Writerly musings
Mar. 9th, 2006 07:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
brainofckCK: I had a brain wave this morning that is worrying me. Will probably try to write it out tonight.
CK: Teal'c is going to challenge Daniel to prove to Jack that Daniel has accepted his change so that Jack can, too.
So then, I was thinking that Daniel should have a big think about who he is and make a decision to pick a team, as it were. Then I though, jeez, at least one trannie type person is going to be reading this crap. So now the brainwave is worrying me. I will need to be careful how Daniel's thought process flows on this subject, as I'm not really wanting to write some sort of political piece, just explore ideas, but Daniel *is* eventually going to *decide* to be a woman, and that could put me in the position of appearing to make some sort of value judgment about other people's decisions not to decide. Or inability to decide. Or opinions that it is not an issue to *be* decided, and all the other permutations thereof.
*glares at brain*
Can you tell I went to Carolina?
Person A: *snort* YES I CAN TELL!!!!!!
And you're not deciding for other people. Just for Daniel. And just for *your* personal Daniel-muse. Which, as a writer, is your toy to play with. :)
CK: Yes, but the writer's voice comes through the narrative, doesn't it. I can see the lit crit exam question on this now - what is the writer's stance on personal identity and gender? Can you have a free floating identity that is not clearly gender identified? Discuss. Meaning lies with the reader, after all. :p
Person A: This is true, I suppose I just don't choose to analyze my characters too much. [muses about her muses, but don't know if that was supposed to be confidential musing, so not putting it here]
CK: Well, mostly, I don't over analyze my characters, either. But it'll be pretty unavoidable, if I write this.
Person B: I'm with Person A.
Write what feels right for you and your characters, write what comes from the heart. Don't worry how the audience is going to take what you write. Your loyal band of perverts will be happy and interested to read whatever you write and whatever direction you take it. Don't start to compromise because of what someone may or may not think.
But that's just my two penneth :)
Person A: Person B's two penneth sounds right to me, too!
CK: On the one hand, I agree with you. On the other hand, I *know* I have at least one reader who can be quite sensitive. Considering my vast pool, of, I dunno, 50 readers? Prefer not to crush toes that I know are just right there *waiting* to be stepped on. :) I think the thing will have it's own internal logic, so all will be well. It should be clear that Daniel is talking about Daniel of the perfect sex swap, not Daniel of the authentic tranny nature. But now I'm just thinking about it. You know?
Person C: And CK, I say you have to go where your brain or your muse leads you.
The thing I've discovered about RP is you may think you're in control
of the muse, but they take over sometimes.
CK: Yeah, but I'm not totally sure I come to my writing from quite the RP perspective, though I totally get what you're saying.
I also have an infuriating idea that writing is only part inspiration and is largely controllable. This is not a popularly held belief among writers, I realize. Even less popular than my belief that meaning lies with the reader. :/
Person C: Well, I think you're totally right about the meaning/reader thing. We
all bring our preconceptions to everything we do, including reading.
Wasn't that Tolkien's big thing?
Person B: I totally agree that each reader will take their own meaning away from what you write, but would say that is what makes it more important to write from the heart, and that's for fic in general, not just RP. I once read a quote that was along the lines of "write for yourself, once you start to write for the audience, you're lost".
CK: I'm not so much thinking of changing what I eventually am going to say, but possibly just thinking about how to say it in the right way.
I often think that the phrase "from the heart" is in direct confrontation to the idea that there is value to the intellectual part of a process - writing, speaking, whatever. *Of course*, there is a deep instinctual/emotional/inspirational component to writing, but that doesn't mean that letting your brain get involved somehow devalues the piece. And in a way, I think it's more of a balance than that quote suggests. You write for yourself, but you must be writing for the audience, too, or what would be the point? Probably the real trick is to keep your personal vision and communicate it in a way that suits your audience, never losing track of one thing and replacing it with the other, but using them to play off each other for a better, clearer piece.
I don't know how much of my attitude comes from writing so much non-fiction in the academic forum before trying to write fiction. Maybe it's because my mind-set is that I am writing to make an argument, that I am extending that to fiction writing in a way that maybe not everybody does. I mean, obviously, not the ice cream porn. But maybe some of the other things. Like Daniel wondering what it means that there are so many other Daniels. Or Daniel pondering whether he is himself, in and of himself, and whether he can be separate from the sex of his body, or the gender identity of his entire life. I feel a real conciousness of making an argument with those pieces, even if they are just Stargate fanfic, in a remote corner of the internet. :)
And that was just rambling, btw, not intended to be any sort of attack on anyone! Stupid e-mail.
CK: Teal'c is going to challenge Daniel to prove to Jack that Daniel has accepted his change so that Jack can, too.
