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Post by En on Dec 5, 2004 14:40:38 GMT -5
Well, if you get a weird urge to visit the States, I know a bookshop where you can hang out
On writing - word of advice from Bill Kittredge, one of my favourite authors: don't wait until you have the ability. Just write. Throw it out. Then write it again. Repeat until it comes out the way you want. (It sounds like a lot of work - but it works.)
Ahhh... *cough* search or browse - or check the address. I'm working on a prettier webpage, but this is what I've got at the mo.
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Post by hermoine on Dec 5, 2004 14:50:29 GMT -5
I'd be very glad to.
I know. That's why I've started writing on various websites; there are competitions which allow me to write, although it's fanfiction. One thing I have noticed is that no matter how many times I read my submissions, I always manage to get technical errors.
I knew it had something to do with that kind of title! I actually tried searching that too. I might be able to try and help you with something about the website during the summer, if you want me to, that is. I'm planning on learning html, and all that stuff. I can't wait for summer to come! It's going to be a heck of a busy one!
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Post by En on Dec 5, 2004 15:47:45 GMT -5
If you want to work on the 'site, I'd love to have your help, but I also think you have a zillion other things to do, so only if you have time I will be making a page where people can write reviews of books - maybe you could do some reviews - it depends on how many pages I get written, and whether I can remember how to do all the stuff I want to do
Oh, I have technical errors all the time, too - not because I'm not a good writer - it's just that I tend to use the language as I hear it, and that's not always Correct. You know what I mean? But if you need someone to read through a piece for you and check for mistakes - you could post it at F&B, or you could email it to me, if you don't mind waiting forever for me to have time to read it
I just think that grammar is totally overrated. Of course it's important to be able to write well enough to be understood; but sometimes, you have to break the rules to be understood. Like if you're writing a story in which the narrator is from a place with a different dialect - like the deep South in the USA or something - then it would be stupid to write the story with the Queen's grammar, don't you think?
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Post by hermoine on Dec 6, 2004 9:21:55 GMT -5
I love the idea about the reviews! Maybe you could do a bit of expansion, if that's the right word, for the various genre. Oh, the children's section would be so cute! I can imagine it all colourful, and fancy shimmering lights!
Thanks for the offer! I had started writing 2 novels, and always stopped. In one of them I got writer's block, and I couldn't move. The other was an adult type, and I decided that it would be better to write it when I'm of an older age. When I know more what life has to offer, and the barriers a person must face. It is difficult to write for a drunk when I don't even want to touch alcohol with my mouth(which is good I guess).
Yeah I agree with you on that. I actually read a short story once where the grammar was terrible. But the narrator was a woman who didn't know how to write or speak English properly. So you'd get sentences like "They all like that here." In the case of the fanfiction I was writing, Snape has got impeccably grammar capabilities, Dumbledore too, and Peeves required an infinite amount of humour and rhyming.
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Post by KoNeko on Dec 6, 2004 19:59:29 GMT -5
Thing to remember about Roald Dahl: he wrote stories for Playboy before his kids' books got big. If you get a chance, do read Kiss, Kiss, which is a collection of his stories for adults (and they are definitely... weird. Macabre. Kind of Harold and Maude-ish. In a good way though).
Stephen Hawking rocks my socks. Though, actually, the book of his that I recommend most is The Universe in a Nutshell, which would make a great textbook for Physics for Non-Physics-Students. And speaking of the Simpsons, remember when Hawking was on the show? *laughs* How could I forget? But yeah, I'll check out The Universe in a Nutshell, if that's going to help me with me (really slow) learning of physics and stuff. I thought I could get away with not knowing about quantum particles and then it sprung up on me in writing my philosophy thesis... So thanks for the tip. I've actually also heard of Kiss kiss before, but never read it, so I'll track that one down too. I didn't know that he used to write for Playboy either, but it does explain quite a bit...
Let me know how the Tom Wharton book comes along. I've heard good things about it.
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Post by hermoine on Dec 13, 2004 7:43:59 GMT -5
I have finished The Wee Free Men; it was a really great read but in something like 3 chapters before last it started getting confusing. Like when "dreams in dreams in dreams" parts in the story start appearing in the book.
But now I'm going for a completely different thing. All this dreaming stuff stirred a couple of lines from Shakespeare when Romeo and Mercutio start talking about dreaming and then follows the speech about Queen Mab.
"I dreamt a dream tonight Well so did I! Well what was yours? That dreamers often lie"
I'm not exactly sure if I got all the words there right, but I love Mercutio! ;D Anyway, after turning the house completely upside down, looking frantically for Twelfth Night, I managed to find it, and with it The Merchant of Venice. I'm reading the latter. Shakespeare rocks!
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Post by KoNeko on Dec 13, 2004 20:28:26 GMT -5
*grins* Merchant of Venice is one of my favourite Shakespeare plays, along with MacBeth. I also had a thing for Hamlet once, but then my school made us study it and they totally ruined it for me.
But yeah, Mercutio rocks. He is so fast talking and witty... kind of how his name implies. Like, Mercutio, mercury, mercurial? (Sorry, suppressed English classes ) So he's pretty awesome. Romeo and Juliet on the other hand just annoy the hell out of me as people.
