(no subject)
Jun. 4th, 2003 07:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
essayelHave lots to write about, mainly due to LJ making my life much more interesting by eating my two previous attempts to post!
Physically I’m a wreck – migraine last week, food poisoning at the weekend and on Monday I put my back out and am hobbling around like a ruptured duck. Can’t even claim to have been doing anything worthwhile…like falling off the kitchen table while having wild jungle sex… since I was loading the washing machine when it happened. Oooooh the dangers inherent in laundry!
What else has happened?
Paul and Mike got to go and see Terry Pratchett at the Hay Festival – I couldn’t get cover dammit! He was a very entertaining speaker and they said it was a pity I missed it but they took one of my books with them and Mike and Barley queued up in relays to get him to sign it. He heartily approved of Mike’s gothic appearance and when told why I hadn’t brought the book myself signed it ‘To Sally…you really had to be there..’ Oh well, he’ll be there again, bless him.
Eeeww mildly yukky happening. Jen came to me grumbling that she had something scratchy in her sweater. I was as sympathetic as all mothers are under those circumstances – not vastly – and suggested she took it off. She did but said her arm was still being ‘itched’. I looked up the arm of her t-shirt and saw a little dark something under her arm then realised it was metallic then that I was looking at about 3mm of a needle. There was just enough to get hold of to pull it out and a good 25mm slid out of her puppyfat. Thank goodness she is – well covered. If she’d been a skinny little thing it might have hit bone!
Mike, bless, is doing GCSEs. Tension mounts. Poor lad. When you’re fifteen its tough to be doing something that will determine your future – though in the middle ages he would probably have been on the battle field. Henry V was commanding a wing of cavalry at 15. If he passes the right GCSEs he can pick and choose his A levels and if his GCSE results are good he will get better offers for university places. August 21st the results come out and there’s nothing I can do other than nag him to revise!
On the writing front I posted Writer’s Block on FA and the very first review was one of those that make you shake your head in bafflement. The exact wording was “oh dear, I didn’t like this at all.” Now, fair enough, it wasn’t a good fic and had many faults but as a review ‘I didn’t like this at all’ is about as much help as a chocolate kettle. I can only assume that the reviewer found every aspect of it – the style, the phraseology, the attempts at humour, the OC, the sex – so distressing that she was lost for words. As usual I emailed to say thanks for the review and to ask, rather plaintively, for a more detailed critique but…and this was the really annoying thing…the person, T.T., doesn’t appear to have registered. Someone else said they didn’t like it because Remus is or was a teacher and they found it unbearably squicky to think that teachers might possibly have sex (must remember to tell my husband that) but that’s a fair comment. I feel a bit the same about traffic wardens.
While on the subject of baffling reviews…Cas was very much afflicted by a couple she had from one of the fan fiction ‘greats’. When a famous writer reads and reviews one does hope that she is going to like it but her remarks were not only patronising but also inaccurate. For instance that ‘blench’ isn’t a real word. True it’s not in everyday use even in the UK but it is familiar, though often confused with blanch which is something one does to almonds and string beans. Well, OK, perhaps it is a word she had never come across and perhaps she either didn’t have a dictionary or couldn’t be arsed to look in one, but she strongly criticised Cas for using British phrases and turns of speech ‘that might not understood by the readers’. Hmm, wish I had a pound for every time I’ve seen dollars and cents mentioned in HP fics, or the Dursleys sitting down to a stack of pancakes for breakfast. For goodness sake, the ‘great’ in question even had a fifteen year old Harry roofing 4 Privet Drive at one point, which is fine in the US where shingles are light and easy to use but absolutely out of order in the UK where shingles are NOT used and roofing slates or tiles are incredibly heavy, hard to lay and difficult to handle, requiring a very different technique. (I once had a long and interesting conversation about this very subject with relatives of mine in Canada who have a building company and were appalled and amused at the difference between the two jobs.) Even the stingiest British uncle wouldn’t be daft enough to entrust a job as important as re-roofing to a teenager he regards as little better than an idiot. Cas, on the other hand, was writing about Britons talking to other Britons in Britain! Why shouldn’t she allow a little flavour of the country to creep in? Perhaps in future, UK writers should prefix all their fics with the following warning:
“Please note: This fic has been written in British English by a British person. Despite all our efforts the British persist in using archaic forms of speech and turns of phrase that are not common elsewhere on the globe. If any readers find themselves confused or alarmed by such misuse of the language please feel free to treat the author like a moron.”
Cas, while hopping mad initially, calmed down after having a good rave to me and inserted a very dignified definition, plus dictionary reference, of blench in the relevant review. This may have had some effect because 24 hours later she was invited to become a Niffler. Now we are wondering if it was all some kind of strange and esoteric test as to how she would react to criticism. I still feel annoyed on her behalf, however.
