~~ ranter without a cause. heh.
Jun. 10th, 2003 12:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
reenkai kind of like being curmudgeony, but it certainly makes me feel... even more unreasonable than usual. disturbing, kind of, just how many things can annoy you once you set your mind to it. eep. most often, i can't even put my finger on it, and just bristle. 'course, usually i'm annoyed by pretention, stupidity, lack of taste and prejudice. but no, these are all related, so probably i'm still annoyed by that one thing. everyone knows people are stupid, but what no one tells you is that intelligent, discerning people are stupid too. there's really no escaping it-- and if everyone is stupid, the word loses its meaning, of course. not that i'm the arbitrer of stupidity or lack thereof, and as usual once you're not infatuated with something, it's a lot easier to see all the stupidities and fatuities in the system. oh yes, fatuity. so, so many people are guilty of it. shallow, lazy thinking passes for something worth giving a sneeze about every day. not that i'm setting myself somewhere above it and saying i'm better-- it annoys me anyway.
repetition is a major culprit. for some reason, the concept of "let's say it again" holds this mass appeal, because, well, no one gets it the first time, and there are always new people, right, who haven't heard it before. we must do it for them. it's educational. that's why we try-- it's because we care. yes.
the problem is also just that i have this erroneous instinct to say, "well, people can tell -me- this, but i can't tell -them-". you can tell me i'm being stupid and lazy-thinking anytime. anytime. i will listen, i will try to understand, to see what i'm missing. i may not change my mind, but i would not get offended. i get this sneaking suspicion that i can't go around telling people they're talking crap. god, how that annoys me. and it's not even crap because it has no inherent value. it's crap because we've all heard it before, we all know it, there are better ways to say it again, and it's so purely self-indulgent and masturbatory as to discomfit even -me-, who is the mistress of self-indulgent masturbatory rhetoric.
i'm not even referring to anything in specific-- but then, so -many- things are like that. talking meta, analyzing, thinking-- is such a double-edged sword. i may be shallow, i may be missing something by not thinking much (though, obviously -some-) about `queer as folk' and only humming in pleasure-- but at least that's what it is, and no one can contest it-- it's pleasure. try to quantify pleasure, and unless you've got more intelligence than most people are willing to show, you sound like a complete dork. this pretty much includes me, yes.
one of the things that bothers me the most (er... in fandom, i guess) is an unmitigated endorsement of others' fiction on a large scale-- the best-seller phenomenon. it just sort of pushes itself after awhile. when it becomes just like... "read it, it's good! so good! read it! i read it, you should read it too! it's so good!!" it just makes me ill. i will -not- read it (for the longest time-- this is what happened with hp, anyway-- even to this day there's a bad taste in my mouth about jkr's books because the whole bloody -world- pimped them), but then, i'm very curmudgeony as i said. i have rated fics before myself, but i think when you continuously pimp them instead of discussing them or saying anything except "it's good-- in this/this/this/this/and this way", then it just becomes mindless propaganda.
and well, out of all the things in the universe that people do, i hate two of them the most: propaganda (mind-control & dominance of any sort) & insensitivity (cruelty to animals, people, plants, anything). i mean, i've shipped h/d with a huge intensity-- that's why i was ever -in- the fandom-- but i love anti-h/d rhetoric, i can empathize with it. it must suck to have there be this machine of h/d, h/d everywhere. entirely natural, because there will -always- be popular things and less popular things, but that doesn't make it less horribly annoying. sigh.
and what the hell? copyrighting fanfics? oh yes, i suppose you can add "wankery" to the list of the things that annoy me most. that is pretty much the definition of wankery. oh yes, and the propaganda is wankery too. 'course, actually attacking particular -people- in any way is in itself wankery, so there's a lack of options as to how to express one's righteous rage, heh. i found this fic where it actually says 'copyrighted 10/31/02' at the top, and now i don't wanna read it. fuck that. that's the same sort of thing that turns into the persecution (oops, i mean prosecution) of fanfic writers when the person actually becomes a success (by some insane fluke of fate). 'course, i didn't really wanna read it in the first place, but i have this gig where i check out any recced h/d fic (i'm so thorough it hurts, it really does). but it's postwar, too. eh. hell with it.
