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564. webfeet - 4/27/2006 4:50:07 AM Gabriel Garcia Marquez wrote "Love in the Time of Cholera," which has set a kind of superhuman standard for modern literature. I think what I meant was adding something more complex emotionally, a pinch of pathos along with that saffron.
There was something so sensual and intense about all those flavors--the earthiness of the mushrooms "the creamy field" of arborio rice, that it was something of a letdown to get to the 'silhouette' of zucchini eyes and then rice 'pummeling' the taste buds. It just didn't work.
I get the feeling that anything less than adulation on this thread is discouraged. It's either shove my tongue down your throat--or be ignored. I think it's kind of healthy to give real feedback especially when you have put so much care into it.
And Scallops Istanbul? I mean, I'm dying. I have to know.
565. Macnas - 4/27/2006 8:44:12 AM Webfeet
I know what you mean, about feedback and such, and I agree to an extent.
But there again, it's a thread for a bit of fun, not much else. If I was to seriously review all that was written here, and if other did the same, I'd doubt it'd make any of us better writers, as we're only story telling for the amusement of ourselves and other Mote-o-naughts.
In Nuplanet's case, I might make an exception, as it's very very good. So good, that he might be better off with some critique. He might be an even better writer if he's given some sound advice.
But you're the only one here (sorry now lads, tis the truth no less) who would be able to do that. I read his story and thought it just good, didn’t see anywhere that needed changing or tightening up or whatever.
I've had feedback from alistair, from time to time, but for the most part have ignored it and have never done a re-write.
Because I couldn't be bothered. Nuplanets story is so good, maybe he should be.
566. alistairconnor - 4/27/2006 10:45:06 AM The dialogues are good. In the rest, I like the density of the sentences, the imagery, and sometimes the rythm. The bits that would need redrafting, for me, is where the rhythm doesn't work, an occasional clumsiness or laziness with word order. 567. webfeet - 4/27/2006 3:19:06 PM You're certainly right, Macnas. Much of it is for fun and it's not a fiction writing workshop. Part of the fun is the spontaneity of it; I love it when Jenerator starts to run around with a lampshade on her head and you all follow, outdoing each other as you created that crazy story about a hooker, a cat, and a mexican bandit with a ph.d.
Yet I can't help thinking, as you, that Nuplanet genuinely wants to aspire farther, and that just stroking his ego and shouting bravo! would be a disservice to him.
When I read his story, I really lit up and stood around it like a dressmaker, tucking pins and making mental adjustments. Because I have put myself in this zone, it is a reflex. But I promise not to stick too many needles into anyone's flesh.
568. webfeet - 4/27/2006 6:16:42 PM So as I was saying, I find Maurice Sendak very sexy. I didn't realize it. Not really, not at first. Oh and it's not because --I know what you're thinking--that dirty title "Where the Wild Things Are" would make such a great porno movie put to music, but because he is really such a curious genius, a trifle dark--all that holocaust sadness informing his work. I read in an interview that he is obsessed with "milk" and "cake". Funny, so am I!
I spend a lot of my time deconstructing Maurice Sendak, since his world has intermeshed so completely with ours--all his storybook characters--"Little Bear" and 'Chicken Soup with Rice'. I remember being slightly terrified of the latter when I was younger, disturbed when they actually showed "Chicken Soup with Rice" on television. I don't know why.
So "Brundibar" one of his more recent books, is a story about the holocaust in which the children are forced to get milk somehow or else they will be put to death-- by someone who looks a lot like Hitler. It was first a book, then an opera, and i think it's either the opera orthe musical that I'm taking my son to see in a few weeks.
I don't think we're ready for a holocaust talk yet. I'm slightly nervous.
569. Jenerator - 4/27/2006 8:59:02 PM webfeet,
I think critiquing is helpful and I appreciate it when it's done. I wish we could all be a bit more open to learning rather than being defensive and attacking.
Your suggestions to Nu are right on.