So then, I was thinking that Daniel should have a big think about who he is and make a decision to pick a team, as it were. Then I though, jeez, at least one trannie type person is going to be reading this crap. So now the brainwave is worrying me. I will need to be careful how Daniel's thought process flows on this subject, as I'm not really wanting to write some sort of political piece, just explore ideas, but Daniel *is* eventually going to *decide* to be a woman, and that could put me in the position of appearing to make some sort of value judgment about other people's decisions not to decide. Or inability to decide. Or opinions that it is not an issue to *be* decided, and all the other permutations thereof.
*glares at brain*
Can you tell I went to Carolina?
Person A: *snort* YES I CAN TELL!!!!!!
And you're not deciding for other people. Just for Daniel. And just for *your* personal Daniel-muse. Which, as a writer, is your toy to play with. :)
CK: Yes, but the writer's voice comes through the narrative, doesn't it. I can see the lit crit exam question on this now - what is the writer's stance on personal identity and gender? Can you have a free floating identity that is not clearly gender identified? Discuss. Meaning lies with the reader, after all. :p
Person A: This is true, I suppose I just don't choose to analyze my characters too much. [muses about her muses, but don't know if that was supposed to be confidential musing, so not putting it here]
CK: Well, mostly, I don't over analyze my characters, either. But it'll be pretty unavoidable, if I write this.
Person B: I'm with Person A.
Write what feels right for you and your characters, write what comes from the heart. Don't worry how the audience is going to take what you write. Your loyal band of perverts will be happy and interested to read whatever you write and whatever direction you take it. Don't start to compromise because of what someone may or may not think.
But that's just my two penneth :)
Person A: Person B's two penneth sounds right to me, too!
CK: On the one hand, I agree with you. On the other hand, I *know* I have at least one reader who can be quite sensitive. Considering my vast pool, of, I dunno, 50 readers? Prefer not to crush toes that I know are just right there *waiting* to be stepped on. :) I think the thing will have it's own internal logic, so all will be well. It should be clear that Daniel is talking about Daniel of the perfect sex swap, not Daniel of the authentic tranny nature. But now I'm just thinking about it. You know?
Person C: And CK, I say you have to go where your brain or your muse leads you.
The thing I've discovered about RP is you may think you're in control
of the muse, but they take over sometimes.
CK: Yeah, but I'm not totally sure I come to my writing from quite the RP perspective, though I totally get what you're saying.
I also have an infuriating idea that writing is only part inspiration and is largely controllable. This is not a popularly held belief among writers, I realize. Even less popular than my belief that meaning lies with the reader. :/
Person C: Well, I think you're totally right about the meaning/reader thing. We
all bring our preconceptions to everything we do, including reading.
Wasn't that Tolkien's big thing?
Person B: I totally agree that each reader will take their own meaning away from what you write, but would say that is what makes it more important to write from the heart, and that's for fic in general, not just RP. I once read a quote that was along the lines of "write for yourself, once you start to write for the audience, you're lost".
CK: I'm not so much thinking of changing what I eventually am going to say, but possibly just thinking about how to say it in the right way.
I often think that the phrase "from the heart" is in direct confrontation to the idea that there is value to the intellectual part of a process - writing, speaking, whatever. *Of course*, there is a deep instinctual/emotional/inspirational component to writing, but that doesn't mean that letting your brain get involved somehow devalues the piece. And in a way, I think it's more of a balance than that quote suggests. You write for yourself, but you must be writing for the audience, too, or what would be the point? Probably the real trick is to keep your personal vision and communicate it in a way that suits your audience, never losing track of one thing and replacing it with the other, but using them to play off each other for a better, clearer piece.
I don't know how much of my attitude comes from writing so much non-fiction in the academic forum before trying to write fiction. Maybe it's because my mind-set is that I am writing to make an argument, that I am extending that to fiction writing in a way that maybe not everybody does. I mean, obviously, not the ice cream porn. But maybe some of the other things. Like Daniel wondering what it means that there are so many other Daniels. Or Daniel pondering whether he is himself, in and of himself, and whether he can be separate from the sex of his body, or the gender identity of his entire life. I feel a real conciousness of making an argument with those pieces, even if they are just Stargate fanfic, in a remote corner of the internet. :)
And that was just rambling, btw, not intended to be any sort of attack on anyone! Stupid e-mail.
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no subject
Date: 2006-03-10 04:50 am (UTC)I would say more but I am blissed from amazing lasagna and a very nice evening spent with a couple of lovestruck, cute as heck lj friends. :) And I ate pipchiks.
*snogs you* Stupid email. Need more vicodin. Need sleep. Nitey nite.
no subject
Date: 2006-03-10 06:16 am (UTC)Seriously, if the muse leads you there, and if the internal logic holds up, then there it is then.
no subject
Date: 2006-03-10 06:37 pm (UTC)