Because it is. Oh yes. It's time for the jerkiest post of them all. A blog on prescriptive and descriptive grammar rules. The stuff that everypony loves to hate. Or shortly will, because it's just so much frantic fun. Oh yes, yes, yes.
Now, I have bad grammar. Actually, pretty much everyone has bad grammar. The people who like to nitpick other people's grammar? Often without realizing it they have awful grammar themselves. Because there's the "who," "whom" rule, informalization vs. formalization of words, clauses and value in sentences and distribution principles, that bastard semicolon who just refuses to settle on having one damn purpose, and a thousand other things that.
But that all falls under the category of what we know as prescriptive grammar, which hails from traditional "prescriptivism," or the thought that one method of language is the best way to go and everyone should talk like that. In that, you have your "prescriptive rules," the... "DO THIS" of language, and you have your "proscriptive rules," which are... "DO NOT DO THIS."
Guess how often I gleefully ignore both of those rule sets.
I'M DOING IT RIGHT NOW AS A MATTER OF FACT.
Watch me now make everypony from the modernist era angry.
I would like TO DEFINITELY ASK you this question.
FEAR MY SPLIT INFINITIVES.
Okay, okay, okay. Seriously, you think people are bad today because they whine at you about how you're dumb because of this stuff? In the past, people made or broke treaties over the grammar used. Kicked each other out of high society. Slandered and reviled each other. Seriously. But you put a bunch of smart people who think they're all that in a room together and a knife fight will break out much faster than if you put a bunch of criminals in a room together. But then again, you know me. I'm not quite a fan of the unicorn class and all.
But before I get rambling too much on this, let's get back on subject, and look at the other half of things, shall we? Descriptive grammar, which is in many ways the opposite number to the evil, vainglorious Prescriptivism. Descriptive is friendly, and informal, and hugs you. Okay it doesn't hug you, but what it basically follows is the patterns that have emerged in casual society and the how we common-folk speaketh. If you want to simplify it, it's pretty much the way you and I talk, informal language and informal, popular usage. Although amusingly enough, some grammatical rules actually stem from Descriptive grammar and not Prescriptive... which Prescriptive purists would become furious over. So the next time someone tells you it should be "you and I" and not "you and me" you can tell them that many Prescriptivists actually state the opposite.
Now, here's where things get fun. The elite, Prescriptivists, have always declared that writing should be handled a certain way, in a certain form. That this language, our language, has already found it's ultimate apex, and we should all speak a particular way, in a particular methodology. Meanwhile, the Descriptivists just keep on talking however the hell they please, unless they're presenting themselves to a Prescriptive party meeting. Even our formal language these days has taken on tones of casualness and more than a degree of Descriptive rule: but even in the past, even with how seriously language was taken, formalization never took real root. The stories that have survived, all our real written works of art... none of them are a hundred percent grammatically correct, and almost none of them truly hail from the Prescriptive realm.
Go ahead, go look at your favorite author, or grab a book off your shelf. Hell, pick up the dictionary, and look through the definitions. Look at the words, the structure, how much some of them appall, are close to being an abomination (those contain grammar jokes I'm not going to explain). Look at the definition, and how many of them contain mashed together words, split infinitives, clausal breaches. And don't get me wrong, I'm not saying there's not a time and place for fancy-pants grammar... but it does have a specific time and place and it is not something we should allow control or guide or lives, and especially not our writing, even though many schools of thought continue to try and teach this process, hammer this process into our brains.
Look. Look at your books. Look at the books that become successes, productions, worlds unto themselves. Read them, and marvel: what we call a 'personal writing style' is just one person writing words down in the way they think is best. And why am I so hopped up on this crap? Because all of it goes to show that you out there, you and you and you, you can all be writers. You can all find your own 'style,' and you can all learn the basics that you have to learn, and then develop your method of speaking to the world through your stories. It's not about the mechanics. It's not about how perfect your spelling is, or how amazing your grammar is. It's about figuring out how the hell to tell the story in a way that strikes into your reader's very soul, it's about getting your emotions across to the readers who are out there, not looking for some perfect pristine set of words on paper, but a story with a plot and a life of its own.
