HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: thiessen@emr1.emr.ca (Tracy Thiessen)
Subject: Re: Publishers of the wierd... info request
Organization: Energy, Mines, and Resources, Ottawa
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 1992 12:59:28 GMT

In article <1992Dec17.213146.1@hamp.hampshire.edu> bgardner@hamp.hampshire.edu writes:
>Hi :)
>I'm a writer who writes really wierd things... like as in my stuff has
>been compared to Beckett and Albee and Joyce (depending on what I'm writing)
>and I would like to start being published now.  Every one who has ever read
>my work has loved it (even those who hate me), but I didn't think I was ready
>until this point.  But now the problem is finding publishers... from looking
>over and over at the Writers Market I can not find any one who seems avant
>garde enough... is that a failing on the part of the listers, or are there
>truely no publishers out there that are willing to take a risk on something
>that has never been tried before.  What I'm looking to publish is a play
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Everything, but every thing, has been tried before.

In response to a similar query, a pretty astute fellow
in another news group pointed out that "if there's meat
there, (publishers) will be able to smell it".  Pick a
couple of publishing houses and fire out the manuscript.
If your stuff is really that good, it will find a home.

Tracy


Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: bgardner@hamp.hampshire.edu
Subject: Publishers of the wierd response to flames
Organization: Hampshire College
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 1992 14:28:43 GMT

Thanks for your responses... :)
I never claimed to be a good speler or gramar doer :)
The mis-spellings were a result of the combined facts that the comp. center
was closing, and that I basically can not spell.  Learning Disabinlity and
all... at home I have a spell check and everyone's happy.  
As for gramar,it sickens me.  Writers, good writers, get away with very poor 
gramar.  In order to have propper gramar you have to be half insane, because
the rules on gramar change twice a year.  One month you have to put coma's
in between and and something no matter what, then... six months later you
only have to do it if it's the final word in a string... then you only don't
have to do it in those instances.  Gramar is meant to help the reader no
when to put pauses... if a writer can do that without a coma then that, to me,
is a wonderful thing.  The period, and the coma can be used as as much of a
crutch as ALL CAPS or italics; and I have never come across a good use for
those two things in anything... short of plays.
Paragraphs... now that's a flame I agree with, and I apologize for my former
posting's lack of paragraphs...  I tend to write like I would speak... problem
is that I don't speak in a formal tone... and the only way I could think of to
write that post was in... a formal tone... I guess I could've come up with a
character that did speak in a essay form, and pretend he was posting to this
group... but I like to be myself.  So... thank you for your replys, flames
and otherwise and I hope to hear more of them :)  Take care guys...
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(in a cemetary)
-This shall be our deaths, I swear it.
"You should not swear death on those to close to it.
-I swore on nothing.
"You swore on your father.
-Oh, is that where I'm standing.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------0
						Brian
Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: Alan_Barclay@mindlink.bc.ca (Alan Barclay)
Subject: Re: support for the arts in the US
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Date: Sun, 13 Dec 1992 06:52:40 GMT

Hear!  Hear!  I agree with Crawford's comments on subsidized literary
industry in Canada.  It is necessary to reinforce Canadian identity in the
field.  I just regret that the Council (and other agencies) are so inbred.
This is the opposite side of the coin: while Canadan writer need some
reinforcement because we are one=tenth the population of the US, at the same
time because we are small, there are fewer authors to be on directive
orginizations.

I think literature serves a purpose--even if it doesn't sell well.  Its an
area where more experimentation is allowed (failures can be called
"artistic").  It's sort of the abstract mathematics department, while genre
fiction is applied engineering.  I happen to like and aspire to write good
genre fiction.




--
Alan


alan_barclay@mindlink.bc.ca

"When is a leg of lamb like a poet?"

Answer: "When it's browning."
From: curtis@cs.berkeley.edu (Curtis Yarvin)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: support for the arts in the US
Date: 15 Dec 1992 23:21:57 GMT
Organization: UC Berkeley CS Dept.
NNTP-Posting-Host: adder.cs.berkeley.edu

In article <1992Dec15.175442.423@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu> johnh@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu (John J Humpal) writes:
>In article <1gikq6INNra5@agate.berkeley.edu> curtis@cs.berkeley.edu (Curtis Yarvin) writes:
>>
>>When you spend X dollars on libraries for the poor, instead of giving
>>the poor X dollars, what you are saying is:
>>
>>"You do not have enough money to spend on things you need, but we do not
>>trust you to decide what things you need.  Therefore, instead of giving you
>>money, which you would not spend wisely, we will give you what we think
>>is best for you."
>>
>	My goodness.  Who ever said that libraries were only for the poor?

