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Rules of writing?

 
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Osfer
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 13, 2005 12:59 pm    Post subject: Rules of writing? Reply with quote

This is blatantly cross-posted on Yiffstar's forums and here, but I think it's of interest to both tribes of furs Smile

Righto.

I've been paying attention to a few Story Review threads recently where a reader pointed out punctuation or grammatical errors to an author, who responded by saying that 'that's just how I do it'. As much as I respect everyone's preferences and their absolute right to do and think and write whatever and however they want, this attitude rather irked me.

The English language has rules which have slowly evolved over the centuries and decades, and standard procedures and styles for different media. For instance, in novels, you can interrupt a character's speech to show the reader what's happening:

"I've seen two things," said the detective, lighting up a smoke, "and one of them freaks me out."

In comics, you can show the reader how a sentence is being pronounced:

"I don't care what you think, I'm not going into that house!"

A lot of people don't use the established rules properly. This can be a choice, many first-person narratives benefit from colloquial speech patterns to make the narrator come to life (a device I've used frequently myself), but sometimes it's a mistake. Punctuation marks are placed outside quote marks, or Important words are Emphasized with Capitals.

I say mistake, because there is a 'right way of doing things'. This 'right way' isn't necessarily better than any other way, but it's what the world of literature and linguistics at large has decided upon by evolution and consensus. It's what's taught in schools. Sure, sometimes it doesn't make sense -- why are Americans supposed to write 'toward' and the British 'towards'? Some of them may seem limiting -- why can't you use '?!' to indicate indignation in a novel, the way you can in a comic book?

The world is full of arbitrary rules. Some countries drive on the right, some on the left. When you say 'a westerly wind' you mean the wind's coming from the west, not going toward it. Women's clothing has the buttons and fastenings on the opposite side compared to men's. And you write 'Kate's book', with a 's to denote possession, but when James has a book, it's 'James' book'. He doesn't get an extra 's. And sentences start with capital letters, and paragraphs should have the first line indented, except the first paragraph of a chapter -- the list of obscure, arbitrary rules goes on and on.

Anyone with a mind and the will to use it can start to question these things. And think about how they could be done better. An author here, after receiving some comments about his use of ellipses ('...') explained that he preferred to use two periods to denote a short pause and three to denote a long pause. Another, some time back, said he preferred to use em-dashes (long dashes with no spaces before or after) to denote pauses, because he thought periods were silly.

I think it's great that people are engaging the language -- it's be easy to slam those guys by claiming that they're just too lazy to learn the proper rules, but that's not the point and there's certainly no certainty that's the case.

Nevertheless, I think there's merit to sticking to the 'proper way of doing things' even if there's no indication that it's better than any other way and even if the rules sometimes don't add anything. And that's not because I think that centuries of scholars far cleverer than we have determined the best rules for us -- I know as well as any first-year linguist that languages develop by luck and evolution and that exceptions and oddities are far likely to persist than consistent rules. Hell, English has over a hundred and fifty irregular verbs and dozens of weird spellings. Hey, hay, sleigh.

So why do I think sticking to the 'proper rules' is a good idea? Two reasons.

Firstly, for better or worse, the wheel's been invented. We drive on one side of the road and not the other, we eat Western food with knife and fork and Asian food with chopsticks. Commas and punctuation marks in dialogue go inside the quote marks, em-dashes denote interruptions and ellipses consist of three periods, not two and not four, and indicate pauses.

Ninety-five per cent of all the books you'll ever read from your part of the world will follow ninety-five per cent of the Rules. The right-hand page of a book has odd numbers, the left even. Chapters usually begin on an odd-numbered page. The page number is usually on the outer rim of the page.

Secondly, it doesn't cost any more effort to do things 'the proper way' than to do it your way. In fact, it takes considerably more effort because instead of simply cracking the spine on a style guide to learn how you're expected to handle something, you have to spend some time thinking a new way up and teach yourself to be consistent in this. On top of that, you have to make sure that the reader gets it, too. If you use two- and three-period ellipses to differentiate the length of pauses, is the reader going to get that?

The argument of 'if it gets the point across, it's fine' doesn't apply, because it gets the point across both ways and if you do it 'the proper way' you can be absolutely certain that you'll never be criticised for it and you won't confuse anybody who's learned 'the proper way' in school. You'll never hear a complaint from a reader who wonders why a character's question only gets a question mark when she's clearly distressed and would be screaming. You won't be questioned on why you use brackets in description, but not dialogue.

And even then, writing is a craft, like art -- in the snse of graphic arts. With a chunk of charcoal and some paper you could make a drawing that anybody who's seen a raccoon will recognise as a raccoon. Just get the rough outline of a shape, two eyes, the black mask... Or you can draw it 'the proper way', with guidelines and shading, following the procedures taught in art schools. Both of them will 'get the point' across just as well, they're both a raccoon.