It's about writing. If you want to write, you write: forget what everyone else is saying. Forget what everyone else tells you. Forget everything, except the story, and write it down, and go back to it each and every day and make it better and stronger until you know you're getting those words across in the only way that matters: you're foregoing all those mechanical gears and instead stretching out a part of yourself, a piece of your heart and mind and soul, and sharing that story not because it's perfect, but because it's the story you want to tell. And like every story, it should be flawed, it should be naked, and it should be handled gently but with absolute trust to a world that you know is going to try and cut you if it gets the chance.
But if you touch even one person with that story, it's more than worthwhile. It's a miracle.
I have to go now because Luna is staring at me.
Forget about the tea party, the learned books, the scholars and the academy. Jump down the rabbit hole instead: Wonderland has a lot to offer, whether you ever share your stories with another person or not.
~Scrivener Blooms
Thursday 27 September 2012
Friday 21 September 2012
How To Write, Part 5: Where Rules Don't Apply
Now. When we go to school like good little boys and girls, we're taught all these rules and norms and etiquette and stuff. Some of us latch onto these rules and norms and etiquette like it's the one thing that will save us all from damnation in the future. Others completely reject it and continue their atrocious attacks upon the language as a whole with the way they write. But if you want to really master a language and be a writer, you have to learn to cut down the middle: sometimes we should honor certain rules of writing, but other times you have to slap the norms in the face and declare your own way of doing things.
Every writer develops his or her own ticks: for better or worse, we all find ourselves falling into set habits and ways of doing things, and I'm not talking about how we plot stories out, or how we develop characters, or blah-blah-blah, although many of us do it on that macroscopic level too: what I'm talking about is the micro right now, the smallest level you can get: how we simply write down words and phrases.
Here's an example.
"Scrivener Blooms, thou art fat." Luna declared, then she leaned forwards and smiled slightly, half-lidding her eyes teasingly as she shifted eagerly on her hooves. "Now I demand thou helps me out with some new 'fun;' I have the most delightful idea in mind."
Yes, that happened and no. No. It was not very fun. No.
...I don't want to talk about it. We're. Busy with something else.
Okay, examining the sentence. We get an idea about how I construct my sentences. I abusively use commas and tend to create run-on descriptions. Note the segment here: ['fun;'] and how it's constructed: I place punctuation inside the single quotes instead of outside, although it's fairly common to see it written as ['fun';] by many authors. My word choice is fairly simplistic and note [lidding]: I've bastardized the word with my conjugation and I'm clearly a fan of double-consonants in situations where we're dealing with Unknowns. Oh, Unknowns. I love Unknowns. Do you know how many Unknowns there are in this language I'm writing in? A hell of a lot. It amuses me endlessly because a lot of grammar freaks don't recognize that what they're taught in school, even fancy-pants university, isn't necessary correct: it's not a law, but a custom. And it's really fun to get into prescriptive/descriptive grammar, but if I even touch on that I'm just going to cause screaming fits to every sane and competent writer in a two mile radius.
...I don't think that would matter, since. I'm pretty sure we're more than two miles deep in the Everfree. And Twilight, hey, Twilight? You're not a sane writer. Competent, oh yes. But no pony who spends as much time on scheduling as you is sane. And Luna's neither. She can't even do dictation spells properly, as a matter of fact. That's why she always had me to abuse. Oh, she caught what I just wrote.
Well. Now I'm covered in coffeLUNADONTLICKME.
...
Distractions aside. I've strained or broken a few rules in the sentence above. I've done an extended sentence, I've used a semicolon where a colon could arguably suffice, I kept punctuation inside the quote thingies instead of placing it outside. But how you bend rules and tenets and put mechanics to use for yourself will affect your story: let's modify the above example.
'scrivener blooms thou art fat' luna declared and she leaned forwards and smiled slightly half-lidding her eyes teasingly as she shifted eagerly on her hooves. 'now i demand thou helps me out with some new fun, I have the most delightful idea in mind.'
Minimal grammar, mass-structural transformation, and it affects both the pace and the dynamics. Lack of capitalization of names downplays the importance of the ponies named, and it has a sense of all running together. The use of a comma after [fun] creates a minor pause, but there's no longer any emphasis on [fun] because of the lack of quotes or anything similar, meaning it goes from impacting with a sense of innuendo to a simple statement.
