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ScottyDM Registered User
Joined: 12 Feb 2005 Posts: 1142 Location: Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA
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Posted: Tue Sep 12, 2006 6:01 am Post subject: Fall 2006 Contest |
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Greetings:
I will announce the fall contest about this time tomorrow.
Watch this space!
Scotty _________________
Kantaro wrote: | Almost real enough to be considered non-fiction, if it weren't made up. |
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PrincessB Registered User
Joined: 06 Jan 2005 Posts: 3070 Location: south of Nashville, Tn
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ScottyDM Registered User
Joined: 12 Feb 2005 Posts: 1142 Location: Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA
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Posted: Thu Sep 14, 2006 2:11 am Post subject: |
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It's been a zoo here, Princess, and I don't mean that in a good way. My cousin in China had an emergency with his website Sunday and I was photoshopping pictures for two days.
Announcing the Fall 2006 Writing Contest!
The fall contest is ready to roll and the theme is the harvest.
I'm interested to see if anyone will try something daring.
Scotty _________________
Kantaro wrote: | Almost real enough to be considered non-fiction, if it weren't made up. |
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Nadan Registered User
Joined: 04 Jul 2003 Posts: 163 Location: Southern California, USA
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Posted: Thu Sep 14, 2006 8:27 am Post subject: |
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::has a sudden brainstorm... or brainfreeze::
ow... _________________ Nadan
AKA AnthonyTiger
"Cats are mysterious beings... symbols of evil, gods of the Pharoahs. You never know if they love you or if they condescend to occupy your house. This mystery is what makes them the most attractive beast." - Paul Moore, 1978 |
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Tygon Site Owner
Joined: 03 Apr 2001 Posts: 2497 Location: Isernhagen, Lowersaxony, Germany
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Posted: Thu Sep 14, 2006 10:44 am Post subject: |
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Oh dear... and I thought the last one was difficult... _________________ Tygon Panthera - name and species
www.planetfurry.com/~tygon/ |
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ScottyDM Registered User
Joined: 12 Feb 2005 Posts: 1142 Location: Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA
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Posted: Fri Sep 15, 2006 2:52 am Post subject: |
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Difficult?
Oh, you're joking.
Most people in modern times are not as harvest oriented as they were in the past. I think for many of us, our personal harvest consists of going to the grocer's and getting something shrink-wrapped in clear plastic.
While "harvest" can be applied to almost anything that people gather up, most traditional harvest is done during a particular time of year. Crops like pumpkins, peaches, and barley are ripe and ready at a certain time and must be harvested, and in some cases preserved. Wild game often has an annual cycle, which gives the locals a particular time of year when hunting (or harvesting) is best. Calamari come together to spawn one month out of the year, and whales have migration paths that will find them in local waters for a short while each year. My father, who is in his early 80s, told me of the ice harvest each winter in Clear Lake, Iowa--they would take horse drawn sleds out on the lake, saw out slabs of ice, then store them in a well-insulated barns for sale during the rest of the year (before refrigerators). Also, many types of livestock bred for meat are slaghtered during this time. Meat salting, canning, smoking, and sausage making are all harvest time activities.
There are many things directly associated with the harvest as well. Preserving the harvest, as I mentioned. But in days of old the time immediately after harvest was a time to relax and celebrate. In medieval villages it was a time for the young folks to take a break from work and check each other over, and it became a time to choose a mate. A good example of the post-harvest celebration was Dr. Kayngi's story The Seedling from the fall 2005 contest. BTW, there really was a Druidic harvest festival to keep evil spirits from infecting an apple orchard (the cool things you learn from Google). Another example of a harvest festival is Bernard Doove's Harvest Ceremony.
Rather than create a story about a harvest or harvest festival, you could create a story about something else that happens to be set during harvest time. A murder mystery perhaps. I remember Sherlock Holmes commenting on the lack of beeswing in the bottom of a wine glass, and that detail lead to the truth. Beeswing is a characteristic of aged wine, but if you know wine-making or the grape harvest, perhaps some detail of that could be a pivotal point in a mystery tale. For one story I wrote I wanted a character to be a beer brewmaster. I found a PDF book online that explained all about beer-making--from simple kits, to roasting barley and selecting hops and doing every step from scratch. Beer, by the necessity of the raw ingredients, is a harvest-time activity. Romance and beer, murder and beer, rebellion and beer, or... you get the idea.
So pick a crop (apples, whales, etc), or pick a product (wine, beer, etc.), or even pick a holiday, and start Googling. For example a lot of things we do at Halloween have their roots in harvest-time activities. Something is bound to pop.
Have fun!
Scotty _________________
Kantaro wrote: | Almost real enough to be considered non-fiction, if it weren't made up. |
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Nadan Registered User
Joined: 04 Jul 2003 Posts: 163 Location: Southern California, USA
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Posted: Fri Sep 15, 2006 5:01 pm Post subject: |
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ScottyDM wrote: | Difficult?
Oh, you're joking.