*grins* eeeeee, i don't have to like it!! it is pretty sucky, although with potential. ha! yeay! i was right! i'm not that biased. no need to read it, even for fairness sake. heh....
okay, fine, i read even more of it and now i'm liking it against my will, even if it -does- have mean!harry which is just insane-- and somewhat offensive, because a harry who doesn't know what love is is just not harry to me, and jaded-slut!draco which makes me sick just 'cause it's so overdone and it was a one-trick pony to start with. although this proves that even now, burnt out as i am, i'd still forgive a whole lot of iffy writing for some desperate!harry and slowly-melting!draco. damn me, damn me to hell. though at least it's a sexy hell. damn frottage, gets me every time. ok, so the fic is rather inventive and interesting, if you ignore the extreme amounts of exposition, awkward wording, semi-offensive characterization of harry, mostly-ooc-draco and an almost complete lack of actual interaction-- as in, dialogue and not summation, frustrating as all hell-- to back up the h/d. heh. the ideas, seriously, are more fresh than most of the stuff out there. i'm reading an h/d for the plot. this has never happened before. oh god. first time for everything? like, wow. and mind you, i -hate- evil!dumbledore, i really do. no, really. but it makes sense anyway, doesn't it.
this makes me wonder if plot-heavy chaptered fics are counter-productive to an entirely believable romance between harry & draco (or maybe believable romance in general?). or maybe it needs to be -really- long, then. plot that doesn't revolve around their relationship, that is. maybe you can have that in a sequel... or something, but it seems like without a lot of attention paid to it, the relationship becomes a leap-of-faith sort of phenomenon, which bothers me. i mean, this fic goes from apathetic!draco who merely tolerates harry's advances to slightly-softening!draco who grows to like them sometimes, to reciprocating!draco without actually -explaining- or giving them enough airtime to charm the reader into belief. lots of sex in 2 sentences or less, gratuitous and yet unsatisfying. while i do like the plot, the characters' motivations are merely -stated-, and never actually created. this is poor writing, no matter who does it. wah. that one crit i posted to the veela list must've really sent me on the long-term warpath, heh.
~~
it just occurred to me yesterday, in one of those flashes of pointless insight that mean nothing to anyone but me, that i find almost nothing as hateful as people proclaiming opinions as if they were fact.
because no matter what you're saying, if you're that certain, you're too certain. you're blinded and in effect blind. you're lying to yourself and to your audience at the same time under the pretense of truth. rhetoric should be spoken within the confines of rhetoric-- in the style & format of an argument. rhetoric disguised as simple statement of accepted precepts insults the listener's intelligence and your own as the speaker.
this is probably the root of my huge bias towards "show-don't-tell" storytelling. as a storyteller, you're in the business of speaking the truth outfitted in lies. this is a delicate, subtle procedure, easy to mess up. all stories both are and aren't true, and the writer needs to be sensitive to the many gradations within that concept to be successful at really capturing the minds, hearts & imaginations of the audience.
admittedly, i tend to overcompensate and over-qualify my statements and end up making my actual stand too implied, even incomprehensible. i do actually have an ego, of course, and actually am often convinced i'm right about all manner of things, but i consider it in such poor taste to be bombastic as to be deeply offensive a lot of times.
i admire outrageousness, out-spokenness, brashness, actually. speaking uncensored isn't the same as being an ego-maniacal, closed-minded, self-righteous asshole, on the other hand. being passionate and honest doesn't have to mean being an exclusionary and rabid propaganda machine. you can feel strongly, basically, without forcing it on others. that force is, to me, a basic human right being threatened. the right to think for yourself, feel for yourself.
as soon as someone approaches disturbing that circle of clarity, they become one of "them". the opressors. i'm serious about this.
you think it's stupid to apply this to not using "show-don't-tell" in fiction? maybe so. but the principle remains. voltaire said something like, "i may not agree with a word you said, but i will defend your right to say it to the death."
free speech isn't just a lack of censorship. that's really a rather superficial view. the issue here is about having a deep respect and tolerance for those views contradictory to yours. you would need to accept your limitations as an individual for free speech to really -work-.