I must thank the sewer sprites of Baltimore that I somehow escaped from
that place.  There's lead in them thar steam leaks.  If I'd spent more
than a year at Johns Hopkins I believe that to this day the inside of
my skull would be plated with a fine film of solder.

And lead, they say, corrodes the mind.  The first sign is the infamous
"Homewood Shamble," but rot in the imagination cannot be far behind.
Fortunately I am a liberal type and well willing to compensate for the
handicaps of other; so I shall introduce you to the concept of a
"private library," which is exactly the same as yer vaunted public
library in all respects, save that it is not financed at gunpoint, but
in the same way as your local racquetball club, solder-scraping plan,
or slicemonger trade school.

If you can still get onto the roof of the NEB and have a good Aerobie
arm you should be able to hit one such.  Two if it ain't snowing.

>Do you believe that libraries are mere book repositories?  Perhaps you
>ought to visit one.  Speak to a reference librarian.  You'll find that the
>modern library does far more than simply lend books; it is an information
>resource.

Ooh.

c
From: ai118@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Rich Zidonis)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: LIBRARIES
Date: 17 Dec 1992 15:37:32 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio (USA)
Reply-To: ai118@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Rich Zidonis)
NNTP-Posting-Host: slc10.ins.cwru.edu


>>  online, ASCII-format collections available for browsing/ftp/etc. over the Internet?

telnet library.cpl.org     The Cleveland Public Library  (Clevenet)
-- 
RAZ     ai118@cleveland.freenet.edu
Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: ecaxron@ariel.lerc.nasa.gov (Ron Graham)
Subject: Re: Engineers must communicate better.
Followup-To: misc.writing
Summary: Here's a place to start
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    
Organization: NASA Lewis Research Center
Date: 11 Dec 1992 15:18 EST  

In article <10DEC199214271963@csa3.lbl.gov>, jtchew@csa3.lbl.gov 
     (Ad absurdum per aspera) writes...

>You can also learn a thing or two from the newsgroup misc.writing.

No you can't, either.

There is no newsgroup in all off Usenet in which more indignant eighth-
grade English teachers can be found.  I have asked questions in misc.writing
several times - honest questions, for which I wanted an honest answer, and
I have never failed to be flamed.  It's a club, not a useful tool.

And to think I helped campaign for it.  I oughta be shot :-).

I might also add that the Society for Professional Communication, although
it claims to deal in such areas, will not issue more than token assistance
to non-members.  You have to pay the toll first.

RG

Who became an engineer thinking "free-body diagrams" might prove interesting.
Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: ds@tejas.watson.ibm.com (Dinkar Sitaram)
Subject: Re: support for the arts in the US
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 92 23:29:55 GMT
Reply-To: ds@tejas.watson.ibm.com (Dinkar Sitaram)
Organization: IBM TJ Watson Research

In article <1gikq6INNra5@agate.berkeley.edu>, curtis@cs.berkeley.edu
(Curtis Yarvin) writes:
|> 
|> When you spend X dollars on libraries for the poor, instead of giving
|> the poor X dollars, what you are saying is:
|> 
Sorry to waste bandwidth, but are libraries used only by the poor?  I
don't consider myself poor, but I go to the library all the time.

By the way, both private and public libraries exist in India, with 
the private libraries concentrating on magazines and best-selling
literature, and public libraries concentrating on other material.

Dinkar

Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: jim@sage.cc.purdue.edu (Jim Myers)
Subject: Scripts
Organization: Purdue University
Date: Tue, 15 Dec 1992 18:00:06 GMT

	I looking from any internet or FTP sites that hold screenplays.  All
I've gotten so far is Star Wars screenplays and Monty Python.  There has to be
other--better sites out there.  Please e-mail any responses to:

						jim@sage.cc.purdue.edu

			Thanks for any help.



Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: Alan_Barclay@mindlink.bc.ca (Alan Barclay)
Subject: Re: Publishers of the wierd dont no no grammer
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Date: Sat, 19 Dec 1992 04:57:12 GMT

Flame!  Flame! Flame!

