Done

owlwink

Would love to here what people think of this work in progress.

http://owlwink.wordpress.com/2010/08/07/done/

EileenG

Er, what's it supposed to be about? And why?

I read it twice, and I couldn't make head or tail of it. As a reader, I find paragraphs are extremely useful. And sentences tend to make more sense when they contain verbs.

Is it a joke, an attempt to get a computer to string words together randomly to see if they produce anything?

owlwink

Hey EileenG,

First of all thanks for taking a look at it. Please keep in mind that it is still only in its infantile stages. The piece is written by two people and constantly switches between the two writers. Grammar is difficult because it is more of a constant stream of random thoughts and I felt that cleaning up the grammar aferwards would constrict the flow of the piece. I would typically write much more coherent short stories, but just wanted to try this out with a friend. After writing the piece we then used a Burroughs-esque cut and paste technique, hence the fact that you thought that it was a randomly generated stream of thought. I appreciate it is very difficult to understand and for most that are not into this style it probably comes across as giberish. What I wanted to know though is what kind of emotions did the piece invoke in you, for once in my life I wanted to let go of the rules of writing and just write a piece that is governed by the consciousness and how it helps in the construction of thought.

A sample of some of my more coherent work can be found @ http://issuu.com/owlwink/docs/upsyndromevol1x

As for this piece I don't really want to over think it too much as it is an experiment. It's just nice sometimes to let go of the rules and challenge the way you think about writng (Note: I said sometimes)

Anyways thanks for checking it out.

Owlwink.

EileenG

The emotion it generated was exasperation!

I read it wondering what on earth was going on, and as it got more confused, starting to suspect I was the victim of a joke. At no point did I get involved with the piece, because there was no character to emphasise with.

Seriously, what was it about? Who was it about? What was your reader supposed to take from it?

By all means, experiment, but refine your experiment before you unleash it on the world.

owlwink

After re-reading it I think that one of the key points of it is how it deals with detachment from both the mother and the father. The constantly ambiguous [subject] of the piece helps in making the notion of identity become askew, thus possibly reinforcing how identity can be perceived as a very malleable construct in relation to the concept of family. As regards to what was it about, I guess with this kind of style it is more of an invoked feeling than a direct explanation that can define this and unfortunately that is something unique to each and every reader. I'm the kind of reader who likes it to be as blurred as possible as it gives the reader the power to create their own interpretations on what is going on.

Even though it is always nice to release a finally tuned and polished product it is also nice to release the odd work in progress to see how people react to your experiment.

Cheers again for taking the time to look at out clusterf*ck of a story. If you are looking for something more polished and in tune with my actual style check the link I posted in the last comment. That is something I would love to here your thoughts on.

Peace.:)

EileenG

One of my favourite saying is "Easy reading requires hard writing".

To be honest, if I picked this up anywhere except in this section of Boards, I'd have put it back down again after two lines and not read any further. No-one now has time to wade through anything which doesn't grab them in some way, so your job as a writer is to hook your reader, then lead her deep into your philosophy.

Try to sum up your piece in ten words or less. If you can't, chances are you need to rewrite.

As for the other link, I honestly think you need to reformat it, it's extremely difficult to read, and you definitely need to rewrite. "Fondled memories between clerical costumes and withered masks of natural beauty bring me to the Great Pretender." Come on, what does that mean?

damselnat

I can see where you're going with this (or maybe not, that might be the beauty of surreality ), I agree with Eileen you need a little more consistency and coherency, in setting/train of thoughts, the way one thing leads onto another prompted by something else, but it did remind me of dozing about on morphine in hospital post op, which is a feeling I rather enjoyed so I guess I'm into that kind of thing