you (in general), whoever you are, whatever you happen to think, are not omniscient. face it. you don't know all there is to know about absolutely anything. you thus cannot be "right". no one is right-- or all wrong, either. no one can really -judge-, regardless. if you, then, think you "know", you're wrong. you don't. if you don't know that, this basic awareness of limitations, you know even less. if you then use your false knowledge as fact-- as something outside opinion-- thus deceiving & controlling others-- you basically re-create the original sin as far as i'm concerned.
i'm not christian, so obviously, who cares, but it pisses me off something fierce, too. and yes, i just got all self-righteous about self-righteousness. sigh. at least i admit it?
repetition is a major culprit. for some reason, the concept of "let's say it again" holds this mass appeal, because, well, no one gets it the first time, and there are always new people, right, who haven't heard it before. we must do it for them. it's educational. that's why we try-- it's because we care. yes.
the problem is also just that i have this erroneous instinct to say, "well, people can tell -me- this, but i can't tell -them-". you can tell me i'm being stupid and lazy-thinking anytime. anytime. i will listen, i will try to understand, to see what i'm missing. i may not change my mind, but i would not get offended. i get this sneaking suspicion that i can't go around telling people they're talking crap. god, how that annoys me. and it's not even crap because it has no inherent value. it's crap because we've all heard it before, we all know it, there are better ways to say it again, and it's so purely self-indulgent and masturbatory as to discomfit even -me-, who is the mistress of self-indulgent masturbatory rhetoric.
i'm not even referring to anything in specific-- but then, so -many- things are like that. talking meta, analyzing, thinking-- is such a double-edged sword. i may be shallow, i may be missing something by not thinking much (though, obviously -some-) about `queer as folk' and only humming in pleasure-- but at least that's what it is, and no one can contest it-- it's pleasure. try to quantify pleasure, and unless you've got more intelligence than most people are willing to show, you sound like a complete dork. this pretty much includes me, yes.
one of the things that bothers me the most (er... in fandom, i guess) is an unmitigated endorsement of others' fiction on a large scale-- the best-seller phenomenon. it just sort of pushes itself after awhile. when it becomes just like... "read it, it's good! so good! read it! i read it, you should read it too! it's so good!!" it just makes me ill. i will -not- read it (for the longest time-- this is what happened with hp, anyway-- even to this day there's a bad taste in my mouth about jkr's books because the whole bloody -world- pimped them), but then, i'm very curmudgeony as i said. i have rated fics before myself, but i think when you continuously pimp them instead of discussing them or saying anything except "it's good-- in this/this/this/this/and this way", then it just becomes mindless propaganda.
and well, out of all the things in the universe that people do, i hate two of them the most: propaganda (mind-control & dominance of any sort) & insensitivity (cruelty to animals, people, plants, anything). i mean, i've shipped h/d with a huge intensity-- that's why i was ever -in- the fandom-- but i love anti-h/d rhetoric, i can empathize with it. it must suck to have there be this machine of h/d, h/d everywhere. entirely natural, because there will -always- be popular things and less popular things, but that doesn't make it less horribly annoying. sigh.
and what the hell? copyrighting fanfics? oh yes, i suppose you can add "wankery" to the list of the things that annoy me most. that is pretty much the definition of wankery. oh yes, and the propaganda is wankery too. 'course, actually attacking particular -people- in any way is in itself wankery, so there's a lack of options as to how to express one's righteous rage, heh. i found this fic where it actually says 'copyrighted 10/31/02' at the top, and now i don't wanna read it. fuck that. that's the same sort of thing that turns into the persecution (oops, i mean prosecution) of fanfic writers when the person actually becomes a success (by some insane fluke of fate). 'course, i didn't really wanna read it in the first place, but i have this gig where i check out any recced h/d fic (i'm so thorough it hurts, it really does). but it's postwar, too. eh. hell with it.
