The House of Grammar Part 14: One Flew Over the House of Grammar

D spent some time on my birthday taking some photos for my blog posts. This is one of several, and I like it.

On to bloggy goodness.

I've recently been playing a board game with a few folks called Twilight Imperium 3. It's akin to Risk in its tactical and strategic depth, and takes as long if not longer to play through a full game.

One of the game's stronger aspects is the universe the creators have built, and the background for each of the races that players can control. The game I'm currently playing is actually being done via BBS (Oh my God, ANCIENT technology!) and I'm finding myself quite involved not only in the game itself but in the roleplaying side of things.

Currently I'm playing as a race of mercenaries and pirates called the Mentak (How in the heck does this have anything to do with grammar?) Shut up. I'm about to tell you.

I haven't written poetry in quite a while, but something in the background of the Mentak really started to speak to me, so I chose to spend some time writing a couple of poems through the eyes of the Mentak. I have no idea if they are actually good in any respect, but I enjoyed writing them. Fair warning, these are almost pure fan-fiction, with very little substance outside the context of the game, but I'd appreciate feedback anyway. More fair warning: When it comes to poetry I write for feel rather than structure, so at least the first poem is going to come across as a bit sloppy. Imagine it read in an Irish accent, maybe by Sean Bean, and you'll hear it the way it sounded in my head when writing it.

Poem 1: An Ode to Moll Primus

Betwixt the stars, on rails of light we fly
From fields and valleys where unmarked the bones, our fathers', lie
Where shackled once they slaved and strove, with plows they tilled and hoes they hove
And fought with brothers, kin of other mothers
And slew them, and in turn were slain, for lords possessed of greed, and vain.

And now amidst the silent sough of space, the cough of cannon spurs our race
The rusty tang of blood in air, the rending sound of a railgun's tear
The scream of foe hacked down by blade, or his noiseless death by enfilade
His wealth made ours, his last words devoured
By ears long deaf to the words of cowards

But we still dream, in the abyss between the stars, so far from home
Of you, Moll Primus, and the rolling fields of red we left
For we found our brothers, and strove together, and found,
That those who shackled could in turn be shackled,
And bound,
And made humble, through fire and pain

Each breath of air compressed, each sight we take by artificial light
Each time we hear the engines roar, the shields engage and our fighters soar,
Each ship our weapons set ablaze, or tear asunder, each battle waged
Our thoughts are of you, of warmth, of home.
We hear you call us back
Amidst the sounds of plunder.


Poem 2: The Ballad of the Widow's Pain

Of ships oft sung there's many names
Yet there's one rare heard that still remains
A tale worth hearing, so hark the strains
Of the ballad of the Widow's Pain

Her crew was surly, her Captain drunk
Her bosun rare to rise from up his bunk
Her hull was ragged, her engines junk
Worth more a'scuttled, still she slunk

One day she dropped from speed of light
Her thrusters burning with all their might
Her Captain cursed with all his spite,
As she dropped from warp a'to an unexpected fight

Three ships there were, all shining new
Gleaming hulls and disciplined crew
Weapons trained and torpedos flew
A swift death approached and all hands knew

But the captain cried, "No, not today!
"For every drop our blood we make them pay!
"Hands to stations, prep to evade!
"To arms, to glory, to Hell we wade!"

And the Widow's Pain engaged full thrust
And the crew felt the call of battle lust
Into the captain's hands they placed unexpected trust
To fight, to survive, they knew they must

The ship was old but something changed
In her heart burned hot a sudden rage
The bosun shrieked, "All guns, engage!"
And the sky lit fire with the ship's barrage

Swift and true she jigged and yawed
Close missed by cannon, and torpedos' claws
Her weapons fired, trails of fire sawed
And delivered one foe into death's hungry maw

Another lucky shot made the end another,
Her perfect flanks were torn asunder
A ball of fire blossomed with no answering thunder
But one remained, and the crew looked on in wonder

But then the strains of age did tell
This hoary boat that had fought so well,
Klaxons blared, and her speed it fell,
The alarum's cry a funeral bell

"More power, bosun, make her soar!"
"I cannae, Captain, she can give no more!
"The tiller's struck, the dirty whore!
"We cannae turn, only thrust afore!"

With this grim news the Captain set his face
Found now the courage that defined his race
"If death must come, we will find our place,
"Or die forgotten in the depths of space."

The Captain pushed the bosun aside
Took the tiller, his spine stiff with sudden pride
"Into fire I go, into death I ride,
"All hands to lifeboats, save your hides!"