If you think grammar is a series of proscriptive rules you're wrong.  Grammar
ranges from core rules that are basic to the communication of sense, to rules
of style--like the placement of some commas and dashes.  In final analysis,
grammar is a tool the writter uses to communicate.  The more you know about
your tools, the better craftsman you are.  Of course, it depends on what sort
of product you intend to produce.  A painter who knows nothing about color
blending or brush strokes may produce a painting he likes by throwing
paint-dipped tennis balls at a canvass.

Of course, after fifty years, the artist who is remembered is the one who
demonstrated skill with his medium, as well as an exploration of its limits.
--
Alan


alan_barclay@mindlink.bc.ca

"When is a leg of lamb like a poet?"

Answer: "When it's browning."

Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: guay@fraser.sfu.ca (Tim Guay)
Subject: Re: support for the arts in the US
Organization: Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
Date: Sun, 13 Dec 1992 15:02:06 GMT

In article <18426@mindlink.bc.ca> Alan_Barclay@mindlink.bc.ca (Alan Barclay) writes:
>RE: Support for the arts is control
>If Canada's literary funding is guilty of anything, it's encouraging
>"Frontier Stories", "immigrant stories" and other "cultural" literature and
>ignoring genre work.  Apparently they don't believe genre literature can
>express any Canadian Character.

That's my GREAT complaint with the Canada Council and the rest of my country's
literary establishment! SF is treated as a secound-class literary citizen.
They seem to think that literary SF is an oxymoron! 


Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: Crawford_Kilian@mindlink.bc.ca (Crawford Kilian)
Subject: Work in Progress
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 05:31:44 GMT

Redmagic is slogging along...finished chapter 4 tonight, for a total of
15,000 words (thank God for word-counters--they give you such quick,
uncritical progress reports!).

A couple of interesting developments. Since my hero is a supermagician, and
the opposition are smart enough to realize it, he's not under any kind of
physical threat; like the 500-pound gorilla, he can sleep anywhere he likes.
But at the moment he and his opponents are ignorant of one another. They
don't speak the same language, they don't know anything about one another's
culture or values. The bad guys know Calindor is major league and want him on
their side. He knows they're nasty customers but can't resist nosing around
to learn their magic. And the bad guys have completely missed the real source
of the magic "earthquake"--Deir. They assume that a dude who can run a boat
by magic must be capable of throwing his weight around in other ways too.

So this will lead to intriguing mistakes and some eventual consciousness
raising on the part of the Exteca (bad guys). And my hero can't just wave his
magic twanger to solve his problems; all he knows so far is that the Exteca
are an enigma and probably a big problem.

By the way, I ran across a fantasy called Red Magic the other day...part of
some sharecropping multiple-author fantasy series, I think. It could
conceivably pose title problems, but you can't copyright titles (though
Norman Mailer would probably send you exciting correspondence if you call
your next novel The Naked and the Dead). In any case, this book won't be out
until 1994, by which time "Red Magic" will be long forgotten.


--
Crawford Kilian   Communications Department   Capilano College
North Vancouver BC Canada V7J 3H5
Usenet: Crawford_Kilian@mindlink.bc.ca
Internet: ckilian@first.etc.bc.ca

Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: rmr@sgi.com (Robert M. Reimann)
Subject: Re: support for the arts in the US
Organization: Technical Publications, Silicon Graphics, Inc.
Date: Sat, 12 Dec 92 06:21:22 GMT

curtis@cs.berkeley.edu (Curtis Yarvin) writes:
> bjones@denitqm.uswest.com (Brent Jones) writes:

>>Also, I'll take "marginalised" art over institutional art any day. :-)
>
>Same here.  A while ago I asked, rhetorically, "How many good writers
>did the Soviet Union produce?"  A few minutes later, I realized.
>Pasternak... Rybakov... Solzhenitsyn...  

I wasn't going to say anything...  :^)

>Maybe the best way to create great art _is_ to institutionalize it. :-)

Humor aside, the obvious fault in reasoning here 
is to equate financial support with "institutionalization",
especially that of the character found in the late USSR.
Are you therefore also against public funding of 
libraries, because of the power librarians are given
over selection of titles?