*grins* eeeeee, i don't have to like it!! it is pretty sucky, although with potential. ha! yeay! i was right! i'm not that biased. no need to read it, even for fairness sake. heh....
okay, fine, i read even more of it and now i'm liking it against my will, even if it -does- have mean!harry which is just insane-- and somewhat offensive, because a harry who doesn't know what love is is just not harry to me, and jaded-slut!draco which makes me sick just 'cause it's so overdone and it was a one-trick pony to start with. although this proves that even now, burnt out as i am, i'd still forgive a whole lot of iffy writing for some desperate!harry and slowly-melting!draco. damn me, damn me to hell. though at least it's a sexy hell. damn frottage, gets me every time. ok, so the fic is rather inventive and interesting, if you ignore the extreme amounts of exposition, awkward wording, semi-offensive characterization of harry, mostly-ooc-draco and an almost complete lack of actual interaction-- as in, dialogue and not summation, frustrating as all hell-- to back up the h/d. heh. the ideas, seriously, are more fresh than most of the stuff out there. i'm reading an h/d for the plot. this has never happened before. oh god. first time for everything? like, wow. and mind you, i -hate- evil!dumbledore, i really do. no, really. but it makes sense anyway, doesn't it.
this makes me wonder if plot-heavy chaptered fics are counter-productive to an entirely believable romance between harry & draco (or maybe believable romance in general?). or maybe it needs to be -really- long, then. plot that doesn't revolve around their relationship, that is. maybe you can have that in a sequel... or something, but it seems like without a lot of attention paid to it, the relationship becomes a leap-of-faith sort of phenomenon, which bothers me. i mean, this fic goes from apathetic!draco who merely tolerates harry's advances to slightly-softening!draco who grows to like them sometimes, to reciprocating!draco without actually -explaining- or giving them enough airtime to charm the reader into belief. lots of sex in 2 sentences or less, gratuitous and yet unsatisfying. while i do like the plot, the characters' motivations are merely -stated-, and never actually created. this is poor writing, no matter who does it. wah. that one crit i posted to the veela list must've really sent me on the long-term warpath, heh.
~~
it just occurred to me yesterday, in one of those flashes of pointless insight that mean nothing to anyone but me, that i find almost nothing as hateful as people proclaiming opinions as if they were fact.
because no matter what you're saying, if you're that certain, you're too certain. you're blinded and in effect blind. you're lying to yourself and to your audience at the same time under the pretense of truth. rhetoric should be spoken within the confines of rhetoric-- in the style & format of an argument. rhetoric disguised as simple statement of accepted precepts insults the listener's intelligence and your own as the speaker.
this is probably the root of my huge bias towards "show-don't-tell" storytelling. as a storyteller, you're in the business of speaking the truth outfitted in lies. this is a delicate, subtle procedure, easy to mess up. all stories both are and aren't true, and the writer needs to be sensitive to the many gradations within that concept to be successful at really capturing the minds, hearts & imaginations of the audience.
admittedly, i tend to overcompensate and over-qualify my statements and end up making my actual stand too implied, even incomprehensible. i do actually have an ego, of course, and actually am often convinced i'm right about all manner of things, but i consider it in such poor taste to be bombastic as to be deeply offensive a lot of times.
i admire outrageousness, out-spokenness, brashness, actually. speaking uncensored isn't the same as being an ego-maniacal, closed-minded, self-righteous asshole, on the other hand. being passionate and honest doesn't have to mean being an exclusionary and rabid propaganda machine. you can feel strongly, basically, without forcing it on others. that force is, to me, a basic human right being threatened. the right to think for yourself, feel for yourself.
as soon as someone approaches disturbing that circle of clarity, they become one of "them". the opressors. i'm serious about this.
you think it's stupid to apply this to not using "show-don't-tell" in fiction? maybe so. but the principle remains. voltaire said something like, "i may not agree with a word you said, but i will defend your right to say it to the death."
free speech isn't just a lack of censorship. that's really a rather superficial view. the issue here is about having a deep respect and tolerance for those views contradictory to yours. you would need to accept your limitations as an individual for free speech to really -work-.
you (in general), whoever you are, whatever you happen to think, are not omniscient. face it. you don't know all there is to know about absolutely anything. you thus cannot be "right". no one is right-- or all wrong, either. no one can really -judge-, regardless. if you, then, think you "know", you're wrong. you don't. if you don't know that, this basic awareness of limitations, you know even less. if you then use your false knowledge as fact-- as something outside opinion-- thus deceiving & controlling others-- you basically re-create the original sin as far as i'm concerned.
i'm not christian, so obviously, who cares, but it pisses me off something fierce, too. and yes, i just got all self-righteous about self-righteousness. sigh. at least i admit it?
