(no subject)

Holy shit Raymond Carver's "Cathedral" is actually not a downer. I mean, it's not a pleasant read: the narrator is viciously ableist and casually racist (though it is vintage 1983 and I'm not sure of when that falls with respect to the evolution of terminology to describe PoC in general and black people in specific). But he's less ableist at the end of the story than he is at the start. Robert, who's described hella lots more often as "the blind man" than as "Robert", does most of the work to accomplish this, and the narrator does not much work at all. But, like. A small victory, hard fought for, is still a victory, and the story is not a downer.

(no subject)

Okay, pausing the Week 6 lecture eight minutes into the twenty-eight to argue with the professor: Why the hell is "advancing the plot" not an intended function of dialogue in prose fiction? Or even just in literary fiction? Maybe it is just that I'm writing a genre that is not the literary genre, but my story that I wrote for his class, most of the plot happens in the dialogue and not the thoughts of the narrator. Because the story lies in the character interactions.

(And also the editor who had a look at "Inherit the Flame" told me I shouldn't ought to spend the first third of the story entirely in the narrator's head! ...I still really need to rewrite that. Especially in light of the "everything tastes like mashed potatoes" metaphor for depression, because that gives Akinyi and Meredith a really compelling reason to want to stay Underhill: life doesn't taste like mashed potatoes!)

But seriously. What is the purpose of divorcing dialogue from plot? "To distinguish prose fiction from television and movies" doesn't count!

(no subject)

Perseverance is a virtue.

get your essay topics here

I have now seen a December Days get-your-topics-here post and I have the distressing feeling I'm two years behind on that shit. I am pretty sure I never did write the feminist economics post, certainly.

I am sure I have a tag for that but I am afraid to look.

So what I am going to do instead is, one of the columns in Alexeigynaix (which, for those of you outside my lock, is the digital magazine I'm starting, just me, mostly for the Arts Fellow distinction from my university, which takes 200 hours to attain, all hours on the same creative project that is then presented to a wider audience than the circle around the faculty mentor) will be Alex Pontificates On Reader-Submitted Topics. Hit me with topics and months in which to cover them! If I get more than twelve, that is not in any way a problem! I intend to publish each issue in the first week of the month.

Dec: Gender/sexuality terminology
Jan: Religion/Belief
Feb: Fun animes/series/books
Mar: Intersectional feminism
Apr: Writing: how, why, what
May: Gender identity
Jun: Formative book(s) you read growing up
Jul: Stories you would like to be told more often instead of [tropes]
Aug: Poetry: when to use formal structure, when to use freeform, when to blend, how to decide
Sep: Ritual
Oct: The Free Space on your Bingo Card
Nov: Feelings about cooking

(no subject)

*reviews instructor comments on "Connect the Dots"*

*opens new Scrivener tab to revise "Connect the Dots"*

*stares at blank page*

*idly wonders whether professor would have pointed out that the bad guys need to be at least a little sympathetic too if it were not true that both professor and bad guys are white men*