth. This is why I’m reading everything I can get hold of for the Hugos and why I will not make an exception for this one work. I need to retain my trust in my own reading and judgement. There is a vast difference between a thousand people bringing shared and thoughtful views together and sitting in judgement on a group of works, and a thousand people baying at the moon.
I’m a bit of an outlier on this, I suspect, especially when really, really I never want to meet Beale. Partly I have a need to understand what makes people with privilege hurt other people, but partly it’s because my particular privilege (my education, my brain) brings with it the responsibility to make my own judgement about any given work of literature and, in this instance (because I’m eligible to vote) make my voice heard. Privilege brings responsibility. It’s not always about being shiny and pretty and blessed by life.
This is what I do with my privilege – I read as much as I can stomach and then more again, just to make certain. And I judge. Just as any critical reader will, I judge. Ask me about my views on Orson Scott Card’s writing some day…for I have views. That is, in fact, the whole point.
Judgement leads to some strange realities, sometimes. I started reading the nominated work yesterday, but had to stop for a bit to laugh at the Latin. This doesn’t bode well for my vote. A writer who doesn’t check their foreign languages with an editor or someone who knows a bit more is going to work that much harder with me to get me to respond positively to the work. Readers are not neutral and bad Latin, Italian, French make me laugh, every time. I’ll get past the laughter and read the work seriously. But first I have to get past the laughter.
We should get past the laughter and past the pre-reading pain. We should criticise. We should think things through. And we should make up our own minds.
This is not dividing the work from its creator – it’s maintaining our own capacity to live in a complex and dangerous society and to retain who we are and to use that right to vote as our own small part of privilege. For me, either I read none of the works and don’t vote, or I read everything I possibly can and I think it through, for myself.
I do understand when it’s easier to follow the crowd and accept an agreed opinion. When the molotov cocktails ‘happened’ in the ACT (the Jewish community was attacked) the meeting at Parliament House was carefully arranged so that everyone Jewish of note would agree with the cabinet Minister who met with us to make everything right. The minister in question tried to get it minuted that the whole thing was probably a group of teenage boys who were up to mischief. I questioned this approach, gently. I was the one whose hand the minister refused to shake at the end of the meeting.
I don’t make big waves. I’m obdurate, but not important. But I will read works for myself and I will form my own opinion. And if it means someone doesn’t want to shake my hand at the end of the day, then they’re in fine company.
I’ve been following the Hugo awards closely this year for so many reasons. I’ve already said that I’ll read everything I can get hold of, regardless of who wrote it. Scalzi suggesting that we all read everything has become a subject of controversy in some circles. I do agree he’s suggesting this from a position of privilege (it’s easier for him, and he is probably aware of this) but I’ll also be reading everything I can get hold of.
The fact that the work has been short-listed and I can get hold of it is sufficient to provoke this reaction. The new article by Foz Meadows has got me thinking, though, that maybe I should explain myself a bit.
Beale’s is not the kind of writing I enjoy, so I generally avoid his fiction. His non-fiction I won’t go near with a barge pole except in very specific circumstances. I checked his blog and some posts out, ages ago, in the interest of fairness, when the SFWA stuff happened. Then I checked it out again (in disbelief) when he said those very strange things about Jemisin and others. I let his own words convince me that he and I live in different universes and that his universe is one I want no part of. I read him because I do try to read people’s own opinions in the shape they give to them in public. I try not to rely on summaries or extracts by other parties. I did this for Hitler (yes, reader, Mein Kampf and I have made intimate acquaintance, albeit in English translation) so it’s only fair I do it for others.
No reader is a fair and dispassionate judge. Craft is not independent of the creator and reading is not independent of the reader. My concept of the perfect work of art bears my interests and my personality like a deep imprint. We share ourselves with the fiction we read. It says something about me that the best-written book out there for me - the gold standard against which others are compared - is To Kill a Mockingbird – this shows what kind of reader I am.
I am, however, a trained reader. I should be able to see the person and culture beneath the writing for myself and to assess the writing and make up my own mind as to the relationship between the two, the quality of the latter and so forth. This is why I’m reading everything I can get hold of for the Hugos and why I will not make an exception for this one work. I need to retain my trust in my own reading and judgement. There is a vast difference between a thousand people bringing shared and thoughtful views together and sitting in judgement on a group of works, and a thousand people baying at the moon.