My position on this is clear, I'm sure, but it should also be clear that I'm not trying to slam anyone for doing things their own way. If you have no intention of publishing your work, then you probably won't ever be in a position where you have to change your work to satisfy someone else's standards.

Frankly, I'm interested what others think on this issue. Should writers be free to reinvent the rules of language? should readers be expected to take the time, when reading a story, to learn this or that author's particular style of representation? Does inventing new rules often help tell a story better, or does it make it more difficult for the reader to get into it?

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anthony
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 13, 2005 4:29 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Well...

I no longer post critiques over at the Yiffstar forum because of the flak I got when I commented on those issues...
(Some would try to fix their mistakes, but most took it as a personal attack)

Here, though, most are a bit more mature...

And to answer your question; no, they shouldn't be allowed to 'reinvent the wheel.'
It's bad enough with the L337 morons and the SMS zombies doing their worst, but in a story? Hell no!


For those who doesn't know, SMS-messaging is a service in the GSM network, and each text message can be up to 160 characters, with modern phones capable of splitting longer messages into shorter ones. Strangely enough, even with a possible message length of 160 characters, an SMS zombie will shorten it as much as possible, by replacing whole words with single letters or numbers, even if the original message was less than 50 characters...

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Osfer
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 13, 2005 4:43 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

SMS language is actually something I may be studying quite in-depth. I think the l33t there can be excused by the fact that typing on a numerical keypad is really hard work and really annoying.

I know what you mean about some people taking such comments as a personal attack, although that's unavoidable. Anybody's going to be defensive when their homespun's criticised, it's only natural. It is the sad lot of a reviewer that he has to be tough enough to withstand unfounded snapbacks!

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PostPosted: Tue Sep 13, 2005 6:16 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

But they still use that SMS 'language' even if the phone has a full keyboard or T9 word prediction.

As for calling it a language, no....
That would imply a generally agreed-upon syntax and dictionary, and except for a small core of words, it's made up on the fly.
(I get enough mis-sent messages to be fairly up-to-date on it.)

I've edited a few stories here and there, and I always warn the writer that I'll be a good friend by not taking lightly on the task...
(Those who try to be 'nice' does the writer a horrible dis-service)

Of course, having been exposed to James R. Lane, I may have been somewhat desensitised...

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Osfer
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 14, 2005 1:31 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

In the Phillipines, SMS is the primary means of long-istance communication, since it's so cheap compared to actual phone calls. Phillipinos send more SMSes per person per hour than most people in the western world do per week. Hell, the 'People Power II' movement which ousted President Estrada from power through e-petitions, flash protests and the rapid dissemination of details on his impeachment trial opeated almost entirely through the Short Message Service. A political revolution brought about by SMS! Powerful stuff.

A 'nice' reviewer or editor is, ultimately, as useless as they are pleasant. I'll take someone who can respectfully show holes in my work, flaws that can be fixed and suggest how to go about it. I may not always agree, I may recognise some of the flaws he suggested already, but it's the thought that counts Smile

I can't say I'm familiar with James R. Lane... Is your exposure to him good or bad? Smile

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Nadan
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 14, 2005 12:12 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I used to have a copy of "Redeeming Factors", but I gave it away. Now I wish I hadn't. I bought the first copy used off of Amazon. This time I'll go to the Raccoons Bookshelf.

As far as the original message, I am in agreement. There are occasions in which I belive it to be both advantagous and worthwhile to invent a system of punctuation for your story, novel, or other written work. I take as an example the Wilderhom trilogy. The phur characters in this story communicate by means of telepathy. Using quotation marks for telepathic transmissions would be more confusing, in this case, than using the brackets the author settled on. Also, by consistant usage and good writing skills it was made clear what the bracketed text was.

In my own case, I occasionaly write stories in which there are deaf characters 'speaking' in sign language. I have chosen to use single quotes to represent that. From what I gathered from your original post, Osfer, you and I are in complete agreement as to the benefits of following the norm, the reasons these rules should be followed, and the acceptability of variations when made for well thought out reasons, used in a consistant manner, and executed with care.

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Osfer
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 14, 2005 12:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I want to amend that the 'rules' don't apply to forms of expression for which they're not explicitly designed. Telepathy and sign are examples, but also, for instance, text supposedly spoken in a foreign language which the listeners don't understand, but which is translated to English for the benefit of the reader. No conventions exist for this, it is up to the writer to convey the meaning succinctly and consistently.