Hey, I think that was my very first rant! Just for fun – non-UK readers, should British writers try to write in as Mid-Atlantic a style as possible or keep to the old ways and lose a few readers by the wayside? I’d start a poll if I knew how to.
This has been a good week for birthdays. Mabel’s birthday was on Saturday so I sent her a copy of the rather outré photo of Viggo Mortensen that Camilla emailed me, embellishing it with a party hat, squeaker and a label, tied firmly, saying “To Mabes”.
It was Kate’s birthday on Sunday so I sent her another Lymond – this time I got his mouth and jawline right. If I keep pitching away at it I might get the rest of him into shape by Christmas! Then because I was in the mood for drawing I cloned Viggo and used his willowy form as a template for a very sultry, sulky, seriously nude Sirius and sent him back to Camilla. My Mum’s birthday was on Tuesday but I didn’t send her a naked anyone, feeling that at 78 it might be a bit much for her!
Physically I’m a wreck – migraine last week, food poisoning at the weekend and on Monday I put my back out and am hobbling around like a ruptured duck. Can’t even claim to have been doing anything worthwhile…like falling off the kitchen table while having wild jungle sex… since I was loading the washing machine when it happened. Oooooh the dangers inherent in laundry!
What else has happened?
Paul and Mike got to go and see Terry Pratchett at the Hay Festival – I couldn’t get cover dammit! He was a very entertaining speaker and they said it was a pity I missed it but they took one of my books with them and Mike and Barley queued up in relays to get him to sign it. He heartily approved of Mike’s gothic appearance and when told why I hadn’t brought the book myself signed it ‘To Sally…you really had to be there..’ Oh well, he’ll be there again, bless him.
Eeeww mildly yukky happening. Jen came to me grumbling that she had something scratchy in her sweater. I was as sympathetic as all mothers are under those circumstances – not vastly – and suggested she took it off. She did but said her arm was still being ‘itched’. I looked up the arm of her t-shirt and saw a little dark something under her arm then realised it was metallic then that I was looking at about 3mm of a needle. There was just enough to get hold of to pull it out and a good 25mm slid out of her puppyfat. Thank goodness she is – well covered. If she’d been a skinny little thing it might have hit bone!
Mike, bless, is doing GCSEs. Tension mounts. Poor lad. When you’re fifteen its tough to be doing something that will determine your future – though in the middle ages he would probably have been on the battle field. Henry V was commanding a wing of cavalry at 15. If he passes the right GCSEs he can pick and choose his A levels and if his GCSE results are good he will get better offers for university places. August 21st the results come out and there’s nothing I can do other than nag him to revise!
On the writing front I posted Writer’s Block on FA and the very first review was one of those that make you shake your head in bafflement. The exact wording was “oh dear, I didn’t like this at all.” Now, fair enough, it wasn’t a good fic and had many faults but as a review ‘I didn’t like this at all’ is about as much help as a chocolate kettle. I can only assume that the reviewer found every aspect of it – the style, the phraseology, the attempts at humour, the OC, the sex – so distressing that she was lost for words. As usual I emailed to say thanks for the review and to ask, rather plaintively, for a more detailed critique but…and this was the really annoying thing…the person, T.T., doesn’t appear to have registered. Someone else said they didn’t like it because Remus is or was a teacher and they found it unbearably squicky to think that teachers might possibly have sex (must remember to tell my husband that) but that’s a fair comment. I feel a bit the same about traffic wardens.
While on the subject of baffling reviews…Cas was very much afflicted by a couple she had from one of the fan fiction ‘greats’. When a famous writer reads and reviews one does hope that she is going to like it but her remarks were not only patronising but also inaccurate. For instance that ‘blench’ isn’t a real word. True it’s not in everyday use even in the UK but it is familiar, though often confused with blanch which is something one does to almonds and string beans. Well, OK, perhaps it is a word she had never come across and perhaps she either didn’t have a dictionary or couldn’t be arsed to look in one, but she strongly criticised Cas for using British phrases and turns of speech ‘that might not understood by the readers’. Hmm, wish I had a pound for every time I’ve seen dollars and cents mentioned in HP fics, or the Dursleys sitting down to a stack of pancakes for breakfast. For goodness sake, the ‘great’ in question even had a fifteen year old Harry roofing 4 Privet Drive at one point, which is fine in the US where shingles are light and easy to use but absolutely out of order in the UK where shingles are NOT used and roofing slates or tiles are incredibly heavy, hard to lay and difficult to handle, requiring a very different technique. (I once had a long and interesting conversation about this very subject with relatives of mine in Canada who have a building company and were appalled and amused at the difference between the two jobs.) Even the stingiest British uncle wouldn’t be daft enough to entrust a job as important as re-roofing to a teenager he regards as little better than an idiot. Cas, on the other hand, was writing about Britons talking to other Britons in Britain! Why shouldn’t she allow a little flavour of the country to creep in? Perhaps in future, UK writers should prefix all their fics with the following warning:
“Please note: This fic has been written in British English by a British person. Despite all our efforts the British persist in using archaic forms of speech and turns of phrase that are not common elsewhere on the globe. If any readers find themselves confused or alarmed by such misuse of the language please feel free to treat the author like a moron.”