I’m a bit of an outlier on this, I suspect, especially when really, really I never want to meet Beale. Partly I have a need to understand what makes people with privilege hurt other people, but partly it’s because my particular privilege (my education, my brain) brings with it the responsibility to make my own judgement about any given work of literature and, in this instance (because I’m eligible to vote) make my voice heard. Privilege brings responsibility. It’s not always about being shiny and pretty and blessed by life.
This is what I do with my privilege – I read as much as I can stomach and then more again, just to make certain. And I judge. Just as any critical reader will, I judge. Ask me about my views on Orson Scott Card’s writing some day…for I have views. That is, in fact, the whole point.
Judgement leads to some strange realities, sometimes. I started reading the nominated work yesterday, but had to stop for a bit to laugh at the Latin. This doesn’t bode well for my vote. A writer who doesn’t check their foreign languages with an editor or someone who knows a bit more is going to work that much harder with me to get me to respond positively to the work. Readers are not neutral and bad Latin, Italian, French make me laugh, every time. I’ll get past the laughter and read the work seriously. But first I have to get past the laughter.
We should get past the laughter and past the pre-reading pain. We should criticise. We should think things through. And we should make up our own minds.
This is not dividing the work from its creator – it’s maintaining our own capacity to live in a complex and dangerous society and to retain who we are and to use that right to vote as our own small part of privilege. For me, either I read none of the works and don’t vote, or I read everything I possibly can and I think it through, for myself.
I do understand when it’s easier to follow the crowd and accept an agreed opinion. When the molotov cocktails ‘happened’ in the ACT (the Jewish community was attacked) the meeting at Parliament House was carefully arranged so that everyone Jewish of note would agree with the cabinet Minister who met with us to make everything right. The minister in question tried to get it minuted that the whole thing was probably a group of teenage boys who were up to mischief. I questioned this approach, gently. I was the one whose hand the minister refused to shake at the end of the meeting.
I don’t make big waves. I’m obdurate, but not important. But I will read works for myself and I will form my own opinion. And if it means someone doesn’t want to shake my hand at the end of the day, then they’re in fine company.
April 30, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-05-01T14:04:00
Today is a healing day. All my good intentions lead me in a path towards bed and more sleep. I have interesting dreams and wake up hours later wondering where all this fatigue comes from. I look in the mirror and see just how sick I was because my face is reducing to normal size and normal colour and my breathing is sane again. It would all be very exciting, if I weren't so exceptionally sleepy.
It takes quite some fatigue to override the nervous energy of cortisone. Also, it probably helped that I overdid it yesterday by meeting so many obligations (on foot, for I experimented with catching no busses, in the hopes of freeing more lung space). Tomorrow is my last day on these large doses of drugs, though, and the antibiotics are beginning to hit the chest problems and it was all worth it. I have no exceptional pain or strange symptoms, you see. This is healing sleep, not sick sleep.
There are some unavoidables today, too. This is not a time of the year when illness produces free time to get better, but I'll fit them in around sleeps.
It'll be Monday or Tuesday before I'm really better and I'll probably need to take some extra care for a week or so longer, but the moment the sleep is all caught up, I'll be back to normal life. It's a good feeling.
And in other news, apparently tomorrow after class I acquire many green tomatoes. I've found two different low carb ways of cooking them, so I'm looking forward to playing with them. In fact, I'm looking forward to having the energy to play with them. I don't have it yet, however. I'm not quite up to cooking yet, and have been working though cheese and nuts and old vegies and reheated roast chicken (as my astonishing daily accomplishment) and I'm getting by. I was too tied to miss coking til today. Today I suddenly find myself sick of pieces of cheese or handsful of pistachios in lieu of meals.
it'll all be fine though, very soon, for I'm sleeping it off, at last.
It takes quite some fatigue to override the nervous energy of cortisone. Also, it probably helped that I overdid it yesterday by meeting so many obligations (on foot, for I experimented with catching no busses, in the hopes of freeing more lung space). Tomorrow is my last day on these large doses of drugs, though, and the antibiotics are beginning to hit the chest problems and it was all worth it. I have no exceptional pain or strange symptoms, you see. This is healing sleep, not sick sleep.
There are some unavoidables today, too. This is not a time of the year when illness produces free time to get better, but I'll fit them in around sleeps.
It'll be Monday or Tuesday before I'm really better and I'll probably need to take some extra care for a week or so longer, but the moment the sleep is all caught up, I'll be back to normal life. It's a good feeling.