Similarly, as Pollack and Mondriaan could get away with rather extreme non-pictorial art, writers who have mastered their craft can take huge liberties. e.e. cummings springs to mind, but also Mark Z. Danielewski, who holds the dubious honour of having written the only book whose typography actually made me scream in terror. This isn't hyperbole as to how bad it was, quite the contrary. After a number of pages with deliriously complicated typographical compositions, suddenly the next two pages were blank and there was a black square on them. I literally dropped the book and screamed, and had I been a lad I might have wet myself to boot. Smile

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RunningCat
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 14, 2005 8:04 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

WOW, so many rules so much to continue to learn. I have many problems with writing (this is why I need/have an editor) but I do have a question that has puzzled me and I thought you might be able to help. How is a thought expressed (properly) in a story? Such as when a character is thinking about something that you want the reader to know but not other characters in the scene?
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Superlagg
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 14, 2005 8:54 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

RunningCat wrote:
WOW, so many rules so much to continue to learn. I have many problems with writing (this is why I need/have an editor) but I do have a question that has puzzled me and I thought you might be able to help. How is a thought expressed (properly) in a story? Such as when a character is thinking about something that you want the reader to know but not other characters in the scene?


Like this, I think:

"Hey guys!" Said Jimmy as he arrived to his group of friends at the bar.

"Ey Jim!" Said Bob.

Just then, Jimmy saw Sean Grimjey, his arch enemy ever since he killed Jimmy's prized and most loved cat.

"I will kill him tonight! Sprinkles WILL be AVENGED!!!" Thought Jimmy.

"Ey Jimmy, you want a drink?" Asked Toddy.

"Sure." Said Jimmy. He then thought to himself, "Aha! Possibly I could get Sean drunk to the point where he will die from alcohol poisoning, then run him over with my car!"

"Ey barkeep, two Holmeys!" Said Toddy.

"Make that three." Said Jimmy.

"Thirsty?" Asked Toddy.

"Nah, Imma invite Sean here to buy him a drink to show no hard feelings about killing Sprinkles. Ey Sean!" Said Jimmy.

Sean walked over to Jimmy and asked, "Yes?"

"Here, have a drink on me!" Said Jim, offering a Holmey to Sean.

"Sure, beer's a beer!" Said Sean, who took the Holmey and began drinking it.

"What he dosent know is that I laced the drink with poison, time activated POISON! He wont even remember dying! I love you Sprinkles!" Thought Jimmy.

"Thanks for the beer, mate." Said Sean, who got up and rejoined his friends.

About an hour later, Sean began to twitch, which lead to severe nausia, making Sean feel gravely ill.

"Ehehe! Poison is taking hold!" Thought Jimmy, watching Sean slowly die in pain.

Sean then regurgitated the consumed beer, expelling the poison in the process. He was all better then.

"Er... what the hell!" Thought Jimmy, "DAMNIT! YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO DIE FROM THAT! DAMN YOU!"

Little did Jimmy know that he didnt think that very quietly. He was quickly met with a pool cue to the back of his head, killing him through a freak accident that involved severe cranial hemorrhageing.

"Im coming Sprinkles!" Was Jim's last thought.


Kinda something like in that.

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Superlagg
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 14, 2005 10:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Mike Regan wrote:
Using italics for the thoughs works too. Using quotes could make it a bit cofusing to follow if there is a lot of talking and thinking going on. Italics sets the thoughts apart.


For where I post my story, I cant really have italics without it being only BBS compatable. Once I get to making an actual HTML webpage that allows italics, il modify my story to include it. Until then, I dont have much of a choice.

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Osfer
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 15, 2005 1:11 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Yeah, when unusual formatting restrictions are applied, you have no choice but to be creative.

One thing, though: don't overuse italics where they aren't due!

Quote:
"Ey Jim!" Said Bob.


Should be

Quote:
"Ey Jim!" said Bob.

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Superlagg
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 15, 2005 7:16 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Osfer wrote:
Yeah, when unusual formatting restrictions are applied, you have no choice but to be creative.

One thing, though: don't overuse italics where they aren't due!

Quote:
"Ey Jim!" Said Bob.


Should be

Quote:
"Ey Jim!" said Bob.


Il try and fix that some time eventually. Just being curious, but why should the letter be decapitalized?

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Osfer
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 15, 2005 7:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Because it doesn't start the sentence. The sentence is started with a quote, in this case.

Italics are commonly used to denote thoughts.

And when I said 'don't overuse italics where they aren't due', I actually meant 'capitals'. My bad!

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Superlagg
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 15, 2005 7:33 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Osfer wrote:
Because it doesn't start the sentence. The sentence is started with a quote, in this case.

Italics are commonly used to denote thoughts.

And when I said 'don't overuse italics where they aren't due', I actually meant 'capitals'. My bad!


I see, il make the corrections to my story some time eventually. Thanks.

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PostPosted: Fri Sep 16, 2005 12:25 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

That is really helpfull. It will really help in a story I started writing over 7 years ago "THE END" which is written in first person and I kept on trying to figure out different ways of denoting that the character is thinking. Oh by the way that story is over 1,000 pages long all written long hand and I got stuck when came to the end so have been taking a break from it for a while so I can recharge get some other stories out of the way I will get back to it.
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