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no subject
Date: 2003-06-10 05:17 pm (UTC)with h/d in particular, you need a lot of detail and set-up to make the pairing believable. that's what i was talking about. i realize it's suspicious coming from me, the romance-freak, but i -do- enjoy lots of fics with romance-on-the-side (i'm not a fanatic, just... v. exciteable. no, really. hee)
anything can be effective when written well. and i was talking about h/d in particular, which rather limits the scope, because h/d needs lots of care, you know. and to this day, i can't tell you -what- chaptered h/d fic is entirely believable (and plotted). that is, successful on all counts-- no gimmicks, no ooc!draco or harry, no sappy ending and descent into fluff and cliche, no over-angstying, no radical changes of personality, no sudden realizations of great t00by love (i'm okay with sudden lust, 'cause you know, that happens, though i dunno about harry, if he'd go for it) where before there was only resentment and annoyance.
often, i think there IS no fic that does succeed at really selling me h/d if i didn't -want- to be sold and if i wasn't such a horrid romantic who'd believe almost anything if it was prettily packaged.
sigh.
so no, plot doesn't -have- to get in the way of romance, but it CAN when you barely pay attention to the romance, or not as much attention as to the plot, especially when it's a high-maintenance, hard-to-achieve pairing like h/d. like raising orchids and trying to make pie and do cartwheels all at once. you can do it, but it's hard is all i'm saying, and that particular fic pretty much sucks donkey balls at it.
*smiles sweetly*
no subject
Date: 2003-06-10 06:04 pm (UTC)i mean, you're talking the main plot, right? or are you saying that the relationship merely becomes an aside, a desultory thing that is there for the sake of being there?
in which case i agree. of course, i believe this about all pairings and relationships in both original and fanfiction- although fanfiction often has to take extra steps simply because of the possible issues (like you detailed above).
actually, a really good fic was utterly ruined for me recently. it was SS/SB with some harry on the side and at the very end, with no preparation or warning there was sudden H/Hr that made absolutely no sense. none. it was there for the sake of being there, and i actually spent about 10 minutes on AIM bitching with
i hate gimmicks too. meh.
but you're right, when writing any relationship you have to back it up. i wasn't defending PoL or VM or really any fanfic, actually, when i was commenting. i was thinking about Lois MacMaster Bujold's Cordelia's Honor and how the book was one of the most well plotted, emotionally driven books i've read. with a great voice and romance that is subtle but -real-.
it was there, was a driving force in the story, but didn't supplant anything else. on the whole, a very well-balanced book. of course, it is original fiction but the main characters had a lot stacked against them...
it didn't make me think of harry and draco, but many of the emotions are related. so, uh, yes.
checking out that link i think i remember coming across the fic on ff.net, reading the beginning, and giving up. i have very little time nowadays and even less patience for what might be a waste of said time.
but of course, it's definitely hard. good things tend to be hard.
:smiles back:
no subject
Date: 2003-06-10 06:30 pm (UTC)in this fic, it's the other way around-- harry & draco happen because of the plot. kind of, more like... as a side-effect of the plot. as a corollary to the plot-- which is to do with the wizarding world vs muggle, evil!dumbledore, the defeat of voldemort and draco's role as traitor, insane original characters and so on. harry & draco's relationship is... um... important (as far as, it's the only major emotional development the characters are getting), but the fic's events haven't been -too- impacted by it yet. mostly, things happen anyway and the relationship reflects these events without too much interference. and the one-on-one interaction, the little conversations between them, the chemistry, the way they -are- together, gets referred to but not shown because most of the time is spent delineating what's happening in terms of larger events.
you need more skill, i think, to carry off subtle relationships & characterizations without taking time to work them out as pain-stakingly detailed. this is probably the way miniature is more difficult than a large-scale drawing of a single feature. plot has its demands, and so does characterization. in the end, i think characterization is more important, 'cause without it, plot means nothing (ie, who cares what happens to characters one couldn't care less about?)
and yah, in original fiction, you have all sorts of mixtures and combinations of plot and character development, with all manner of subtleties. but also, this fic advertises itself as a "harry/draco love story". so. i was talking about plotted romances in particular, too. gah. i don't know -what- i was talking about.
it's a good thing -you- do, even somewhat. *laughs*
and now i'm maybe interested in that book, btw~:)