HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: chuq@gallant.apple.com (Chuq Von Rospach)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: short story writing vs. novel writing
Date: 1 Sep 92 20:47:25 GMT
Organization: I is a writur

sasafw@dobo.unx.sas.com (Fred Welden) writes:
>In article <Btwt4r.IBK@unx.sas.com>, sascmc@pecos.unx.sas.com (Christopher Mark Conn) writes:
>|How important do you think it is to write short stories
>|(and I'm thinking primarily of writing SF) before you 
>|tackle a novel?  

What is your purpose in writing short fiction? To be a better writer? To
tell a story that doesn't warrant being a novel? To make a 'name' that'll
make it easier to sell your novel?

I use short work to practice various technical aspects of my writing and to
try to improve them. I can throw out or rewrite a shorter work without
feeling terribly guilty, and it's nice to know that something is going to
work (or not) before committing to 250 pages of the stuff. 

I also use short work to tell stories that don't deserve the time or energy
that a novel would require, yet are interesting enough to me that I don't
want to just toss them on the scrap heap. 

Both of these are good reasons (IMHO) for a novelist to dabble in shorter
lengths. A third reason is that shorter fiction (or, at least, good shorter
fiction) forces you to think and write more efficiently, which you can use
in your novel writing to help minimize that horrible mid-book flab that
seems to wander in when you're not looking.

If, on the other hand, you see short fiction as a way of greasing the skids
towards selling books, you're a lot better off putting that time into
writing better books. I haven't seen much evidence that publishing a few
short works helps you in the market much, unless (1) you publish a LOT 
of stuff that also happens to (2) win some non-trivial awards. I just don't
see that it does much good to expect short fiction to slingshot you out of
the slush. Better novels do.

>Your biggest payoff from writing short stories before, and while, you
>work on your novel is the feeling that you are getting somewhere with
>your writing.  A novel takes a long time, and probably won't be accepted
>for publication (face it, the odds are heavily against you, or any
>first-time novelist).  I know it's a good feeling when you're bogged
>down in mid-novel to be able to show your friends and loved ones a new
>short piece you "whipped off."

And I can't agree with Fred strongly enough on this.


-- 
Chuq "IMHO" Von Rospach, ESD Support & Training (DAL/AUX) =+= Member, SFWA
  chuq@apple.com | GEnie: MAC.BIGOT | ALink:CHUQ =+= Editor, OtherRealms
	A real SF writur with stories in ALTERNATE KENNEDYS and THE 
	  FURTHER ADVENTURES OF BATMAN, in better bookstores now!
Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: gburton@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Garland O Burton)
Subject: Re: Any Screenwriters out there?
Organization: The Ohio State University
Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1992 03:02:15 GMT

i just got ahold of _screenplay_, by syd field.

i haven't dove in yet.  does anyone have any opinions on it.
          ^^^^  ooh, that's an ugly word.

does it (the book) rate highly?
gb

-- 
gburton@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu.............copyright 1992 gary burton........
Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: jim@thinkage.on.ca (James Alan Gardner)
Subject: Re: First one to correct the typo wins
Organization: Thinkage Ltd.
Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1992 19:53:26 GMT

In article <mtan-280892084759@maureen.cen.uiuc.edu> mtan@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu (Maureen Tan) writes:
>In article <14670@mindlink.bc.ca>, Alan_Barclay@mindlink.bc.ca (Alan
>Barclay) wrote:
>Oops!  In item #7, I suspect that Alan means six WEEKS, not six months!

...referring to when to send a "Did you get my story?" query.

I've been keeping stats over the past four years.  I have only twice got
a reply to a submission in less than three months, and since I've
been selling regularly to some of these magazines (like Amazing) I
would assume that my stuff does not go to the bottom of the slush
pile.  I certainly don't get concerned until at least four months
have gone by and probably wouldn't send out a query until after
at least six months.

