if i were a sculptor, but then again, no
So without Heroes to make me turn on the TV last night, it didn't even occur to me to watch The Black Donnellys, so I guess I know where I stand on that. I just wish I'd remembered about The Riches, because that did look fun, and it sounds from people on my flist like it was worth watching. Ah, well, the last thing I need is another show. Even if it is about a family of con artists, which sounds like it would hit many of my bulletproof kinks.
I've been thinking about this last episode of Rome, and I think while the new Octavian is quite good, and believable as an older extrapolation of the younger Octavian, Max Pirkis had something about him that made the character not only palatable, but sympathetic, which this new guy lacks. He's so very severe looking, which, okay, yes, given who Octavian is and who he becomes, but I *liked* Maxtavian, even knowing that. This guy? Not so much.
***
lunabee34 wrote about POV, and this is one of those writing subjects I can talk about for hours. And I did in her comments. *g* I had to whittle it down slightly to fit in one comment box, so this is the unexpurgated version, with all the YMMV left in, because a vague disclaimer is nobody's friend:
Oh, man, POV. My most troubling issue lately is whose to write from. Most of my stories come with POV and tense attached - I "hear" the story in Dean's voice, or know it *has* to be in River's POV, or what have you - but sometimes I just have the *idea* and I can think of two or three different ways to tell it, and then it becomes a matter of trying it out and seeing which fits, or stalling out before I even start because I can't decide.
I do find breaks in POV jarring, if only because my default reading and writing setting is third limited, and over the years, I've had it beaten into me by betas not to change POV in the middle of a scene, because it gets confusing, and it also breaks the intimacy and flow.
While reading, I will let one or two instances slip, but if it happens consistently in a story, or is a certain type of break (the really horrid kind where the person is describing themselves - "Dean's lambent green eyes glistened with a jewel-like sheen of tears as he watched Sam walk away and realized he might never see his brother again." or "Eowyn's hair glinted like molten gold in the moonlight as she waited for Faramir to come to her." - those are usually clear signs of a newbie writer) I'll likely back out of it in annoyance.
Third omniscient is hard, and I find it off-putting except in the hands of a really good author - too often it slips into multiple third limited without any delineation of who is actually telling the story, which is problematic for me, because then I spend time going, "but how did Y *know* what X was thinking?" And then it's a question of narrative tone, and if you're doing pastiche, that can be fun, but in fanfic, I don't really like it.
I have written in first person on rare occasion, but I really dislike it in fanfic. 1. it almost never sounds like the character as I hear him or her; 2. it becomes a crutch for the author, especially if they always write in first person from the same character's POV; and 3. it tends to sound more like the author than the character. Mileage obviously varies, and I include my own first person stories in with this - I tried, say, to make Molly Weasley sound like Molly Weasley, but I fear when I was doing first person for Rogue, she sounded more like me than like herself.
Second person is... I've written successfully from second person POV once or twice, and I've seen it said that it's meant to foster intimacy, putting the reader right there in the character's shoes, but I feel it's a *distancing* technique on the part of the character - I think of it as a character telling a story, and saying "you" instead of "me" (that's very much how I wrote "The Language of Goodbye" - in my head, that's Logan telling the story to someone in a bar somewhere, saying, "So you meet a girl and you fall in love" because it's too hard for him to say, "I met a girl, and I fell in love," because of how badly it ended) - so I think it only works with certain characters - Remus and Snape come to mind, or Bruce Wayne, if I wrote him - men who are very good at compartmentalizing, at cutting intimacy off or only allowing it in very rare circumstances - or certain situations that might be too traumatic for the character to relate in first or close third - River, perhaps, or maybe Veronica talking about the aftermath of Lilly's death, or the rape, or her feelings about the possibility of her parentage.
Most of the time, to me, badly written second person reads like a "Choose Your Own Adventure" story, and that's just not what I'm looking for. And sometimes it just feels like the author is saying, "Hey look at me! Look how clever I am!" Which also happens sometimes with other stylistic experiments which in the end don't feel necessary to the telling of the story. Again, in my opinion. Mileage varies.
I think I manage a good, tight, in character third person POV most of the time - most especially from Mal's POV for some reason - I don't know why it's so easy for me to slip into his head, but it is, and I can write for days in his voice without slipping. I have a harder time with characters who are less prone to the sort of constant questioning - I hesitate to call what Mal does navel-gazing, but I do think he's prone to overthinking, and characters like that - Remus, Sam Winchester, etc. - are the best kinds to use as narrators. Writing from the POV of Zoe, for whom action follows thought like breathing - not that she's not thoughtful, but that she's not going to analyse herself into paralysis, like Mal might - or Dean, who is going to avoid thinking about a lot of stuff if he can possibly help it, or Danny Ocean, who is always running a con on multiple layers, even inside his own head - those are the characters from whose POVs I find it difficult to write, because your opportunities for rumination and emotional exposition are nearly nil, and you have to express all that stuff in action, especially with someone like Dean or Danny, who is going to consistently conceal his actual feelings when speaking, unless pushed by circumstances or great emotional stress to reveal. A lot of that stuff is great in visual media, where you can see the clench of a jaw or fist, the slumped shoulders straightening in preparation, the quick, furtive glance away before the not-quite meeting of someone else's gaze, but those are harder for me to convey in writing.
Hmm...
***
Speaking of wordy characters who overanalyze their own actions, and everyone else's, I really am going to start my
sportsbackinsn story today. I spent a bit of last night rereading stuff about the Carmelo Anthony incident, and while I don't think the story is actually going to be about that (though I'm sure I could write 750 words of Dan and Casey pontificating on the ramifications of Carmelo Anthony throwing a punch like that and then running like a scaredy-cat), though I suppose I could work in the Chris Simon thing, now. Hmm... Or I could just write some Dan/Dana porn.