Now, mechanics, grammar, spelling, they don't make a story. But proper use of them can, will, and does influence how your story will make an impact. I'll get more onto this topic on a later post when LUNA STOPS BITING ME BECAUSE MY MANE TASTES LIKE COFFEE HORSES OF HEAVEN I THINK SHE JUST ATE MY EAR.
~Scrivener Blooms
Every writer develops his or her own ticks: for better or worse, we all find ourselves falling into set habits and ways of doing things, and I'm not talking about how we plot stories out, or how we develop characters, or blah-blah-blah, although many of us do it on that macroscopic level too: what I'm talking about is the micro right now, the smallest level you can get: how we simply write down words and phrases.
Here's an example.
"Scrivener Blooms, thou art fat." Luna declared, then she leaned forwards and smiled slightly, half-lidding her eyes teasingly as she shifted eagerly on her hooves. "Now I demand thou helps me out with some new 'fun;' I have the most delightful idea in mind."
Yes, that happened and no. No. It was not very fun. No.
...I don't want to talk about it. We're. Busy with something else.
Okay, examining the sentence. We get an idea about how I construct my sentences. I abusively use commas and tend to create run-on descriptions. Note the segment here: ['fun;'] and how it's constructed: I place punctuation inside the single quotes instead of outside, although it's fairly common to see it written as ['fun';] by many authors. My word choice is fairly simplistic and note [lidding]: I've bastardized the word with my conjugation and I'm clearly a fan of double-consonants in situations where we're dealing with Unknowns. Oh, Unknowns. I love Unknowns. Do you know how many Unknowns there are in this language I'm writing in? A hell of a lot. It amuses me endlessly because a lot of grammar freaks don't recognize that what they're taught in school, even fancy-pants university, isn't necessary correct: it's not a law, but a custom. And it's really fun to get into prescriptive/descriptive grammar, but if I even touch on that I'm just going to cause screaming fits to every sane and competent writer in a two mile radius.
...I don't think that would matter, since. I'm pretty sure we're more than two miles deep in the Everfree. And Twilight, hey, Twilight? You're not a sane writer. Competent, oh yes. But no pony who spends as much time on scheduling as you is sane. And Luna's neither. She can't even do dictation spells properly, as a matter of fact. That's why she always had me to abuse. Oh, she caught what I just wrote.
Well. Now I'm covered in coffeLUNADONTLICKME.
...
Distractions aside. I've strained or broken a few rules in the sentence above. I've done an extended sentence, I've used a semicolon where a colon could arguably suffice, I kept punctuation inside the quote thingies instead of placing it outside. But how you bend rules and tenets and put mechanics to use for yourself will affect your story: let's modify the above example.
'scrivener blooms thou art fat' luna declared and she leaned forwards and smiled slightly half-lidding her eyes teasingly as she shifted eagerly on her hooves. 'now i demand thou helps me out with some new fun, I have the most delightful idea in mind.'
Minimal grammar, mass-structural transformation, and it affects both the pace and the dynamics. Lack of capitalization of names downplays the importance of the ponies named, and it has a sense of all running together. The use of a comma after [fun] creates a minor pause, but there's no longer any emphasis on [fun] because of the lack of quotes or anything similar, meaning it goes from impacting with a sense of innuendo to a simple statement.
Now, mechanics, grammar, spelling, they don't make a story. But proper use of them can, will, and does influence how your story will make an impact. I'll get more onto this topic on a later post when LUNA STOPS BITING ME BECAUSE MY MANE TASTES LIKE COFFEE HORSES OF HEAVEN I THINK SHE JUST ATE MY EAR.
~Scrivener Blooms
Friday 14 September 2012
How To Write, Part 4: Killing The Hippo
My title is a clever reference that absolutely no one is going to get. It doesn't have to do with hippos, which I'm pretty sure are one of the few things Luna hasn't ever killed.
Pretty sure. She really got around in the old days. And really. Killed a lot of everything. Or at least pummeled the hell out of it. Which I don't think she understands can be just as bad at times.