		Jim Gardner, Thinkage Ltd.
Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: guay@fraser.sfu.ca (Tim Guay)
Subject: Re: Electronic publication
Organization: Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 12:22:42 GMT

In article <1992Aug31.101259.9684@usenet.ins.cwru.edu> bf455@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Bonita Kale) writes:
>I've got the info (temporarily mislaid--I'll find it after I wake up, no
>doubt) on ClariNet (sp?), a plan to publish reprint short stories and
>reimburse authors depending on how many subscribers ($5.00 a month) to the
>service download their stories. 
>
>Anyone got an opinion on whether this would put your story in the public
>domain? 
No it wouldn't as long as a copyright notice was included. Granted it could
end up in some conntry with no copyright law and get pirated, but that could
happen even if printed in Analog. From the sound of it it works like syndicationwhere you get paid by how many papers pick up a column, so the same rules would
apply hence you still own copyright and have only leased noexclusive reprint
rights/syndication rights. 

    

Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: johna@intacc.uucp (John Allen)
Subject: Re: Any Screenwriters out there?
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1992 18:04:43 GMT
Organization: Inter/Access' Matrix BBS

In article <jjonsson.112@alexandria.lib.utah.edu> jjonsson@alexandria.lib.utah.edu writes:
>In article <1992Aug22.001433.10551@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU> ren@Turing.ORG (Karen Prestemon) writes:
>
>
>>I've done a bit of screenwiritng, and I'm looking for other people on
>>the net who do the same....  Anyone?
>
>
>>--Karen
>
>Yeah, I've written a couple of scripts, never sold any. I've taken a couple 
>of screenwriting courses at my University with varying degrees of interest, 
>and I'm in the process of looking for an agent. I think that if anyone has 
>any information on getting agents, said info would be greatly appreciated on 
>Usenet. . .
>
>
>Jeff Jonsson
>Marriott Library System Support, University of Utah.
>==============================================================================
>--"It's the sound of the secret--  jjonsson@alexandria.lib.utah.edu
>-- machinery at the center of  --  jjonsson@utahlib.bitnet
>-- the world." -Cliff Steele   --  "You talkin' to me?"


Yes I have written and been paid for four screenplays. I have also read and
analyzed literally hundreds of screenplays for funding agencies and production
companies. Currently I have a script in development at one of the local grant
agencies.

I mostly write plays six of which have been produced and act in them.Now that
I have stated these qualifications I can't rememeber why I did. I teach screen
writing at times and recently posted here offering my services for analysis.

The majour problem I have seen with screenwriters is their lack of respect for
the form. Granted in film the writer is the bottom of the heap but that still
doesnot mean that there is some easy formula to it. Time and time again I have
seen three act structure screenplays filled with plot points and inciting
incidents but no moment to reality. It seems we are breeding a generation of
Happy Days writers.

I always recommend anyone who wants to write to read Shakespeare.If you study
his developement you can watch him kick the habit of poetry and learn to write
drama. Poetry is language that calls attention to itself while good p\script
writing is where you look through the language to character and action. There
are no good and evil characters in Bill's plays. They are people and are not
formulized and the author stays out of the way of the story. 

Recently the best example of great screenwriting is The Unforgiven. It is a
script devoid of sentimentality and cliche. It is interested in the moment to
truth as opposed to the manipulation of audience and the writer does not allow
himself the luxury to preach as I'm doing here. 

Manhattan and Chinatown are two other scripts which it pays well to study.John
From: Crawford_Kilian@mindlink.bc.ca (Crawford Kilian)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: short story writing vs. novel writing
Date: 1 Sep 92 22:42:43 GMT
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Distribution: world

Christopher Conn asks whether it's important to write short stories before
writing novels...depends on whether the short stories are important in
themselves to you. A short story is a sprint; a novel is a cross-country run,
so training with one doesn't always qualify you for the other. Being a
long-winded old guy, I find short stories uninteresting: five thousand words is
a chapter of warm-up, not a whole event! But a good short-story writer can whiz
past me and deliver a hell of a bang.