Decisions, decisions...
***
I've been thinking about this last episode of Rome, and I think while the new Octavian is quite good, and believable as an older extrapolation of the younger Octavian, Max Pirkis had something about him that made the character not only palatable, but sympathetic, which this new guy lacks. He's so very severe looking, which, okay, yes, given who Octavian is and who he becomes, but I *liked* Maxtavian, even knowing that. This guy? Not so much.
***
lunabee34 wrote about POV, and this is one of those writing subjects I can talk about for hours. And I did in her comments. *g* I had to whittle it down slightly to fit in one comment box, so this is the unexpurgated version, with all the YMMV left in, because a vague disclaimer is nobody's friend:Oh, man, POV. My most troubling issue lately is whose to write from. Most of my stories come with POV and tense attached - I "hear" the story in Dean's voice, or know it *has* to be in River's POV, or what have you - but sometimes I just have the *idea* and I can think of two or three different ways to tell it, and then it becomes a matter of trying it out and seeing which fits, or stalling out before I even start because I can't decide.
I do find breaks in POV jarring, if only because my default reading and writing setting is third limited, and over the years, I've had it beaten into me by betas not to change POV in the middle of a scene, because it gets confusing, and it also breaks the intimacy and flow.
While reading, I will let one or two instances slip, but if it happens consistently in a story, or is a certain type of break (the really horrid kind where the person is describing themselves - "Dean's lambent green eyes glistened with a jewel-like sheen of tears as he watched Sam walk away and realized he might never see his brother again." or "Eowyn's hair glinted like molten gold in the moonlight as she waited for Faramir to come to her." - those are usually clear signs of a newbie writer) I'll likely back out of it in annoyance.
Third omniscient is hard, and I find it off-putting except in the hands of a really good author - too often it slips into multiple third limited without any delineation of who is actually telling the story, which is problematic for me, because then I spend time going, "but how did Y *know* what X was thinking?" And then it's a question of narrative tone, and if you're doing pastiche, that can be fun, but in fanfic, I don't really like it.
I have written in first person on rare occasion, but I really dislike it in fanfic. 1. it almost never sounds like the character as I hear him or her; 2. it becomes a crutch for the author, especially if they always write in first person from the same character's POV; and 3. it tends to sound more like the author than the character. Mileage obviously varies, and I include my own first person stories in with this - I tried, say, to make Molly Weasley sound like Molly Weasley, but I fear when I was doing first person for Rogue, she sounded more like me than like herself.
Second person is... I've written successfully from second person POV once or twice, and I've seen it said that it's meant to foster intimacy, putting the reader right there in the character's shoes, but I feel it's a *distancing* technique on the part of the character - I think of it as a character telling a story, and saying "you" instead of "me" (that's very much how I wrote "The Language of Goodbye" - in my head, that's Logan telling the story to someone in a bar somewhere, saying, "So you meet a girl and you fall in love" because it's too hard for him to say, "I met a girl, and I fell in love," because of how badly it ended) - so I think it only works with certain characters - Remus and Snape come to mind, or Bruce Wayne, if I wrote him - men who are very good at compartmentalizing, at cutting intimacy off or only allowing it in very rare circumstances - or certain situations that might be too traumatic for the character to relate in first or close third - River, perhaps, or maybe Veronica talking about the aftermath of Lilly's death, or the rape, or her feelings about the possibility of her parentage.
Most of the time, to me, badly written second person reads like a "Choose Your Own Adventure" story, and that's just not what I'm looking for. And sometimes it just feels like the author is saying, "Hey look at me! Look how clever I am!" Which also happens sometimes with other stylistic experiments which in the end don't feel necessary to the telling of the story. Again, in my opinion. Mileage varies.
I think I manage a good, tight, in character third person POV most of the time - most especially from Mal's POV for some reason - I don't know why it's so easy for me to slip into his head, but it is, and I can write for days in his voice without slipping. I have a harder time with characters who are less prone to the sort of constant questioning - I hesitate to call what Mal does navel-gazing, but I do think he's prone to overthinking, and characters like that - Remus, Sam Winchester, etc. - are the best kinds to use as narrators. Writing from the POV of Zoe, for whom action follows thought like breathing - not that she's not thoughtful, but that she's not going to analyse herself into paralysis, like Mal might - or Dean, who is going to avoid thinking about a lot of stuff if he can possibly help it, or Danny Ocean, who is always running a con on multiple layers, even inside his own head - those are the characters from whose POVs I find it difficult to write, because your opportunities for rumination and emotional exposition are nearly nil, and you have to express all that stuff in action, especially with someone like Dean or Danny, who is going to consistently conceal his actual feelings when speaking, unless pushed by circumstances or great emotional stress to reveal. A lot of that stuff is great in visual media, where you can see the clench of a jaw or fist, the slumped shoulders straightening in preparation, the quick, furtive glance away before the not-quite meeting of someone else's gaze, but those are harder for me to convey in writing.
Hmm...
***
Speaking of wordy characters who overanalyze their own actions, and everyone else's, I really am going to start my
sportsbackinsn story today. I spent a bit of last night rereading stuff about the Carmelo Anthony incident, and while I don't think the story is actually going to be about that (though I'm sure I could write 750 words of Dan and Casey pontificating on the ramifications of Carmelo Anthony throwing a punch like that and then running like a scaredy-cat), though I suppose I could work in the Chris Simon thing, now. Hmm... Or I could just write some Dan/Dana porn. Decisions, decisions...
***