More Chapter 1 Tweaks and New Chapter announcement · 7:54pm Aug 7th, 2014
Hello FimFiction folks,
I once again tweaked the first chapter of My Little Poem. It is strange how the smallest bits of advice can help you gain a deeper understanding of your own work... at the risk of your own personal vision. I hope I managed to reach a happy medium with this current revision, but time will tell if it stands the test of time.
The issue was that, well, Pantrostic doesn't start off as a relatable character. He's been through soul-crushing stuff and is then thrown into a situation against his will. I have a narrative reason for Pantrostic to be such a passive and weak character at the start of the story, however. I just never gave enough of a reason for folks to hang around and discover that narrative, to discover the twists and turns Pantrostic's life leads and how he changes as a result.
This spurred the revision, although it was difficult. You see, starting off with a very passive character is very tricky, because everything happens TO them, rather than THEM exerting their own will and taking an active part in their own life. This means that the axiom of "avoid passive voice" and avoiding passivity is much harder in the beginning of the story, and it makes readers wonder why we are following someone who doesn't DO anything. It contributes to the MARY SUE warning flag and so on and so forth.
In short, you would need to be either a master writer, or very clever with your story construction, to start your story in the manner that I had attempted.
The recent revision does try to give people a couple more reasons to stick around through the passive beginning. It does try to "hook" them into continuing with the story and seeing where it goes. Will it succeed? Will it fail? I am not sure, but either way I will do what I can to learn from that experience.
This leads into another question: if a story is being difficult, like My Little Poem is, then why am I sticking with it? Why not put it on hiatus and effectively abandon it? It's a kind of story that, apparently, I didn't know how to write well. Why not perfect what comes naturally to me, rather than throw my head at something I apparently have a hard time wrapping my head around? Why waste years of effort on something so obtuse and full of stumbling blocks?
The answer is simple: because I learn from the experience of trying to write My Little Poem. No one starts out in writing with a perfect understanding of what works and what doesn't. My Little Poem was an idea that I had, and I want to see it through to the end. In the process, I learned about the importance of an audience, and I am slowly adopting a mindset where I think about how the audience will perceive what I write, and if what they perceive is what I intended with the piece from an artistic point of view. It sounds so simple, but the practice is much more hard to carry out. The above was just one more hurdle in the writing race to the finish of the story, which is STILL a ways away, even 45k words in.
And I relish that.
I love the challenge of trying to write something I may not be comfortable with. I want to see if I can take my crazy idea and express it in a way that other readers can understand it and engage with it. I want to create a dialogue between author and reader where artistic ideas and interpretations are expressed and compared. Will it be perfect? Of course not! But I'd rather make the attempt and stumble over the finish line than never make the attempt and forever leave that potential unexplored.
So, after 2 years of writing this story, 1 year after publishing the initial drafts, I am still writing this story. I am still putting one foot forward, even if that requires two steps backward and three steps forward to accomplish. I am still here, still writing and still moving forward. I hope I can give readers a reason to walk along the story with me.
On a related but separate note, I also published another chapter. Go check it out if you're interested.
Sincerely,
Mr. Album
Ehm, it's possible that ff glitches again, but I do not see new chapter.
2354049
Huh. It did come up a week or two ago, maybe that's why you didn't notice it? The new chapter is "An Intruder Exposed by Bickering", which was what I was referring to. Sorry if that confused ya :)
2354522
Of course I noticed and read that chapter. I just thought that since blog-post is much more recent - you are talking about new new chapter :)
I'm sorry for misunderstanding.
2356395
I suppose I should have clarified. Apologies again for the confusion.