And so while the crew did flee the captain held
The Widow's Pain creaked at every weld
The foe, his doom in the air he smelled
An unfamiliar resolve he felt

Straight as an arrow, hard as rain
So flew the Captain and the Widow's Pain
The foe beckoned them with fury unrestrained
But no wound her trajectory could constrain

Now eye to eye with the foe's gleaming ship
The Captain grit his teeth and bit his lip
Felt the tiller beneath his sweating grip
And with a crash of steel into the foe's hide they ripped

When later came the salvage crews
To find the wrecks of ships old and new
They found still the Captain, standing true,
At the tiller, fused with the ship he slew

She fought with fury, and glory gained,
Her Captain honoured where he once was shamed
No ship come after could such a story claim
Here ends the tale of The Widow's Pain



Anyway, I had fun with these. Please let me know what you think.

The House of Grammar Part 13: To Kill The House of Grammar

Ooooh. Photo in the centre. Will the awesome and unexpected changes never stop? No, they won't. Get used to it, and quickly (I could have said "and fast" but this is a grammar blog... ostensibly)

Okay, so I'm typing this on my new laptop. I have a confession to make: I hate laptop keyboards. The worst problem is the stupid mouse pad which puts my typing back at the mouse cursor every time the heel of my hand hits the stupid thing. The other problem is that the enter key is in an uncomfortable place and I often end up hitting \ instead. That having been said, I'm actually fairly pleased with the laptop, though ultimately I'll end up using a regular keyboard plugged in via USB instead. I'm just not going to bust into the attic while D is asleep to find one. So I will make do.

It was recently suggested to me by D based on a reply I made to a friend's facebook post that I do a blog about something. Well, I'm vain, and if someone tells me something I've done is neat enough to expand upon, I'm liable to go ahead and wax philosophical on the topic. Even if that person is D and automatically someone I should suspect of covert and even overt manipulation. But she's cute, so I typically fall for it anyway.

Anyway, a friend of mine mentioned that awkward was an awkward sounding word, to the point where it was almost onomatopoeic. I liked the idea, and decided to run with it, but I thought that in addition to awkward being it's own awkward word, we should also have a defining term to other words that are just, well, awkward. Although the word I'm about to use has been used before it does not appear to have been used in quite this context.

We're talking about "awkwords".

The link above speaks about a few definitions for this term that don't quite fit my intended meaning. Most of them speak to the social aspects of certain words, and how they can cause discomfort in certain conversational situations.

I'm talking about words that are just weird, make you question your spelling of them every damned time you try and put them down on paper. Conscience. Segue. Onomatopoeia. Definitely. Tomato (how many times have you wanted to put an "e" on that?) Incense. Broccoli. Nuclear.

Any word, essentially, where you have to think two or three times before you remember how it is actually spelled, and still wonder whether you are correct is an awkword. It's a word that never seems right to you, never seems quite like it fits, like a pair of jeans that's just a little bit too tight, or an office chair that won't recline quite enough to be that perfect combination of comfort and lumbar support that you're looking for. If you find yourself looking up the spelling in an internet search engine for a word you've said a thousand times when you're finally trying to put it on paper, that's an awkword.

So while this is a short post, I'd love if people posted a list of their own awkwords. We all have them, and not everyone experience the same difficulties with some words that others will. I'm absolutely fascinated to know what yours are, because I'm sure they'll be something unexpected.

Please post. There will be no ridicule. Well, not by me anyway. Unless it's really darned funny. Then there will be lots of ridicule.

I'm being disingenuous. Of course I won't mock you. But I welcome the discourse.

The House of Grammar Part 12: 10000 Leagues Beneath The House of Grammar

I have mentioned a few times that I have recently been editing some of D's essays for school. This is something I am happy to to do for her, because I'm that sort of spouse, and also because I find the process itself to be rewarding.

D, for her part, when I've actually written something, is usually also willing to edit what I've written, when I actually sit down to write something other than this blog. As much as I may hate some of the comments she makes about my work, because I'm very rigid about certain things (Really? Is everyone surprised?) I can at least accept that the points she makes are in many ways valid. I don't let her muck with the sentence structure or grammar because this only causes conflict (Have I mentioned I'm very particular?) which is best avoided, but I'm very careful to listen when she tells me something just doesn't make sense.

The reason for this is that when I write fiction, I write sci-fi or fantasy, and she reads neither, at least in the sense that she has no particular dedication to either genre.