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Post by hermoine on Dec 14, 2004 9:11:12 GMT -5
Personally I prefer Macbeth although I have never read it. I read it as a sort of summary, but it was in prose. It was great nevertheless.
We're doing Romeo & Juliet in class. Last year's teacher made me realise that I had a completely bad opinion of Shakespeare's writing. This year, he's terrible! Especially when someone like Lady Capulet starts talking! He puts this high unnatural feminine tone and starts speaking in a mid-scream. He's exasparating and destroys the joy of Shakespeare and literature.
I prefer Juliet to Romeo though. The guy is like an ever-turning pointer, and he's always moaning about something or other. We just did it during my English lesson today in fact. We're starting Act 4, when Juliet goes to Friar Lawrence's cell to ask for the potion and finds Paris there. Romeo and Juliet keep reminding me of the movie Troy. You know where you've got Helen and Paris. Although come to think of it, those two were worse.
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Post by KoNeko on Dec 14, 2004 20:27:50 GMT -5
Haha, good point. See, my gripes about Romeo are the same as yours. I never really liked Romeo's character because he's so... fickle. Like, at first he's all mopey about Rosaline (or whatever her name is) and then he's like, "now I obsessively have the hots for Juliet" kind of thing. Like, he throws himself into things way too fast without thinking, and it got him killed in the end.
Now Friar Lawrence, Mercutio and Tybalt... that's interesting. ;D
If yo've ever seen the Roman Polanski version of MacBeth it will totally trip you out. Especially that opening scene with the three (naked!?) witches.
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Post by hermoine on Dec 15, 2004 10:28:14 GMT -5
Friar Lawrence annoys me a bit at times. Like the speech about the herbs.
Nope. The only I have ever read from Macbeth is the sing along in a clip from the extra on the POA DVD. Naked witches? Honestly, what's the sense in that. But thanks for telling me. I think it would probably decrease my liking for those three.
I only got to see one of Shakespeare's plays on video though. That was Franco Zefirelli's version of Romeo & Juliet. We saw it last year since we're doing it at school and all. I liked it, though since I had never read it all(I think we were still doing the first few scenes from act I) at one point Romeo says "She speaks!" and I'm like "Duh!" Have you seen that version of the play?
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Post by KoNeko on Dec 16, 2004 0:21:28 GMT -5
Zeferelli! I remember that version! They showed us that when I was at school! Haha, you should really get your teacher to show you the Baz Luhrmann version of Romeo+Juliet. That one was better, also because I didn't really have a penchant for those rainbow stockings they had.
Yeah, I didn't like Friar Lawrence the first few times I read R&J at school but I found him more likeable as a character when I was older. Like, he was a father figure to Romes, he sometimes didn't follow the rules that he was supposed to and as a kid I didn't really get that because he was you know, a priest guy and everything. But I seemed to understand it more when I was older, so yeah. I don't know. But I know where you're coming from with that whole bit about the herbs.
The Polanski version of MacBeth is like, sort of tripped out because at the time (or right before it or something) Roman Polanski's wife was murdered or something by a cult, so he was probably wigging out a bit when he did that scene. But it's a lot darker than some of the other versions of MacBeth I've seen, probably because theatre versions don't scrub up as well with the naked wenches and baby corpses and stuff. But yeah, it's pretty cool if you can get around it.
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Post by hermoine on Dec 16, 2004 5:15:52 GMT -5
Guess that wouldn't be possible. We're already way behind in the syllabus. We have a month to finish Act 4, and then another month before the start of the Easter holidays to finish the whole play. Then I won't have school anymore. Something tells me I'll end up studying it on my own, which personally I think is better, seeing how my teacher can't even describe the effects of an alliteration.
Well yeah, he is rather like that, especially when Romeo's around because he had just been banished. I really hate the way old Capulet starts calling Juliet names and such when she disagrees to marry. He was much better at the beginning of the play, when he had the mask.
Ouch! That's harsh!
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Isbister15
Gryffindor Alumni
Mmmm...chocolate
Posts: 5,082
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Post by Isbister15 on Dec 18, 2004 20:39:54 GMT -5
I just finished reading Magical Thinking by Augusten Burroughs. Gotta say that I was somewhat disappointed with it. It just didn't have the same spirit as the other stuff I've read from him. I'm still hoping the library gets his book Dry back in so I can finally read that. I'm currently reading Laurie Notaro's The Idiot Girls' Action Adventure Club. Don't really like it at all. I didn't like her other book much so I'm not too surprised. I finally borrowed Dave Eggers' You Shall Know Our Velocity and I read the first bit. Seems good but there are two other books I want to finish before I actually get to that one.
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Post by hermoine on Dec 23, 2004 5:03:54 GMT -5
I have finished reading, The Merchant of Venice. I'm really really happy I managed to understand it all on my own.
Now I've started reading, Sabriel!!
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Post by hermoine on Dec 26, 2004 11:37:02 GMT -5
Hmm...I've got myself in a bit of a problem. See I have a gift voucher from Amazon.com, and I wanted to buy Abhorsen although I'm still trying to figure out how it can be bought when the publication date was said to be January 5th!! I noticed that there's a difference in the pages between the English and American version. Do you guys know why? I mean how much difference in the language can there be?
Help!
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