Cas, while hopping mad initially, calmed down after having a good rave to me and inserted a very dignified definition, plus dictionary reference, of blench in the relevant review. This may have had some effect because 24 hours later she was invited to become a Niffler. Now we are wondering if it was all some kind of strange and esoteric test as to how she would react to criticism. I still feel annoyed on her behalf, however.
Hey, I think that was my very first rant! Just for fun – non-UK readers, should British writers try to write in as Mid-Atlantic a style as possible or keep to the old ways and lose a few readers by the wayside? I’d start a poll if I knew how to.
This has been a good week for birthdays. Mabel’s birthday was on Saturday so I sent her a copy of the rather outré photo of Viggo Mortensen that Camilla emailed me, embellishing it with a party hat, squeaker and a label, tied firmly, saying “To Mabes”.
It was Kate’s birthday on Sunday so I sent her another Lymond – this time I got his mouth and jawline right. If I keep pitching away at it I might get the rest of him into shape by Christmas! Then because I was in the mood for drawing I cloned Viggo and used his willowy form as a template for a very sultry, sulky, seriously nude Sirius and sent him back to Camilla. My Mum’s birthday was on Tuesday but I didn’t send her a naked anyone, feeling that at 78 it might be a bit much for her!
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2003-06-04 01:04 pm (UTC)Eek! Hell, no! I bet that's the sort of thinking that led to the US editions of the books being "translated." It won't kill any of us to learn a new word once in a while, really, it won't.
Sigh. And here I am, running my British beta reader ragged in an effort to remove the Americanisms from my stories... Dopey me.
Re:
Date: 2003-06-04 01:19 pm (UTC)I am constantly astounded at the trouble non-UK writers take to get the little details right but if there's a mistake or two it doesn't matter to me as long as the fic is good! It's the things you don't even think about that can catch you out. Things like posting a letter or going into a bar and ordering a beer - we don't you see we go down the pub for a pint. All the same, even the average US writer does a far better job, I'm sure, of writing English HP than I would writing about the US. All I know is what I have seen on the telly and I don't think that's any more accurate a picture of real life in the US than the British programmes that are transmitted in the US reflect my daily experience of life in the UK.
If you ever need any UK input other than from your Brit picker, feel free to post a question on our Original Spin yahoo group. There are several of us who can provide all kinds of odd information if you need it. We also host original and crossover fiction for HP fanfic authors!
(no subject)
Date: 2003-06-04 01:56 pm (UTC)I know what you mean. I've been to England dozens of times, both on holiday and on business trips. I've read tons of British novels, watched endless hours of British TV, have many British coworkers. Yet I still needed to be told, when working on "Harry Potter and the Polka Dot Plague," that Brits don't get shots at the doctor's office, they get jabs.
Thanks for the info about Original Spin, I'll have to check it out.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-06-04 04:57 pm (UTC)As a non-UK reader, I'll just say to UK writers - old ways all the way, baby!! JK doesn't Americanize everything after all (except for those bits in PS/SS, but I can forgive her for that since it was her first publishing deal and everything). For a fandom that puts so much emphasis on brit-picking, I'd think that a fic written by an actual UKer should get a bit more respect.
And an excellent way to handle the criticism - balloons to Cas for the promotion to Niffler-dom!
(no subject)
Date: 2003-06-04 11:26 pm (UTC)When American writers write about the south, they use southern idioms and speech; when they right about the small towns in the northeast, they do the same. Heck, there are so many different ways of saying something in America depending on where you are, that sometimes it's like reading a different language. So, why shouldn't people writing about England write the way they talk? Try to make it understandable in the context, or provide a glossary (ESPECIALLY if you use that rhyming slang. That stuff makes absolutely no sense to me.) I, for one, like the way Brits talk. I'm even starting to learn what some of the slang means from listening to Richard (I'm always asking him, "What's that mean?" hehe) So, my answer is "YES!"
(no subject)
Date: 2003-06-04 11:29 pm (UTC)