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Or just ignore physical harvests altogether and think of the emotional or spiritual implications of a 'harvest'. _________________ Nadan
AKA AnthonyTiger
"Cats are mysterious beings... symbols of evil, gods of the Pharoahs. You never know if they love you or if they condescend to occupy your house. This mystery is what makes them the most attractive beast." - Paul Moore, 1978 |
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PrincessB Registered User
Joined: 06 Jan 2005 Posts: 3070 Location: south of Nashville, Tn
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Posted: Fri Sep 15, 2006 5:26 pm Post subject: |
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Harvesting has been done since practically forever. Now days crop harvesting is hardly ever seen by most, most of the younger generation has never done any sort of crop harvesting, many of the older parents have but now days we take for granted that the food we want will be sitting on the shelf in our favorite store.
Because harvesting is so old there have been many, many stories bassed around the harvest so coming up with a harvest related story is not hard, coming up with a harvest related story that isn't completly over done is. _________________ http://www.bukisa.com/people/AmberBarnes check it out!
http://twitter.com/PrincessBTigres
Girls are like phones. We love to be held, talked too but if you press the wrong button you'll be disconnected! |
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Nadan Registered User
Joined: 04 Jul 2003 Posts: 163 Location: Southern California, USA
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Posted: Fri Sep 15, 2006 5:46 pm Post subject: |
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One thing's for sure. A lot of us are going to have to do some research. =^_^= _________________ Nadan
AKA AnthonyTiger
"Cats are mysterious beings... symbols of evil, gods of the Pharoahs. You never know if they love you or if they condescend to occupy your house. This mystery is what makes them the most attractive beast." - Paul Moore, 1978 |
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Nadan Registered User
Joined: 04 Jul 2003 Posts: 163 Location: Southern California, USA
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Posted: Fri Sep 15, 2006 6:08 pm Post subject: |
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And research pays dividends... Now I've got two stories to write... but which one first? _________________ Nadan
AKA AnthonyTiger
"Cats are mysterious beings... symbols of evil, gods of the Pharoahs. You never know if they love you or if they condescend to occupy your house. This mystery is what makes them the most attractive beast." - Paul Moore, 1978 |
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Tygon Site Owner
Joined: 03 Apr 2001 Posts: 2497 Location: Isernhagen, Lowersaxony, Germany
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Posted: Sat Sep 16, 2006 1:08 am Post subject: |
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AnthonyTiger wrote: | ScottyDM wrote: | Difficult?
Oh, you're joking.
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Or just ignore physical harvests altogether and think of the emotional or spiritual implications of a 'harvest'. |
You don't want me to go that way. I'd try something along the lines of harvesting souls or something. _________________ Tygon Panthera - name and species
www.planetfurry.com/~tygon/ |
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Nadan Registered User
Joined: 04 Jul 2003 Posts: 163 Location: Southern California, USA
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Posted: Sun Sep 17, 2006 12:25 am Post subject: |
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So Tigon, do you think you might enter this season? _________________ Nadan
AKA AnthonyTiger
"Cats are mysterious beings... symbols of evil, gods of the Pharoahs. You never know if they love you or if they condescend to occupy your house. This mystery is what makes them the most attractive beast." - Paul Moore, 1978 |
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Tygon Site Owner
Joined: 03 Apr 2001 Posts: 2497 Location: Isernhagen, Lowersaxony, Germany
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Posted: Sun Sep 17, 2006 12:59 am Post subject: |
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I'm going to try. Can't promise anything though. _________________ Tygon Panthera - name and species
www.planetfurry.com/~tygon/ |
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ScottyDM Registered User
Joined: 12 Feb 2005 Posts: 1142 Location: Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA
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Posted: Sun Sep 17, 2006 1:10 am Post subject: |
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Basic advice to any writer is, "Write what you know."
Some will take that literally and write what soon becomes the same old same old. Most people have limited experiences.
However, there's another way to look at it: come to know what you want to write about before you write about it. In other words, do some research. George Plimpton used to do research by actually doing, personally, what it was he was going to write about. He wanted to write about professional football, so he played a bit of professional football as research (mostly training camp and an early season game). That's a bit extreme.
Anyway, yea. Research.
Scotty _________________
Kantaro wrote: | Almost real enough to be considered non-fiction, if it weren't made up. |
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ScottyDM Registered User
Joined: 12 Feb 2005 Posts: 1142 Location: Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA
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Posted: Sun Sep 17, 2006 5:09 am Post subject: |
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I was doing a touch of research on the scythe (e.g. when it was invented and the various forms through the years) when I found this paragraph on Wikipedia....
Quote: | The scythe also plays an important traditional role, often appearing as weapons in the hands of mythical beings such as Father Time, the four horsemen of the Apocalypse and the Grim Reaper (Death). This stems mainly from the Christian cultural interpretation of death as a "harvest of souls." |
Be aware that some people will hate a story that isn't a literal harvest of some crop like pumpkins or rye or something.
Scotty _________________
Kantaro wrote: | Almost real enough to be considered non-fiction, if it weren't made up. |
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