"All right," said Susan, "I'm not stupid. You're saying humans need ... fantasies to make life bearable."nb: never actually read Hogfather. Or more than a few pages of any Pratchett besides Good Omens. Planning to change that, though; I've got a hold on a library copy of Hogfather. (Also thinking about reading Discworld for my tentatively planned fiction-book-a-week project in 2015. Forty books published per Wiki; that should last me most of the year.)
No. Humans need fantasy to be human. To be the place where the falling angel meets the rising ape.
"Tooth fairies? Hogfathers?"
Yes. As practice. You have to start out learning to believe the little lies.
"So we can believe the big ones?"
Yes. Justice. Duty. Mercy. That sort of thing.
"They're not the same at all!"
Really? Then take the universe and grind it down to the finest powder and sieve it through the finest sieve and then show me one atom of justice, one molecule of mercy. And yet you act, like there was some sort of rightness in the universe by which it may be judged:
"Yes. But people have got to believe that or what's the point?"
My point exactly.
Dec. 19th, 2014
1) All ingredients must be cheap.
2) All ingredients must be nonperishable.
We made him cook dinner last night, which is why this came up. Rice, black beans, diced tomatoes, and assorted spices dumped in a pot to cook, plus microwaved frozen broccoli. Not bad, really. We were talking about how to improve the dish (as Dad pointed out, it pretty much looks like mud), and Dad said corn, which (if canned) fits the rules, and middle sister said beef, which breaks both...
2) All ingredients must be nonperishable.
We made him cook dinner last night, which is why this came up. Rice, black beans, diced tomatoes, and assorted spices dumped in a pot to cook, plus microwaved frozen broccoli. Not bad, really. We were talking about how to improve the dish (as Dad pointed out, it pretty much looks like mud), and Dad said corn, which (if canned) fits the rules, and middle sister said beef, which breaks both...
Why do I write?
How can I not?
And, like, one of my (potential, because there are many and I'm debating) New Year's goals is to write every day. Because I'm bad at that. And I'm not real good at finishing things, or even getting seriously started on things once I've thought of them, as you will shortly see. But the ideas bounce around my head until I've set them on the screen. The only way to stop them is to write them down.
As for novels I'm writing—and I include novellas and planned-as-novel-length short story collections in this category—well, the list is lengthy. I'm just gonna copy straight from my post on![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
alexconall and add commentary:
( seriously lengthy )
How can I not?
And, like, one of my (potential, because there are many and I'm debating) New Year's goals is to write every day. Because I'm bad at that. And I'm not real good at finishing things, or even getting seriously started on things once I've thought of them, as you will shortly see. But the ideas bounce around my head until I've set them on the screen. The only way to stop them is to write them down.
As for novels I'm writing—and I include novellas and planned-as-novel-length short story collections in this category—well, the list is lengthy. I'm just gonna copy straight from my post on
alexconall and add commentary:( seriously lengthy )