Writing Out of Time

Regularly changing timezones. Should probably be writing right now. I like magic and quests and characters who are a little bit different. Predominantly fantasy, historical fiction and short stories/flash fiction in response to prompts. Send me a message. I don't bite. (I might)

[taiey]

The curtains were blue because everything in the room was carefully colour coordinated, reinforcing the character’s stylish and controlled characterisation. The curtains were blue because everything in the room was a different colour, reinforcing the character’s eclectic and globe-trotting personality. The curtains were blue because the character is elsewhere established to hate the colour blue, subtextually implying that their deceased spouse was responsible for that decoration choice.

The curtains were blue because throughout their filmography the director consistently uses cool tones to mark moments of distance between characters. The curtains were blue to tie the events in that room into the broader oceanic motif of this particular novel. The curtains were blue because the assonance evoked a contrast with the following stanza of the poem.

Even the curtains looked expensive: floor to ceiling velvet drapes, in a flawless royal blue. She tucked the saucer up on the windowsill and tied back faded blue curtains with a loop of string. The narrow blinds were the same navy blue as the pinstripe suit of the man who served eviction notice that sent them to this office.

The curtains were blue because the author’s childhood home had blue curtains, which they discussed in their letters related to their feelings of comfort in that place. The curtains were blue because the author’s childhood home had blue curtains, which they discussed in their letters related to their feelings of grief in that place.

The curtains were blue as an allusion to the contemporary joke about literary criticism, an extension of the author’s autocritical approach that will be further discussed in section seven.

The curtains were red, as a pun on;

The curtains were read.

[rongzhi]

Translation request by @unbridled. English added by me :)

[blinkinink]

[les8ean]

:3

[write-out-of-time]

The river is choked by fallen leaves.

Bursting its banks, almost, in the middle of a drought.

Strange, that something so beautiful should cause such pain.

Hot sun and air so dry it hurts to breathe. No wind. No ripples in the still water.

A choice.

Man-made selfishness against the freedom of an unfettered life. The road less travelled leads in both directions.

Pause in the shade, grasshoppers setting the scene with their music. Inhale. It should be peaceful, but it isn’t. Too hot, too still, too much pressure and too little happening.

It is fleeting. And it is never-ending.

This will never happen again. This happiness, this stillness, this sense of possibility. What is yet to come.

And this is forever. This moment, this summer, this heat and the endless expanse of sunlit days with nothing to fill them.

This is the last summer.

The bittersweet songs and the endless disappointments. No responsibilities and no troubles and lazy afternoons by the river.

It should be paradise.

Sounds like heaven.

But the leaves are not the only thing that suffocate.

[historyandmemes]

When your friend starts to cough…

[corvidprompts]

“You came back!”

“I live here.”

[beccafromaphistory]

rip to all the kids who used to reads books cover to cover in one sitting and now can’t find the energy to read for fun

[write-out-of-time]

And will we be together

In those long and distant days?

When the trumpets sound

and cheers ring out?

The final charge.

The last parade.

The emptiness of souls 

Lost a thousand years ago.

Will we be together then,

At the end of it all?

As we have been

So many times before.

[60footwhitearrow]

The fact that Michael Sheen knows what the 🍑🍆💦 emojis mean but also tried to peel an onion with a potato peeler is the funniest thing to me, like what a dichotomy of knowledge, this man has the most chaotic feral energy that I have ever seen

[mjalti]

the idea of fame is like the greatest tragedy, the human soul was never meant to be consumed & the old stories warned us about what demons eat. anyways

[babyseraphim]

*opens the good omens theme score to analyze all of the theory*

it’s such a beautifully simple melody, but all of the harmonies and extra additions make it not simple at all.

the close harmonies of seconds and thirds near the end of the key change, where the key changes from A to E flat, whICH IS A TRITONE UP FROM A, ITS SO CLEVER. plus, there’s all of these accidentals in the melody which means it doesn’t really even stick to the key and the whole thing sounds like its fighting with itself whether its minor or its major.

oh and, the last playthough of the melody with all of the thirds and seconds? the first playthrough of the harmony has no harmony with it, and sounds somewhat devious, but lonely, and the melody itself reminds me kind of a snake, and of the way crowley walks. then there’s the angelic middle section, which sounds, you know. angelic, full of choirs, not so lonely, just like how aziraphale isn’t technically alone in heaven. not like how crowley is alone in hell, anyway. and then after the angel section, there’s the tritone key change (which to me, signifies crowley showing up in aziraphale’s life)

and then the ENDING!!!! with the HARMONIES!!!!! its like a slightly dissonant dance between aziraphale and crowley, they fit well together but they don’t make the most conventional pair, and they don’t always work well together. but sometimes (signified by when it changes to the harmony being in sixths) they hit their stride and really GET each other. its not really dissonant but its not fully consonant either, and its so much more INTERESTING that way

plus the harp glissandos peppered throughout? mmmmMMMM YUMMY

[write-out-of-time]

Stargazing

There is a whole, empty world waiting for us somewhere. It’s up among the stars, among the constellations that human beings have loved and fought for.