That may sound counter-intuitive, but let me explain. When I read D's essays, I have absolutely no bias. I have no idea if the content is correct or not, or if her quotations are accurate, or if the terminology she is using is appropriate to the course work or not. Half the time I have no idea what she is actually trying to say. However, given that I have no preconceptions one way or the other regarding the subject matter, I am extremely capable of editing for structure, removing awkward statements, fixing spelling, and improving the clarity and concision (If that's not a word I'm coining it RIGHT NOW) of her work. I have no problem telling her if what she has written flat out says the opposite of what she intends.

The same is not true of when I try and edit her science fiction. I have too many biases, too many notions of what science fiction should be and how it should be structured. When I sit down to try and edit any science fiction she writes I am far too invested in what I want the story to focus on (or how I would write it if I were her) to really pay attention to what she wants the story to be about. All I read is science fiction, all I write is science fiction, and when her story does not fit easily into a thematic niche I can identify with all I want to do is rebuild it from the ground up so that it does.

When it comes to D reading my work, one would think the fact that she occasionally writes science fiction would hamper her with the same biases I find so restrictive. Such is not the case. When D approaches any piece of writing it is not with a bias towards genre, but with the intent of pursuing a particular core concept. If that core concept works best written as science fiction, then she will write it as science fiction, but for no reason other than to give the idea its best chance to succeed. If the same idea would work better as a romance novel, then that's what she will write. She is absolutely unbiased when it comes to any particular genre, possibly as a result of being so much more broadly read than I am. Because of this when she reads my work, it is with an objective eye, and her only concern is whether or not what I've produced comes across as logically consistent to someone who otherwise couldn't care about science fiction.

Orscon Scott Card, one of my favourite authors, wrote in either "Characters and Viewpoint" or "How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy" (It's been so long I forget which, and it could be both) about the need for any author, published or not, to have an "educated reader". Essentially this is someone who can read your work and tell you when it's done. He goes into great depth about what he means by this, and I'll leave it to you to check out those books for the specifics, but this boils down to an understanding that we are all too attached to our own work to know whether or not what we have created is of interest to others, or only to ourselves, and whether or not what we have produced actually says what we intend.

But I think there's more to this. I think that any writer needs an unbiased reader, someone who can tell them from the perspective of someone who has for all intents and purposes never picked up a book in the genre they're writing whether or not what they have created is enjoyable, consistent, and understandable. However, this individual must also be someone who can read for effect, who has a good enough grasp of literary structure or even just good old fashioned storytelling to know when you've made a mistake, or when you've written something so full of jargon that most of your audience will be alienated. For an established author this person may be the editor assigned them by their publisher, but if you're trying to sell yourself as an author for the first time it's going to have to be a friend or family member, someone who is willing and able to plod through your creation with a dispassionate eye and tell you when it's time to kill your babies (If you think that term is literal, you're on the wrong blog).

For me, that's D. Most of the time I can be that for her as well, as she only occasionally writes science fiction, and the rest of the time I can be as unbiased a reader as she is for me. But not everyone is as lucky as I am. Most writers looking for such a person are going to have to look in unusual places, and probably ask a few friends for their opinions and find someone with just the right level of detachment and critical commentary. An unbiased reader who just says "I don't get it." or "That was really good." isn't helpful (but the latter is quite flattering). You need someone who can put into words what they did or did not like, and why, and then you need to chain that person to your writing desk and never let them escape.

For someone who writes historical fiction, this could be as easily a friend who reads only scientific journals as it could be someone who is heavily invested in the Twilight series of novels. For someone trying to write romance novels you could find your unbiased reader in your uncle, who only reads the obituaries, or your nephew who has just started reading Terry Brooks. There's no way to predict what person will be the best fit to act as your unbiased reader, so if you haven't already found someone, try everyone. Give the first couple of chapters of your story to all of your friends. The person who comes back to you with the most critically constructive comments who obviously couldn't give two shits about the genre you're working in is the person you want to stick with. That's the person who will make you work for it, who will make you try time and time to please them, and who will challenge you to produce something that not only interests your target demographic but everyone else as well.

I don't know that I have any other commentary other than I am glad I have such a person in D. She challenges me to be a better writer, to re-evaluate my own preconceptions, and to write for an audience other than myself. She makes me work for every compliment, and in so doing makes each compliment worth that much more. It's not easy to sell her on an idea, but if I can hook her with a concept, I know I can hook anyone. And that's what tells me I'm on the right track.