We define ourselves by the stories we tell each other. Myths, fairytales, fantasy, scifi, fiction, drama, superhero movies, et., they are all different ways to look at ourselves in a mirror. Consider metal illness and cognitive developmental disorders.
After four years of dodging COVID, we finally succumbed. It’s a nasty virus and, after two weeks in bed, I’m just starting to be able to write again. I did read a few books while sick, and I wasn’t fond of any of them! I didn’t find the characters interesting, and the storylines were boring, and frankly I didn’t see a point in the narrative. There were too many names and characters all introduced up front and I couldn’t keep track of who was who and why I should care. Given how I felt, I can’t leave reviews — I was in the wrong frame of mind. But it was interesting in retrospect. All readers are different. It’s not only our abilities, it’s our cultural backgrounds, our language skills, our availability to read at times when we are able to process information easily, our time in general. There are readings that are just like candy — fun and delicious. And there are those that are “good for you.” And, of course, there are books and articles that we read for professional advancement. All require different support structures to make the reader’s task easier. Indexes, bibliographies, just-in-time lookups, dictionaries, note taking,…
When I was about five, I was obsessed with Swan Lake. I adored the score and played the record over and over again. I remember attending the ballet, but it was the music and the story that truly captivated my soul. The music, written by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky between 1875 and 1876, is sublime. Even now, I can pinpoint where we are in the story just by hearing a few chords; the ending still brings me to tears. But what affects me the most — is it the music or the story? Here’s a quick summary of the story: a princess, cursed to live as a swan during the day, regains her human form at night. One evening, a prince, out hunting, encounters her and falls deeply in love. While court intrigues attempt to lead the prince to choose a bride and a malevolent witch tries to deceive him, these elements pale in comparison to the climax. Ultimately, the prince forsakes his humanity, transforming into a swan to join the woman he loves. Together, they fly away, a happy couple. Swan Lake embodies a mythic story archetype, echoed throughout fantasy and fiction. Consider Twilight, where a lover surrenders her humanity…
People who are happy are able to turn even routine tasks into play. Or perhaps it is the other way around — people who can to turn routine tasks into play are generally happier. We know that people who manage to turn repetitive and tedious tasks — like working on an assembly line in a factory — into a game, manage to thrive as compared to those who see only boredom and frustration. People can engage with any task by gamifying it. Yes, that’s why that word gets thrown around a lot — a design constrain that aims to turn monotony into a fun activity. The problem with gamifying is the nature of a play — what makes a game fun for one person might not work for another. For me, creative writing is a play of the mind, but it is probably a punishment for others. As they say, “it’s nice to have written, but it sucks to write.” But when I write, I’m free. It’s the most exquisite of games for me. In life, there are tasks we have to do and those we get lucky to do. My grandmother cooked dinner for our family for decades, as…
It’s the start of a summer and thus a start of a county fair season. This year felt different — the carny people were gone!
I have taught children, teens, and adults for many years. And I am noticing a trend — as a people, in the name of a more just society, we try to make our definitions ever more expansive. Sounds like great thing, right? But consider this. Decades ago, children diagnosed as autistic were few and their symptoms had to be severe to get this diagnosis. Now we have an autistic spectrum. More and more children and adults get placed on this spectrum. We seem to want to catch as many autistic individuals as we can by expanding the definition of what it means to be on the spectrum. We are being ever more expansive in the name of justice. But shouldn’t we be expanding the spectrum the other way instead? Perhaps it is better to be more inclusive in our definition of what it means to be on the “normal” spectrum. We are all different. We all have a grab bag or positives and negatives. And that’s a good thing. It takes all of our differences to create a great society. So we can treat ADHD kids as different from “normals” or we can think of them as us. Dividing children…
I saw a question on Twitter: Can readers become emotionally invested in a story if the main character is interesting but not sympathetic? My answer was that I need characters that I can care about. A superhero that has all kinds of cool and interesting superpowers is ultimately boring unless there is an emotional narrative that I can care about. I think the most important answer an author can give to their readers in the first few pages (or paragraphs) of their book is why they should care enough to read more? And that answer is always why the reader should care. I find that caring about sympathetic characters is easier than for villains, no matter how interesting those villains are. I can go for a story about a young kid who grows up to be a villain because the world forces him to become one — he wasn’t born evil, he was made to be. Villany was forced on an innocent soul in order to survive. But this just means that I’m reading a tragedy. There are lots of different types of stories. It’s never about the genre. Science fiction is just fantasy wrapped up in fancy techtalk. Romance…