			Robert.
From: curtis@cs.berkeley.edu (Curtis Yarvin)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: support for the arts in the US
Date: 12 Dec 1992 06:17:32 GMT
Organization: UC Berkeley CS Dept.
NNTP-Posting-Host: cobra.cs.berkeley.edu

In article <1992Dec10.005941.20826@bcrka451.bnr.ca> nadeau@bnr.ca (Rheal Nadeau) writes:
>In article <1g5p0cINNjf4@agate.berkeley.edu> curtis@cs.berkeley.edu (Curtis Yarvin) writes:
>>
>>Right.  It may surprise you, but some of us happen to share that
>>philosophy.  More succinctly stated:  "Nothing is worth more than
>>what someone is willing to pay for it."
>
>If a thing is worth what someone is willing to pay, why must the
>"someone" exclude governments?
>
>The ruling class in our democracies is (in theory, anyway) the people,
>represented by their elected governments.

Popularity does not, in my book anyway, make morality.

If fifty-one percent of the population of Canada decided that
anyone with a post-consonant 'h' in their name should be sent
to a concentration camp, would you go?
 
(This may seem silly and far-fetched, but an equivalent body of
good ol' Americans appears to have decided the same in my case.
Fortunately, they will have to catch me first.)

If your ruling majority thinks a piece of art is worth buying,
let them buy it.  Must they force everyone else to buy it, too?

c
paranoia, paranoia, lah-da-da-dee-da
From: mapd1@syma.sussex.ac.uk (Nigel Ling)
Subject: Re: support for the arts in the US
Organization: University of Sussex
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 13:10:15 GMT

In article <1gbvpuINNq0e@agate.berkeley.edu> curtis@cs.berkeley.edu (Curtis Yarvin) writes:
>In article <1992Dec10.141204.13258@syma.sussex.ac.uk> mapd1@syma.sussex.ac.uk (Nigel Ling) writes:
>>
>>Well, excuse me for saying so, but this is *not* what literature is.
>>Literature is art, not necessarily what the majority prefer to read.
>
>Oh?  And who are you to decide which is which?

Well, I'll tell you I am: I am someone who reads literature, who happens
to think it has great value, and who is entitled to express an opinion
just as you are.

>
>But even were it possible to define what is literature and what
>is crap, fund the former and burn the latter, we could not
>agree.  We have a fundamental moral conflict, which cannot be
>resolved by argument.

There cannot be a precise definition but there is no doubt in my
mind that there is writing which is literature and there is writing
which is not. However, I said nothing about burning anything. There
is nothing `wrong' with popular writing; but there is something
wrong when literary work cannot get published because it doesn't
sell as well as pulp.

>
>I believe that art is only valuable insofar as it makes people
>happy.(*)

Maybe that's a fair comment. But not everybody is made happy by
the same things. And something is not art just because it makes
one happy.

Nigel

Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: Alan_Barclay@mindlink.bc.ca (Alan Barclay)
Subject: Re: support for the arts in the US
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Date: Sun, 13 Dec 1992 07:03:52 GMT

RE: Support for the arts is control

Canada seems to have a reasonable system of seperating government from the
arts they fund.  I'm not sure about Canada Council, but the Alberta
Foundation for Literary Arts was a body of established authors which
distributed government funds.  The sitting boardmembers elected the next
year's members and each board set their own criteria for grant awards.
Boardmembers recieved no money for their part in all this.  (Though some
argued their favorite psychophants did).

If Canada's literary funding is guilty of anything, it's encouraging
"Frontier Stories", "immigrant stories" and other "cultural" literature and
ignoring genre work.  Apparently they don't believe genre literature can
express any Canadian Character.
--
Alan


alan_barclay@mindlink.bc.ca

"When is a leg of lamb like a poet?"

Answer: "When it's browning."
From: wasallee@rwasic24.aud.alcatel.com (}Bill Sallee)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: Looking for list of PALIDROMES...
Date: 11 Dec 1992 16:20:36 -0600
Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu

I wrote:

	A Toyota! Race fast, safe car. A Toyota
From: curtis@cs.berkeley.edu (Curtis Yarvin)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: support for the arts in the US
Date: 12 Dec 1992 06:03:08 GMT
Organization: UC Berkeley CS Dept.
NNTP-Posting-Host: cobra.cs.berkeley.edu

In article <tecc2j4@zola.esd.sgi.com> rmr@sgi.com (Robert M. Reimann) writes:

>And as I've already said, plenty of other countries
>figured this [subsidizing art] out years ago.