570. Jenerator - 4/27/2006 9:02:04 PM By the way, I am intrigued by your (and Sendak's) admitted fascination with milk and cake. 571. Snowowl - 4/28/2006 1:53:04 AM So as I was saying, I find Maurice Sendak very sexy. I didn't realize it. Not really, not at first. Oh and it's not because --I know what you're thinking--that dirty title "Where the Wild Things Are" would make such a great porno movie put to music, but because he is really such a curious genius, a trifle dark--all that holocaust sadness informing his work. I read in an interview that he is obsessed with "milk" and "cake". Funny, so am I!
My youngest daughter is doing a course at University in Sweden and she just wrong an essay on Where the Wild Things Are.
I wish I hadn't asked her to send a copy of her essay to me. I can never pick up and read the book with the same enjoyment again! I'm far too busy noticing all the things she discusses in her essay. 572. Snowowl - 4/28/2006 1:53:35 AM wrong = wrote 573. wonkers2 - 4/28/2006 2:46:52 AM All of my children loved Sendak. Especially "Where the Wild Things Are." They also loved Dr. Seuss's books. 574. webfeet - 4/28/2006 4:04:15 AM Jen--While I simply have an irrational sweet tooth, I think Sendak's reasons go much deeper. I think there is something so inherently comforting about milk and cake that their presence belies a world of unspeakable horrors. Of children torn from their families and the safety of their bedrooms. They turn up everywhere in his stories; at the end of 'Where the Wild Things Are' Max wakes up in his wolf suit and what is waiting for him at his bedside? Milk and cake. "Little Bear" has quite a lot of cake for a cub--at harvest parties, duck's birthday party, there are dancing gingerbread men who run away in the snow. The comforts of the home, in all its forms-- but most notably in the kitchen, figure prominently in all the stories.
In 'Brundibar' milk is no longer a third party player. The novel is obsessed with the act of purchasing milk. It's life or death now. The children need to buy their sick mother milk or she will die. I'm not sure if Hitler is the milkman or not in this story. I've only leafed through it in one of those distracted moments at the bookstore, but there is a picture of a baker selling a smorgasbord of cakes and tarts. At the end, the children rejoice; there is enough milk and cake for everyone and they somehow shame Hitler into leaving them alone. The world is free of evil.
Sendak collaborated with Tony Kushner on 'Brundibar.' Kushner, who wrote the screenplay for 'Munich', is best known for writing 'Angels in America' and 'Perestroika.' He is, in a word, extraordinary.
575. webfeet - 4/28/2006 4:05:46 AM Snowowl--you must cite examples from this essay! Please! 576. webfeet - 4/28/2006 4:10:51 AM wonkers--loved the wedding photo, btw. Really elegant, and you wore it with such aplomb!
As the one who reads to my children near what feels like my own witching hour--at the end of the day Seuss is a tangle of words to get over my tongue and i want to throw the book across the room after the first page. But I do recognize his gifts at teaching language. All those gobbledeygook mouthfuls of rhymes really hit home to my son who is now a reader and delights in the language play. 577. alistairconnor - 4/28/2006 9:07:06 AM But have a care. there's all that humanist, anti-consumerist, ecologist propaganda to plough through in Seuss. Some times, reading to my children, I found myself close to tears. What a subversive writer.
In Sendak, I never saw much of a message. Just the genius of his personal universe, immediately accessible, full of childlike wonder. But I'm probably missing stuff.
Milk in the batter! Milk in the batter! We bake cake and nothing's the matter!
My brother was in publishing at the time the Night Kitchen was published, apparently there was controversy over nudity, and the fact that the little boy had a penis, and pronounced the words "cock a doodle doo"...
Apparently Sendak had had a brush with cancer, and this symbolised his exuberant rebirth or something. 578. uzmakk - 4/28/2006 4:04:59 PM I sent Arky an email. 579. PelleNilsson - 4/28/2006 5:13:53 PM That's momentous. Nothing will be the same again. 580. uzmakk - 4/28/2006 5:15:49 PM Not for me it won't, I promise you that, Nilsson.(!) 581. alistairConnor - 4/28/2006 5:16:25 PM No, I think that's the opening line of the Novel. 582. uzmakk - 4/28/2006 5:17:11 PM Snobby, intellectual Swede, MF. 583. uzmakk - 4/28/2006 5:17:46 PM Novel in the form of interesting.
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