Today's Keyboard Smash
Aug. 30th, 2020 06:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
scrubjayspeaksI've noticed something when writing for Lewisia. Every week, Monday is dedicated to the community events calendar, which is broadly an opportunity for me to play with announcements, wanted ads, warnings, and other "nonfiction" type entries. It's a further restriction in an already restricted format (because I live to complicate my own life), and I find them the most difficult to write each week. Particularly because they tend to be seasonally appropriate in some way--while I do write some evergreen ones that can be deployed at any time of year, I'm usually targeting some current event. I spend a lot of time checking the National Day Calendar for potentially absurd inspiration.
What I've noticed, though, is that I'll often write a piece only to realize that there's nothing fantastical happening in it. While most of the regular pieces come out with some element of the strange from inception, the event pieces frequently just...don't. I'll read over what I think is a finished piece and go...uh...magical realism what?
Sometimes, when that happens, I go back and revise it until it has some fantasy flavor. It doesn't necessarily take much--thankfully, because three sentences go quick if you have to explain much. Often a list will do the trick: normal thing, normal(ish) thing, logically connected but outrageous thing. Just enough to tilt the idea off-center. Occasionally, though, I just let it stand as is, mundane as it may be.
That's because I've figured out what's happening when I write those mundane pieces: the fantasy is that a functional town like Lewisia exists in America. Those pieces, devoid as they are of monsters and magic, still feel like they belong in a fantasy series because they're suggesting a town where community building is a priority and has been throughout the town's history. It's a place where people's well-being is valued and actively bolstered. Where people come together to meet needs locally for everything from recreation to education to fashion.
It's just something that happens in Lewisia when I look through that window* I have. They aren't necessarily making a point of showcasing the fantastic at every moment. It only seems noteworthy if I stop and think about it in the context of genre. I'm still never completely sure if I should do anything about this when it happens. It feels dishonest, somehow, to artificially boost up the weird. Sometimes, you just have to report on the shocking development of a town where things work right.
*The idea of a fictional world being a place I'm just looking in on, versus something I'm deliberately creating, is something I'm still trying to think through. I'll write a piece on that at some point too.
What I've noticed, though, is that I'll often write a piece only to realize that there's nothing fantastical happening in it. While most of the regular pieces come out with some element of the strange from inception, the event pieces frequently just...don't. I'll read over what I think is a finished piece and go...uh...magical realism what?
Sometimes, when that happens, I go back and revise it until it has some fantasy flavor. It doesn't necessarily take much--thankfully, because three sentences go quick if you have to explain much. Often a list will do the trick: normal thing, normal(ish) thing, logically connected but outrageous thing. Just enough to tilt the idea off-center. Occasionally, though, I just let it stand as is, mundane as it may be.
That's because I've figured out what's happening when I write those mundane pieces: the fantasy is that a functional town like Lewisia exists in America. Those pieces, devoid as they are of monsters and magic, still feel like they belong in a fantasy series because they're suggesting a town where community building is a priority and has been throughout the town's history. It's a place where people's well-being is valued and actively bolstered. Where people come together to meet needs locally for everything from recreation to education to fashion.
It's just something that happens in Lewisia when I look through that window* I have. They aren't necessarily making a point of showcasing the fantastic at every moment. It only seems noteworthy if I stop and think about it in the context of genre. I'm still never completely sure if I should do anything about this when it happens. It feels dishonest, somehow, to artificially boost up the weird. Sometimes, you just have to report on the shocking development of a town where things work right.
*The idea of a fictional world being a place I'm just looking in on, versus something I'm deliberately creating, is something I'm still trying to think through. I'll write a piece on that at some point too.
(no subject)
Date: 2020-08-31 10:45 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2020-09-07 02:41 pm (UTC)Formally, I track named locations and characters and make a point of circling around to them every so often to make sure no one gets forgotten and no single topic gets overdone. I use bingo cards and seasonal events as prompts, which helps maintain a sense of realistic time passing. A three-sentence story can't do a lot of heavy lifting when it comes to the passage of time, not on an individual basis. I rely on the metanarrative, the whole arc of a year in Lewisia, to add that flavor in aggregate.