Okay, okay, back on topic before I get beaten up too. We're finally at the post I've been wanting to do since the start but was 'too boring.' Something very important to writing, that some of us take for granted, because... we don't take the time to sit down and sift through and examine them. Things that hold a different meaning for each and every one of us, even though most of us are taught them the same way during our lifetime... but how we experience them and what we grow to associate them with is another matter entirely.
Words: and words are powerful things. Words can heal, and words can do damage nothing can ever repair. Words are there only for a moment, but last forever. They say a picture holds a thousand words, but words themselves are made up of letters, and letters are symbols, and a single word can bring a thousand images to mind. We underestimate their power, and we whine a lot about how hard it is to read this or write that or blah blah blah. But personally, for me, writing has always been my one outlet. My one form of 'magic' that this lame hornless unicorn has always had. This one way for me to share with a world that had no love or acceptance of my presence... but they couldn't silence my writing. Well, technically they almost did, but that's another story for another day that can go under a particularly-bitter post heading and be filled with lot of angry cursing and swearing and probably a lot of unfair remarks directed towards people who really are just trying to do their jobs but I treat with loathing and contempt anyway because of my own judgmental viewpoints and stuff.
That was a run on sentence. Luna also says she looks forwards to when I write that post. She seems to like it when I offend the hell out of ponies. I think she's just mean.
Anyway. Words. Knowing your words, understanding them on a level deeper than "scream" is a synonym for "shriek" is a synonym for "loud yell" will greatly, greatly aid your ability to write. It's like... if you were an archer, then your page would be the bow, and your different words are all different arrows to shoot the hell out of things with. Now would you just want a few simple arrows, or do you want some really kick-ass armor penetrating arrows with mystical powers that can blow enemies' heads off and turn them to ice and home in on your opponents?
Yeah. That's what I thought.
Now, personally, I find words fascinating. I know that's not normal, but if you stop and think about it for a second it can become a very interesting subject: all our words come from somewhere, after all, and where they resulted from was usually the result of one bloody invasion or another, or cultures mixing together, often in a rather volatile way. Just as the use of words has evolved: I've had many fun conversations with Luna on this subject, her being... from the past and all. Like "doom," which we've come to know as dark and foreboding but originated just as another word for fate or destiny. Luna tells me how it wasn't uncommon to hear things like "I'm am doomed" and it usually meant nothing more scary than "There's something unavoidable I have to do today."
But that brings up a particularly fun subject for me: how words can be prescribed meanings based upon their sounds. Guttural and ominous-sounding words, after all, usually have ominous meanings: growl, rumble, dark, wretched, wraith... guttural and ominous... etcetera. Learning about those certain sounds that help influence that effect, to recognize how they come into play, and even more, can help you learn to tie words and descriptors together to better get an effect: a "sharkish grin" instead of a "mean smile" for example, or "cruel, cold eyes" instead of a "nasty look." Not to say that fancier words will always have the best impact: sometimes, nothing works better than the simplest descriptors, like "it was sad." If you use something like that at the right moment, something brief and simple and small, it can create a massive impact.
Another thing about words is to always remember how certain words have certain associations with them. For example, let's use doom again. It's technically correct for me to say "I feel it's doomed that something good will happen today," but a good few people are going to scoff at you. If I say "I feel it's fated that something good will happen today" I sound a little pretentious, but people aren't going to make fun of your use of the word fated. They'll just make fun of you - me, I suppose, since I used myself as the sayer example... not that. I'd ever. Say that - for other reasons.
There are a lot of trap words like that. Words that can technically be used in a wide variety of ways, but we as a people tend to only use in one specific context. It's another reason why it's important to get comfortable with knowing your words... or at least having something on-hoof to look up a particular word you're trying to fit in now and then. A thesaurus is helpful, but a thesaurus can also mislead: for example, it may list possible synonyms for "say" to include "assert," "judge," "rehearse," "opine," "yell," etcetera. While the literal definition of "say" is more along the lines of "to speak/to express in words." And we as a society tend to recognize "say" or "said" as "casual speech or natural speaking."
I mean, you wouldn't have "As the horrible monster bore down on him, grinning insanely, he said: 'No, get away from me!'" Replace "said" with "screamed" for much more terrified results. And yes, that sentence was about Luna.
We're awkward.