People used to tell stories about those stars. They’re half-forgotten now, dismissed as the tales of a primitive race even though the loves and losses contained within them have endured for thousands of years. Stories are what makes us human.

Come here, next to me. We’ll share a blanket on the grass. Or on the roof. Perhaps we’ll climb up to the top of the water tower and spread ourselves out across concrete made rickety and baked warm by days of sunshine. We’ll lie side by side, almost touching but not quite, and that electric patch of space between us will say more than a thousand words. The air will cool as the sun goes down. One of us will shiver, and the other will roll over to close the gap, an arm snaking around a waist and a kiss brushing a collarbone.

We will lie there under the great expanse of the night sky as stars begin to shine and we tell each other stories of the heroes and quests immortalised in their radiance.

Two separate beings, made whole under the stars.

[angel-of-stagelights]

Reasons to Write a Play

If you’re an author, you should write a play. Even if your genre is high fantasy novels, even if your genre is romance novellas, even if your genre is poetry, even if you don’t watch theatre often, you should write a play.

Why?

1. It’s a completely different medium for storytelling that still puts your writing skills to use.

2. It’s an incredibly helpful exercise in show-don’t-tell. Like seriously. Wow.

3. A new way to write characters. You can’t shoehorn in extensive physical descriptions most of the time, so you have to resort to defining them by their actions and words. Again, see point 2.

4. You’re creating a piece of performance art without even getting up off the couch? Woah??

5. It’s so gratifying to watch it performed, or even just read, if you can. Like oh wow.

6. Lots of stuff that you never think you’ll need or use again outside of playwriting follows you back into your prose work.

7. The world needs more plays that aren’t just adaptations of Disney movies or 80′s jukebox cash grabs trying to ride the coattails of Heathers. Seriously.

8. It’s fun.

9. Like, really fun.

10. For real, I have never finished a writing project more quickly or with less burnout.

[kaatiba-archive-deactivated2020]

for a writeblr, i sure do barely write anything

[thatwritergirlsblog]

Writing awesome antagonists

You guys asked for it. So, here ya go:

1. An antagonist isn’t necessarily a villain

When I hear the word ‘villain’, I think of someone with sinister/evil intentions. Someone who wants to rule the world or ruins nature by using dark magic or kicks puppies. These characters can be great in stories, but they’re not the only option for conflict.

An antagonist can be your protagonist’s competitor, an overprotective loved one, someone with a different view, or even a different side of the protagonist themself (think Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde).

If your aim is to write an antagonist (who may or may not be a villain),then this post is for you!

2. Motivation is the holy grail

Do not make your antagonist evil for the sake of being evil. The most famous example of this is Iago in the Shakespeare play Othello (yes, Shakespeare made mistakes. Deal with it.)

In children’s stories or melodramatic stage plays, it’s fine if your villain simply exists because there has to be someone evil to oppose the MC’s good. But if you’re writing anything MG or higher, this isn’t gonna cut it anymore. 

People are complicated. They have different morals, beliefs and alliances. But most people believe that they are good, that they are justified in the way they act and treat others. So, even though a great amount of people are dicks, they don’t think they are.

This should translate to your antagonist. They need to have a reason for opposing the protagonist. The first thing you should determine for each character in your book, is their fundamental motivation. What is it that they want/are striving for? Is your antagonist ambitious above all else and they are determined to become King? Is she trying to kill your MC because their blood is the only cure to some alien disease. Are they scared of the unknown and detest the protag because of their ancestry? Whatever the case is, it needs to be a real, identifiable and strong motive.

If you want to go into a more evil direction and use an inherently flawed/dangerous motivation, I would suggest linking it to solid reasons. e.g. If you’re writing something like the evil queen in Snow White, you need to link her psychopathic vanity to the flaws of the society she grew up in or the way she was treated as a child etc. Maybe the character has antisocial personality disorder (psychopathy) or was raised to squash all competition etc.

Motivation is even more important if you intend to write some scenes from the perspective of the antagonist

3. Near invincibility

You can have more than one antagonist in your story, but the big baddie should be REALLY big.