More seriously, train for novels by writing novels. When I got the idea for the
novel that became Eyas, I knew I didn't have the skill for it; so I practiced
with two other stories first. I still didn't have the skill for it, but I wrote
Eyas anyway. Writing novels is like raising children. No matter how many you've
had before, you're never equipped for the new one.
From: sasafw@dobo.unx.sas.com (Fred Welden)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: Editing on Computer or Hardcopy
Date: 4 Sep 92 14:16:06 GMT
Organization: Dobonia
Originator: sasafw@dobo.unx.sas.com


In article <1992Sep2.180831.25822@gallant.apple.com>, chuq@gallant.apple.com (Chuq Von Rospach) writes:
|thomas@datamark.co.nz (Thomas Beagle) writes:
|
|>I used to say that I could never edit on a computer screen.
|
|I still do. And to be honest, sometimes I cheat and do it anyway.
|(I invariably regret it, too).
|
|>After a while, entering changes on paper and then transferring them to
|>my essays got to be too much work. I started editing on screen, and
|>actually found it quite easy.
|
|That's the problem. Editing on screen is 'easy'. Editing, however, is never
|easy. I've found in my work, and in the work of most people that speak about
|it honestly, that editing on screen leads to really sloppy, incomplete
|editing. Why? I'm not entirely sure. On a physical/physiological level,
|staring as closely at a screen as you have to do for editing enhances
|eyestrain and tires the eyes, which reduces comprehension and focus.

I usually print out hard copy only when I want to show what I've 
written to someone else.  I wrote an entire novel on a Commodore 64
using PaperClip, which means 24 lines of 40 characters, and no one 
who's read it has had any complaints about sloppiness.  I'm sorry it
hasn't been published so you could judge for yourself.  :)

I've also written upwards of 10,000 lines of C code in my current job
that work just fine without ever having printed out a single file of it.

The only hypotheses I can spin out to explain this:

1) I do my real writing in my head.  As I've said before, the process
of putting it down in a text file is, for me, more like taking
dictation from someone with an attention deficit disorder than creating
anything at the time.

2) My writing, like my C code, tends to consist of small meaningful
blocks that are arranged in a larger esthetic (in the case of fiction)
or functional (C code) patterns.  Electronic editors work very well for
concentrating closely on the contents of a small block, then cutting the
whole chunk out and moving it to where it belongs.  This is, in fact,
very much my working style.

Before I began using electronic editors I absolutely hated to move a
string of paragraphs from one part of a story to another, even though
that's where they should have been, because it meant scissors and tape
or retyping whole pages.  I also tended to use my typos, if you know
what I mean.  Electronic, on-screen editing has definitely improved my
writing--made it easier, and made the results more what I intended to
write in the first place.

Just another data point for your collection.

-- 
--Fred, or another blind 8th-century BC  |  sasafw@dobo.unx.sas.com
        Hellenic poet of the same name.  |
From: bible@iastate.edu (Anthony E Bible)
Subject: Re: Work in Progress: Outline
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames, IA
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 14:08:41 GMT

In article <14715@mindlink.bc.ca> Crawford_Kilian@mindlink.bc.ca (Crawford Kilian) writes:
>
>Since we're dealing with two hostile cultures who've never met before, I need
>to surmount the language barrier. Given my themes and issues, I think I can do
>this: bring my hero into near-contact with the bad guys. They realize he's a
>world-class magician and want to learn more about him. The boss Tlax Kah
>magicians, being mighty quickwitted, orders a young warrior to pretend to
>defect; his job is to learn about these newcomers, then get back home and
>report. That in turn implies the old magician is pretty smart, the young
>warrior is a plausible liar, and my hero is prepared to accept this potential
>threat if it means learning more about some very sinister characters. Well,
>it's a start...

	I am unfamiliar with books about magic and magicians and such so
perhaps this question has an obvious answer but ...  Why is this necessary?  If
I buy into the concept of a world where magic works, having a magic ring that
lets people understand all languages (or have it as an inherent ability of
magicians) would seem to be an easy way to satisfy any questions about 
foreign languages.  Or perhaps you have more function intended for this 
character than just passing on the language.  Are you, for example, 
thinking of providing information about the two cultures through the eyes and 
memory of the defector?

	Before I return to lurking I'd like to thank you for this thread
Crawford.  I expect it to be both interesting and useful.