Okay, Luna says this post is long and boring enough for now, and that I can write more about hippos next week. She also wants me to write... no. No, no, no. We won't be discussing how to write that. She's being creepy and I'm kind of afraid of-
And then the terrible creature lunged and captured the poet in its fearsome claws, dragging the terrified pony off to its lair to use him for its nefarious delights.
~Scrivener Blooms
Pretty sure. She really got around in the old days. And really. Killed a lot of everything. Or at least pummeled the hell out of it. Which I don't think she understands can be just as bad at times.
Okay, okay, back on topic before I get beaten up too. We're finally at the post I've been wanting to do since the start but was 'too boring.' Something very important to writing, that some of us take for granted, because... we don't take the time to sit down and sift through and examine them. Things that hold a different meaning for each and every one of us, even though most of us are taught them the same way during our lifetime... but how we experience them and what we grow to associate them with is another matter entirely.
Words: and words are powerful things. Words can heal, and words can do damage nothing can ever repair. Words are there only for a moment, but last forever. They say a picture holds a thousand words, but words themselves are made up of letters, and letters are symbols, and a single word can bring a thousand images to mind. We underestimate their power, and we whine a lot about how hard it is to read this or write that or blah blah blah. But personally, for me, writing has always been my one outlet. My one form of 'magic' that this lame hornless unicorn has always had. This one way for me to share with a world that had no love or acceptance of my presence... but they couldn't silence my writing. Well, technically they almost did, but that's another story for another day that can go under a particularly-bitter post heading and be filled with lot of angry cursing and swearing and probably a lot of unfair remarks directed towards people who really are just trying to do their jobs but I treat with loathing and contempt anyway because of my own judgmental viewpoints and stuff.
That was a run on sentence. Luna also says she looks forwards to when I write that post. She seems to like it when I offend the hell out of ponies. I think she's just mean.
Anyway. Words. Knowing your words, understanding them on a level deeper than "scream" is a synonym for "shriek" is a synonym for "loud yell" will greatly, greatly aid your ability to write. It's like... if you were an archer, then your page would be the bow, and your different words are all different arrows to shoot the hell out of things with. Now would you just want a few simple arrows, or do you want some really kick-ass armor penetrating arrows with mystical powers that can blow enemies' heads off and turn them to ice and home in on your opponents?
Yeah. That's what I thought.
Now, personally, I find words fascinating. I know that's not normal, but if you stop and think about it for a second it can become a very interesting subject: all our words come from somewhere, after all, and where they resulted from was usually the result of one bloody invasion or another, or cultures mixing together, often in a rather volatile way. Just as the use of words has evolved: I've had many fun conversations with Luna on this subject, her being... from the past and all. Like "doom," which we've come to know as dark and foreboding but originated just as another word for fate or destiny. Luna tells me how it wasn't uncommon to hear things like "I'm am doomed" and it usually meant nothing more scary than "There's something unavoidable I have to do today."
But that brings up a particularly fun subject for me: how words can be prescribed meanings based upon their sounds. Guttural and ominous-sounding words, after all, usually have ominous meanings: growl, rumble, dark, wretched, wraith... guttural and ominous... etcetera. Learning about those certain sounds that help influence that effect, to recognize how they come into play, and even more, can help you learn to tie words and descriptors together to better get an effect: a "sharkish grin" instead of a "mean smile" for example, or "cruel, cold eyes" instead of a "nasty look." Not to say that fancier words will always have the best impact: sometimes, nothing works better than the simplest descriptors, like "it was sad." If you use something like that at the right moment, something brief and simple and small, it can create a massive impact.
Another thing about words is to always remember how certain words have certain associations with them. For example, let's use doom again. It's technically correct for me to say "I feel it's doomed that something good will happen today," but a good few people are going to scoff at you. If I say "I feel it's fated that something good will happen today" I sound a little pretentious, but people aren't going to make fun of your use of the word fated. They'll just make fun of you - me, I suppose, since I used myself as the sayer example... not that. I'd ever. Say that - for other reasons.
There are a lot of trap words like that. Words that can technically be used in a wide variety of ways, but we as a people tend to only use in one specific context. It's another reason why it's important to get comfortable with knowing your words... or at least having something on-hoof to look up a particular word you're trying to fit in now and then. A thesaurus is helpful, but a thesaurus can also mislead: for example, it may list possible synonyms for "say" to include "assert," "judge," "rehearse," "opine," "yell," etcetera. While the literal definition of "say" is more along the lines of "to speak/to express in words." And we as a society tend to recognize "say" or "said" as "casual speech or natural speaking."