I hate to burn the butane on this newsgroup; but you say this as
though the Europeans had just recently received a strip
telegram from Heaven, been drenched by some divine ejaculation
of wisdom and instantly converted their squalid pigsty in the
north corner of nowhere to Utopia Forever, maybe not quite
up to Paradise but certainly near the elevator.

Yes, European governments have been subsidizing art for years.
In fact, European governments have been subsidizing art since
before I was born; and, for that matter, since before you were
born.  Or your grandfather; or his.  

Perhaps it started in the Renaissance; but I doubt it.  When
they finally dig up Stonehenge I'll give you five to three they
find a grant number scratched into the foundations.
"Contributors include the Thag Fund, makers of fine trepanning
equipment since the reign of Chief Grog."

And when you're studying history, it's pretty easy to fall in
love with old art.  Because for most of time it's the only
history there was.  It's hard to look at a Michelangelo and say
old Florence was anything but the utter navel of civilization
circa 1400; it's hard to look at a society that spent all its
time killing animals and eating them as anything but a bunch of
squalid barbarians.  One starts to think, bingo, culture equals
civilization.  And such an idea being culture in itself, it
makes its way into the seventh-grade social-studies books; and
once planted there it is hard to uproot.

I used to believe it, myself.

But it's bullshit.  It's simple, arrant bullshit; and it's
dangerous bullshit, because it's so easy to believe.

The measure of a civilization is not the art it produces.  The
measure of a civilization is the happiness of its citizens.
The Sistine Chapel sure is nice to look at; but is it nice to
think about?  When you realize how many innocent people lived
and died in utter squalid poverty, conditions that would make a
Rio favela look like Scarsdale, to finance that kind of absurd
waste?  The men who paid Michelangelo were thieves - thieves on
a grand scale, thieves with pretensions, thieves with
organizations, even thieves with taste; but thieves all the
same.  They didn't grow the grain; and they didn't ship it.
They stole it.

If the Sistine ceiling were painted in human blood, would you
still pay a thousand lira to see it?

So - yes.  You're quite right. European governments have been
supporting art for millennia.  This is no new discovery.
They've toned down their game; but they still play by the same
rules, and what's foul in a bucket is foul in a drop.

c
Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: westphal@iscnvx.lmsc.lockheed.com (Dorothy Westphal)
Subject: Re: Stream of consciousness
Organization: Lockheed Missiles and Space Co.
Distribution: usa
Date: Tue, 15 Dec 92 20:07:41 GMT

In article <1992Dec13.212651.22944@lclark.edu> larryw@sun.lclark.edu (Larry Westdahl) writes:
>
>I already have my own ideas on this, but I wanted to know what others thought
>about this technique.  Do you think that stream of consciousness can be 
>a valuable tool in a story, or do you think that the form, because it is
>so rarely used, may only a distraction?  Joyce and Faulkner were able to 
>pull it off with great success, but as a writing technique it never 
>picked much steam.  Like the second person narrative, S.O.C. must
>be used for some specific effect, and not just so the writer can be 
>different from everone else, and often when I see someone use S.O.C., it
>seems a little affected.  Also, do you think that the short story form might
>be a little too restricting for the deployment of a stream of consciousness
>passage?  Within the context of a novel there is enough room to show off, and
>the reader can forgive the the writer these moments.  In a short story, is 
>there enough room?  I would say yes, if the passage was appropriate, and just
>about perfect.  I would appreciate hearing what others think on this matter.

Like many other devices, it should not be tossed in willy-nilly,
but used for a purpose. One example you might see in a short story
would be a peek at the rapidly degenerating mind of an unstable 
character as his attitude toward an individual or thing changes to
increasingly bizarre and unrealistic interpretations.
This may be more tricky if you try to "show" each nuance of change
by his actions and speech alone.


-- 
Dorothy Westphal, Sunnyvale, Calif. % Just when things are going your way...%
westphal@iscnvx.lmsc.lockheed.com   %               they get even better!   %
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: support for the arts in the US
From: scasterg@waltham.columbus.oh.us
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 92 03:40:59 -0500
X-Mailer: rnMac Buggy, I mean Beta, Test Version

Just a clarification on my last post, which was a reply to one by 
Crawford
Kilian. I am using the generic "you" in the post. I was not intending
to rant at Mr. Kilian in specific. I like to spread it around. No 
offense
Intended.

Stuart Castergine
scasterg@waltham.columbus.oh.us
Newsgroups: misc.writing