The main antagonist needs to be the biggest thing your protagonist has ever had to face. And they need to be a more-than-worthy opponent.

This ups the tension in your novel, since the reader will be anticipating the final showdown and truly wondering whether the MC will be able to come out on top.

The way to do this is to litter small conflicts between the two characters throughout the story. You protagonist should have altercations with the antagonist/their army/their minions before the big conflict at the end. Each of these smaller show-downs should end in the protagonist losing/having to retreat/surrendering/getting severely injured and discouraged. 

You can show the protagonist beating other opponents, but they shouldn’t get the upper hand over the main antagonist until the final conflict. This shows the reader than the MC will really have to dig deep in order to overcome the big conflict.

NB: The antagonist needs to start out waaayyy stronger than the protagonist.

4. Antagonist plot twists

Antagonists/villains can be great tools for shocking plot twists.

This mostly has to do with playing with expectations of who the villain will be.

So, maybe the person your characters thought was the antagonist has been under the evil influence of an even bigger baddie the whole time.

Maybe the antagonist turns out to be the one with the better philosophy/plan.

Maybe one of the “good” characters turns out to be the actual villain.

Maybe the antagonist is only a figment of the protagonist’s imagination (think Black Swan).

Maybe the system is the real bad guy and your antagonist is just another victim.

Whatever floats your boat. Just know that you can do wonderful, twisty things with the antagonist. Use that to your advantage.

5. Redemption, anyone?

This is a highly contested topic, but I believe that antagonists can and should sometimes be redeemed. 

How this happens depends on your specific story and the character. Obviously, if the antagonist committed genocide and poisoned kittens, they got some splainin to do. In these cases, the change in mind of the character has to be warranted. Something HUGE needs to happen to them that changes the way they think and behave. And they better be fucking sorry and willing to do whatever it takes to make things right.

If your antagonist isn’t the personification of evil, this will be a bit easier. Since they probably opposed the protagonist due to societal ideologies or fraudulent beliefs, it only requires the truth to be revealed for them to shift their alliance. They should still say sorry, though. It’s only polite.

My advice with redemption arcs is that the antagonist has to suffer before they can truly be redeemed. They have to face some consequences for the time they spent on the wrong side of the fight. And they shouldn’t be trusted/accepted by the protagonist immediately.

If you want to learn how to do a redemption arc right, look at Zuko’s story in Avatar: The Last Airbender. He has the best redemption arc in fictional history.

Alright, that’s all I have for now. I hope that you guys found this useful. If you want me to do a post about creating an antagonistic character that hooks the reader, be sure to leave a comment.

Reblog if you found this useful. Comment with your own tips. Follow me for similar content.

[redportrait]

me, having deeply fallen out of the practice of writing poetry: I can’t write any more, I am now a Talentless Hack

the voice of my 11th grade journalism/12th grade creative writing teacher who rly did know everything: if you stop writing for a while the words will build up and stagnate. to clear the water, you will have to open the dam completely, and accept the fact that what initially comes out will not be palatable

[m-s-harris]

This. This is so true. Starting again is more important than what you actually write. You are rusty. You’ll build up momentum again. All you need to do is start.

[sisterofiris]

A comforting thought

Five thousand years ago, the Sumerians called the night ngi, the stars mul, and the moon Nanna.

Four thousand years ago, the Akkadians called the night mūšu, the stars kakkabū, and the moon Sîn.

Three thousand years ago, the Hittites called the night išpanza, the stars haštereš, and the moon Arma.

Two and a half thousand years ago, the Greeks called the night nux, the stars astra, and the moon Selênê.

Two thousand years ago, the Romans called the night nox, the stars stellae, and the moon Luna.

Kings and queens and heroes looked up at them. So did travelers coming home, and little children who sneaked out of bed. So did slaves, and mothers and soldiers and old shepherds, and Sappho and Muršili and Enheduanna and Socrates and Hatshepsut and Cyrus and Cicero. In this darkness it didn’t matter who they were, or where they stood. Only that they were human.

Think of that tonight, when you close your window. You are not alone. You share this night sky with centuries of dreamers and stargazers, and people who longed for quiet. Are you anxious? The Hittites were too: they called it pittuliyaš. Does your heart ache? The Greeks felt it too: they called it akhos. Those who look up to the stars for comfort are a family, and you belong to them. Your ancestors have stood under Nanna, Sîn, Arma, Selênê and Luna for five thousand years. Now its light is yours.

May it soothe you well.

[thecollectibles]

Traditional sketches by Ashline Art