I mean, you wouldn't have "As the horrible monster bore down on him, grinning insanely, he said: 'No, get away from me!'" Replace "said" with "screamed" for much more terrified results. And yes, that sentence was about Luna.
We're awkward.
Okay, Luna says this post is long and boring enough for now, and that I can write more about hippos next week. She also wants me to write... no. No, no, no. We won't be discussing how to write that. She's being creepy and I'm kind of afraid of-
And then the terrible creature lunged and captured the poet in its fearsome claws, dragging the terrified pony off to its lair to use him for its nefarious delights.
~Scrivener Blooms
Friday 7 September 2012
How To Write, Part 3: Practice, Practice, Practice
Writing, like... pretty much everything... requires a lot of practice and effort and work. And like with everything else, there are going to be good days and bad days, pretty much no matter how practiced you are. I mean, personally, I can usually churn out a poem or two a day, if the urge so takes me. Most days. Then there are days where I'll be lucky if I can get two coherent words together.
Still, practice helps. If you practice your trade, no matter what it is, the bad days should become less frequent... you'll even learn to push hard on even the worst of days, to manage at least a little bit. And every little trickle added to the pot helps, believe me on that. I mean, let's say you write approximately one thousand words a day. Well, that adds up to thirty thousand words over the course of a single month. It adds up, never doubt that... and more important than that, when even on bad days you add even just a sentence to your story or poem or narrative or whatever, it helps keep that steady flow. You don't end up with a day where you said "I couldn't do anything," you end up with a day where you said "I could only manage this much," but the next day you'll be able to go back and say "I left off here" instead of "I didn't write anything yesterday."
I'm probably not making a whole world of sense right now. It's been a long day around here. Luna's all quiet for once and I feel lethargic. But here I am, tapping away anyway because... that's what I do. Because even this is practice. And it's important to remember that... every form of writing you do, you put any amount of effort into, can serve as practice. Can help you experiment with different forms of narrative flow, structure, etcetera... and it can help you find what you're comfortable with, too, especially if you take the time to go back and look over that practice. Examining the way you write off-duty, so to speak, such as in journal entries, side notes, little bits of thought and prose, you can find patterns... you can find what you consciously or subconsciously always strive to include, then recognize it, learn to evolve and develop those kinds of things.
But practice. Practice, because that's what the old writers did.
Or they listened to the voices in their heads. Which went great.
You know.
Up until they died or were put in asylums.
Practice is a little safer.
~Scrivener Blooms
Still, practice helps. If you practice your trade, no matter what it is, the bad days should become less frequent... you'll even learn to push hard on even the worst of days, to manage at least a little bit. And every little trickle added to the pot helps, believe me on that. I mean, let's say you write approximately one thousand words a day. Well, that adds up to thirty thousand words over the course of a single month. It adds up, never doubt that... and more important than that, when even on bad days you add even just a sentence to your story or poem or narrative or whatever, it helps keep that steady flow. You don't end up with a day where you said "I couldn't do anything," you end up with a day where you said "I could only manage this much," but the next day you'll be able to go back and say "I left off here" instead of "I didn't write anything yesterday."
I'm probably not making a whole world of sense right now. It's been a long day around here. Luna's all quiet for once and I feel lethargic. But here I am, tapping away anyway because... that's what I do. Because even this is practice. And it's important to remember that... every form of writing you do, you put any amount of effort into, can serve as practice. Can help you experiment with different forms of narrative flow, structure, etcetera... and it can help you find what you're comfortable with, too, especially if you take the time to go back and look over that practice. Examining the way you write off-duty, so to speak, such as in journal entries, side notes, little bits of thought and prose, you can find patterns... you can find what you consciously or subconsciously always strive to include, then recognize it, learn to evolve and develop those kinds of things.
But practice. Practice, because that's what the old writers did.
Or they listened to the voices in their heads. Which went great.
You know.
Up until they died or were put in asylums.
Practice is a little safer.
~Scrivener Blooms
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