And in other news, apparently tomorrow after class I acquire many green tomatoes. I've found two different low carb ways of cooking them, so I'm looking forward to playing with them. In fact, I'm looking forward to having the energy to play with them. I don't have it yet, however. I'm not quite up to cooking yet, and have been working though cheese and nuts and old vegies and reheated roast chicken (as my astonishing daily accomplishment) and I'm getting by. I was too tied to miss coking til today. Today I suddenly find myself sick of pieces of cheese or handsful of pistachios in lieu of meals.
it'll all be fine though, very soon, for I'm sleeping it off, at last.
April 29, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-04-30T16:36:00
Today is a day to treasure. Fascinating things keep on happening.
I've just had an hour-long conversation with a well-read teen, for instance (we were eating choc Easter bunny and drinking chai, for I found an Easter bunny on special when I got paper for teaching, on the way home from class), where we talked about what premises we were each using when we started discussing books and manga and anime with each other. When I said that I thought she was asking me for the language she needed to describe concepts she already understood, she said yes, that was it precisely. We agreed that it was really interesting that a key difference in the way she and I approach the same work was that she was reading the theme or trope for the first time and was seeking verbal tools to explain what she was seeing, but that I was placing things in a perspective based on having read more over my well-spent (for reading, at least) longer life. I thought she might find my suggestion that she was just looking for words to express stuff she was seeing odd or maybe condescending, but she says that no, it describes what she was after exactly. Which is why I'm now borrowing Dusk Maiden of Amnesia. She's not told me what to look for in it, but we're talking about it next week. It's something she's thinking that's related to Madoka Magica - that's all I know. And it has a ghost. Since we've talked about everything from ethics to quantum physics in regard to Madoka Magica, this is not a lot of guidance!
Her timing is impeccable, for now I have Dusk Maiden of Amnesia and the second series of Scandal to get me through the rest of the cortisone. I'm back to doing some work, but will still need copious amounts of time when I'm just sitting watching TV, so this is all good.
This morning was the first day back for my Wednesday class. I've decided that this term I want to teach them writing techniques that will help them tell the deep stuff that they want to talk about. We're also going to look at how readers take on stories and change them into their own and why this is a very good thing and how it happens. This all comes down (we decided, in class) to being better writers and improving skills, but also to know how to protect what needs protecting when one is writing authentically and intimately.
Today, therefore, we worked on sense of place a bit (for I've been talking about sense of place with various people, including Margo Lanagan - some of Margo's thoughts will be on the Europa website quite soon - I just have to get my act together to put it up), then we added person and narrative into that sense of place, and then we worked on small and specific narratives that brought all this together and revealed intimate and important stuff. It was very effective, but so close to home that we took time out part way to talk about ghosts and snails and budgies (and whether quails or budgies make better eating) and other relaxing subjects.
Physically, today is tough, for I really ought to still be resting more, but it's been such a good day. Now I shall rest for a bit (getting in first before you tell em to!) and then sit in front of the TV for a bit, in my comfy chair and with a hot water bottle.
I've just had an hour-long conversation with a well-read teen, for instance (we were eating choc Easter bunny and drinking chai, for I found an Easter bunny on special when I got paper for teaching, on the way home from class), where we talked about what premises we were each using when we started discussing books and manga and anime with each other. When I said that I thought she was asking me for the language she needed to describe concepts she already understood, she said yes, that was it precisely. We agreed that it was really interesting that a key difference in the way she and I approach the same work was that she was reading the theme or trope for the first time and was seeking verbal tools to explain what she was seeing, but that I was placing things in a perspective based on having read more over my well-spent (for reading, at least) longer life. I thought she might find my suggestion that she was just looking for words to express stuff she was seeing odd or maybe condescending, but she says that no, it describes what she was after exactly. Which is why I'm now borrowing Dusk Maiden of Amnesia. She's not told me what to look for in it, but we're talking about it next week. It's something she's thinking that's related to Madoka Magica - that's all I know. And it has a ghost. Since we've talked about everything from ethics to quantum physics in regard to Madoka Magica, this is not a lot of guidance!
Her timing is impeccable, for now I have Dusk Maiden of Amnesia and the second series of Scandal to get me through the rest of the cortisone. I'm back to doing some work, but will still need copious amounts of time when I'm just sitting watching TV, so this is all good.
This morning was the first day back for my Wednesday class. I've decided that this term I want to teach them writing techniques that will help them tell the deep stuff that they want to talk about. We're also going to look at how readers take on stories and change them into their own and why this is a very good thing and how it happens. This all comes down (we decided, in class) to being better writers and improving skills, but also to know how to protect what needs protecting when one is writing authentically and intimately.