Regards,
tony
From: jtchew@csa3.lbl.gov (JOSEPH T CHEW)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: Technical Writing as an alternative to Technial Development
Date: 27 Aug 92 22:36:57 GMT
Organization: Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory - Berkeley, CA, USA
Reply-To: jtchew@csa3.lbl.gov
NNTP-Posting-Host: 128.3.254.198
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.3-4   

>You might see if, within your current organization, you could switch over
>from straight programming to being the programmer who spends some or much
>of his time writing up the specs, proposals, and so on.  If such a
>role is possible where you are, it's a good intermediate step.

That's pretty sensible advice... get into "technical technical writing"
and, as a salary and status issue, try to remain identified with the
engineers.  There are a lot of nooks and crannies in technical writing
where knowledge of user psychology, information mapping, desktop
publishing, etc., isn't important, but hardcore technical knowledge is.

Many of these writers find that all the writing skill they need is the
ability to put correctly used words together in grammatical sentences
of tractable length, arranged in logical order.  (Not that those skills
should be taken lightly!)  Their product doesn't need to win either a
Pulitzer or a juried art show, but it had better be correct and have
the necessary content.

But I encourage you to learn as much about communication as you can.
It's not as though you're going to lose your technical knowledge in
the process or anything.

--Joe
"Just another personal opinion from the People's Republic of Berkeley"
From: Crawford_Kilian@mindlink.bc.ca (Crawford Kilian)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: Work in Progress:Outline
Date: 30 Aug 92 00:25:51 GMT
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Distribution: world

I'm trying a little experiment, and using a hypertext tool called Storyspace to
rough out an outline for Redmagic. Storyspace might also be called Very
Expensive 3x5 Cards, but you can do some interesting things with it.

But my outlining doesn't depend on software. All I'm trying to do at this point
is catalogue my main characters, establish the main themes and issues of the
story, and then develop some events. Themes and issues are the main problem
right now, so let me list some:

Among the good guys, we have a Yugoslavia-style threat of ethnic warfare that
could ruin the hopes felt at the end of Greenmagic. The Badakhar and the
Cantareans are close to battling one another, while the much worse threat of
the Tlax Kah looms ignored on the horizon.

Among the Tlax Kah, the issue is sustaining constant growth when the main
protein source is other people's bodies, and you need slaves, magicians and
warriors to supply and transport those bodies. So the Tlax Kah want to recruit
good magicians wherever available, as well as warriors who will get to work
when the magicians are exhausted and recovering their strength.

Since we're dealing with two hostile cultures who've never met before, I need
to surmount the language barrier. Given my themes and issues, I think I can do
this: bring my hero into near-contact with the bad guys. They realize he's a
world-class magician and want to learn more about him. The boss Tlax Kah
magicians, being mighty quickwitted, orders a young warrior to pretend to
defect; his job is to learn about these newcomers, then get back home and
report. That in turn implies the old magician is pretty smart, the young
warrior is a plausible liar, and my hero is prepared to accept this potential
threat if it means learning more about some very sinister characters. Well,
it's a start...
Organization: Arizona State University
Date: Tuesday, 25 Aug 1992 15:04:23 MST
From: <KVJLC@ASUACAD.BITNET>
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject:    RE: When is a . . .?


  I'm jumping into this article somewhere towards the end and I'm not
sure if I can really add anthing, but what the heck.

  A goat is an evolved species that has been cultivated to serve a
specific purpose.  The process of cultivation is an evolutionary step
for most domesticated animals.  The cow, horse, dog, etc., have all
been cultured-evolved to the point that their existence is due to
man's dabbling in nature.  So that a goat is a by-product of man's
mutilation of the natural selection process of evolution.

  On other plants, humans or aliens may have another process of
cultivating the species so that natural selection is still the
dominant means of ensuring the survival of the fittest.  If this
is the case, what we consider a domesticated goat on other worlds
may indeed have the necessary extremities for survival.  Such as a
goat with enlarged teeth, razor sharp hooves, etc.  A duck may have
talons and a horse may have horns or something like that.

  The species of animals will vary greatly from our culture because
of lots of environmental and geo-physical disparities that we may not
even begin to imagine, oops -- I forgot this is fiction.  Anyway, a
goat on another world would not be the same as on this world because
their function and evolution will be too different to have evolved
in the same manner.  A goat on another planet may in fact be regarded
as a crocidile on earth or a snake.

  Now to really make another planets animal species unique and yet
similar to earth's, the use of evolutionary biased models can be used
to predict evolutionary progress with and without man's intervention
and what they would look like and act like.  Their traits, eatting
patterns, migration routes, interdependicies with humans on their
planet, etc.

  The great thing about creating a new species is that you don't
really have to look far to be creative.
Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: guay@fraser.sfu.ca (Tim Guay)
Subject: Re: What now?
Organization: Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 18:11:43 GMT

In article <92244.083057KVJLC@ASUACAD.BITNET> <KVJLC@ASUACAD.BITNET> writes:
>     Now to the question at hand.  What can I do to get back into
>the swing of writing and more importantly finishing my novel?  I
>suppose that everyone has a different technique or idea and I
>would appreciate reading what others have done.

Take your last chapter or short story and start retyping it. At some point you
may start digressing from what is on the hardcopy, go with the degression! 
That's telling you that the creative juices are flowing again...

TTFN
	Tim


Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: curtis@berkeley.edu (Curtis Yarvin)
Subject: Re: Language Lists (was Re: Work in Progress: Proposal
Organization: CS Dept. Snakepit - Do Not Feed.
Date: Thu, 27 Aug 1992 17:56:43 GMT

In article <71583@apple.Apple.COM> chuq@Apple.COM (Chuq Von Rospach) writes:
>
>Which is, now that I think of it, probably a good reason why a goat isn't
>really a goat -- if some of the animals are unique entities, than
>consistency dictates that they all ought to be. Stuff that's clearly
>universal (clothing, utensils, etc) are no problem, but props that are
>unique to the environment probably ought to have that uniqueness emphasized.

Paul Park, in the first forty pages of _Soldiers Of Paradise_,
creates one of the strangest worlds in genre fiction. 

_Soldiers_ has _no_ invented words; nor does it rely, a la Wolfe, on
etymologies less taken and linguistic fossils.

A horse, placidly chewing on the severed child's hand in its beak,
is a far more powerful image than a vrishnu, placidly chewing on the
severed murgli's hand in its beak - even if the horse is not a
horse, nor the child a child.

c
From: chuq@gallant.apple.com (Chuq Von Rospach)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: Editing on Computer or Hardcopy
Date: 2 Sep 92 18:08:31 GMT
Organization: I is a writur

thomas@datamark.co.nz (Thomas Beagle) writes:

>I used to say that I could never edit on a computer screen.

I still do. And to be honest, sometimes I cheat and do it anyway.
(I invariably regret it, too).

>After a while, entering changes on paper and then transferring them to
>my essays got to be too much work. I started editing on screen, and
>actually found it quite easy.

That's the problem. Editing on screen is 'easy'. Editing, however, is never
easy. I've found in my work, and in the work of most people that speak about
it honestly, that editing on screen leads to really sloppy, incomplete
editing. Why? I'm not entirely sure. On a physical/physiological level,
staring as closely at a screen as you have to do for editing enhances
eyestrain and tires the eyes, which reduces comprehension and focus.

On a logistical level, it's a LOT easier to flip back to the previous page
to check a reference without losing context. I find it harder to concentrate
on the work because the mechanical aspects of the editing get in the way.

On a psychological level, you're only seeing small chunks of the text. That
might not be so bad if you're doing really micro-focussed grammar work
(although I've found that even there I don't do better on a screen), but I
think it makes it tougher to take the macro view of the work and keep the
overall context in mind. Hurts continuity and consistency.

Since I'm such a strong supporter of minimizing paper, this is an area that
interests me greatly, especially the widespread inability to edit on-line
well (not just me, but most of the writers I know agree). I'll sometimes
alternate drafts, edit one on-line, print out the next, but I'm just a lot
more comfortable and better using a red pen and paper. 

-- 
Chuq "IMHO" Von Rospach, ESD Support & Training (DAL/AUX) =+= Member, SFWA
  chuq@apple.com | GEnie: MAC.BIGOT | ALink:CHUQ =+= Editor, OtherRealms
	A real SF writur with stories in ALTERNATE KENNEDYS and THE 
	  FURTHER ADVENTURES OF BATMAN, in better bookstores now!