Today, therefore, we worked on sense of place a bit (for I've been talking about sense of place with various people, including Margo Lanagan - some of Margo's thoughts will be on the Europa website quite soon - I just have to get my act together to put it up), then we added person and narrative into that sense of place, and then we worked on small and specific narratives that brought all this together and revealed intimate and important stuff. It was very effective, but so close to home that we took time out part way to talk about ghosts and snails and budgies (and whether quails or budgies make better eating) and other relaxing subjects.
Physically, today is tough, for I really ought to still be resting more, but it's been such a good day. Now I shall rest for a bit (getting in first before you tell em to!) and then sit in front of the TV for a bit, in my comfy chair and with a hot water bottle.
gillpolack @ 2014-04-29T17:45:00
I haven't done a lot today. I've taken leave from LonCon work for a week or so (just until I'm better) and I've agreed to my second semester programme for the ANU (more info when the dates are finalised) and I've voted for NAFF (details here: http://thebooknut.wordpress.com/2014/04/21/it-seems-i-am-a-naff-candidate/naff-2014/ ), which is like GUFF, but it gets someone Australian to the Australian National Convention in June. Speaking of which, it looks as if I shall be doing presentations there and be on panels. When the programme is released, I'll give you the usual how-to-avoid guide.
The other thing I did today (since I was thinking about Continuum, between NAFF and programme stuff) was sort through some possessions and think what else I could take down with me for the fan fund auction. I've already got a bundle of things, but whoever wins GUFF is going to need a nice fund to pay for things with (and if I win, I want to go to Shamrokon and Finncon, for there aren't enough contacts between European fans and Australian fans and I'd love to set up some contacts) and I'm in possession-diminution mode, and it was a task that required very little physical or intellectual effort, so I've added to my stash for Melbourne. There are 2 posters from the Conflux Prohibition banquet and some other Conflux material. There's a signed copy of the Conflux cookbook, too, and the Conflux programme with my short story in it. There are some oddities (Jean Weber asked me if I would donate my "I voted at Old Parliament House" button, so that's in there, for instance.) There are some US stamps that would be handy for writers who are lazy about getting return postage to add to SSAEs. And there are all my I-don't-need spec fic DVDs and one video. if there's anything people have desired greatly (eg an annotated Gillian-story, or a recipe CD, or a short ms assessment) now's the time to tell me, for once I am finished this last set of additions, my donations will be completed. I'm taking wild advantage of being sick to watch all the Angel DVDs that I'm donating, for I am an unabashed opportunist.
So I'm doing simple stuff and still sticking to deadlines. I have job applications, that can't be put off, for instance, and teaching tomorrow. But my research and writing can wait until I'm a bit better.
And the general update is that I still ache and etc, but I am definitely improving. I can feel the chest infection more as the inflammation diminishes, which is a good thing, for the antibiotics haven't sorted it yet and I *should* be feeling it. So I am improving and will soon be full of beans.
The other thing I did today (since I was thinking about Continuum, between NAFF and programme stuff) was sort through some possessions and think what else I could take down with me for the fan fund auction. I've already got a bundle of things, but whoever wins GUFF is going to need a nice fund to pay for things with (and if I win, I want to go to Shamrokon and Finncon, for there aren't enough contacts between European fans and Australian fans and I'd love to set up some contacts) and I'm in possession-diminution mode, and it was a task that required very little physical or intellectual effort, so I've added to my stash for Melbourne. There are 2 posters from the Conflux Prohibition banquet and some other Conflux material. There's a signed copy of the Conflux cookbook, too, and the Conflux programme with my short story in it. There are some oddities (Jean Weber asked me if I would donate my "I voted at Old Parliament House" button, so that's in there, for instance.) There are some US stamps that would be handy for writers who are lazy about getting return postage to add to SSAEs. And there are all my I-don't-need spec fic DVDs and one video. if there's anything people have desired greatly (eg an annotated Gillian-story, or a recipe CD, or a short ms assessment) now's the time to tell me, for once I am finished this last set of additions, my donations will be completed. I'm taking wild advantage of being sick to watch all the Angel DVDs that I'm donating, for I am an unabashed opportunist.
So I'm doing simple stuff and still sticking to deadlines. I have job applications, that can't be put off, for instance, and teaching tomorrow. But my research and writing can wait until I'm a bit better.
And the general update is that I still ache and etc, but I am definitely improving. I can feel the chest infection more as the inflammation diminishes, which is a good thing, for the antibiotics haven't sorted it yet and I *should* be feeling it. So I am improving and will soon be full of beans.
