I feel like when you’re writing, organizing chapters and dialogue is easy
but jfc, the amount of time it takes to constantly keep people moving and make sure they’re in the right spaces and trying to come up with wording for it is always such a shock.
Like, fuck, I made you pick up a coffee cup, you need to put it down at some point. also I can’t remember what I dressed you in, can you push up your sleeves? I don’t remember if you even have your shirt on.
and YOU. YOU OVER THERE, you got out of your chair earlier, but did you come back yet? Are you coming back? Where did you even go and why’d you get up? Fuck, I can’t make you sit down again already, you just stood up, go…over there. go get more coffee. Did you bring your mug with you? fine. bring the pot to the table and—wait, wasn’t the coffee pot already over here? shit, hold on, I need to go back and re-read and re-write
this is the most relevant thing i have ever read.
I think one of the most wild things as a writer is the sensation that you’re not actually directing your characters– they’re sort of directing themselves, and you’re scrambling around attempting to copy down whatever it was that they just did, but they don’t wait for you to finish copying. They just keep walking and talking and moving around and existing of their own volition and at some point you look up and you’re like “WHOA OKAY EVERYBODY BACK THE FUCK UP WHERE ARE WE”
It’s kind of like trying to write sheet music for an orchestra while it’s playing
Captioned because even I’m having trouble reading this:
[A screenshot from snapchat of a document that is cut off on the extreme edges, erasing the first and last two or three letters from each line. Doing my best to correctly transcribe]
Breach of terms of service: culturehustle.com Illegal acquisition on behalf of Anish Kapoor of the World’s Pinkest Pink
Dear Sirs,
I am aware that you represent Mr. Anish Kapoor, and I write today not to dob him in so that you can tell him off but rather to try and resolve this matter. Unlike Kapoor I am not one to ‘point the finger’ however on this occasion it has become important to do so.
I hold your gallery in the highest esteem, I am a fan of several of your artists, but on this occasion you have been extremely naughty. You have been part of a conspiracy to obtain my PINK and provide Mr. Kapoor with it.
We have now finished fully researching this situation and it has come to your attention that you have been part of a conspiracy to obtain my PINK and provide Mr. Kapoor with it enabling him to exploit the substance against my wishes. Further, this juvenile behavior made much of the wider artistic community sad thanks to his extremely petty and childish post on Instagram.
The terms of service on my site CultureHustle.com are incredibly clear: Quote: By adding this product to your cart you agree that you are not Anish Kapoor, you are in no way affiliated with Anish Kapoor, you are not purchasing this item on behalf of Anish Kapoor or an associate of Anish Kapoor. To the best of your knowledge, information and belief this product will not make its way into that hands of Anish Kapoor.
In direct violation to the above, on 10th of December 2016 a person by the name of Mr [Blanked out] placed an order via the culturehustle.com website, for one jar of PINK at 5:36 am. This order was placed on behalf of your gallery and was delivered to the Lisson Gallery in London at 11:38 am on the 13th of December. Shortly after which your gallery provided Mr. Kapoor with the substance and on the 23rd of December 2016 Mr. Kapoor posted a photograph on Instagram showing he was indeed in possession of the substance, he also included the caption ‘Up Yours’. The comments on this post clearly demonstrate the negative impact such a gesture has had upon a wide community. He needs to say sorry for hurting everyone’s feelings.
I remind you, hoarding colours and stealing other people’s colours without asking nicely isn’t big -rd it’s simply bad.
I said I think it would be best to resolve this matter amicably without this silly business escalating any further. However, if we are unable to resolve this in a timely and grown up way I am fully prepared to take further action which will no doubt become stressful and expensive.
Therefore I would appreciate it if: 1. Your gallery would say sorry for giving my pink to Mr. Kapoor. 2. Mr. Kapoor would give me my pink back. I don’t want him to have it. 3. He will write 100 times, ‘I will be nice, I will share my colours’ and he will post the same to his Instagram.
Failing the above, an agreeable settlement would also be: 1. The reimbursement of $3.99 (the cost of PINK minus shipping) 2. And Mr. Kapoor to void his exclusive agreement to the use of Vanta Black in art.
If you were to settle as above I will be more than happy to share all my colours with him, so he doesn’t feel left out and can join in with the rest of us.
I look forward to resolving this matter.
Yours,
Stuart Semple
Thank you for captioning this! I’d seen it before but never been able to read it.
the hag in folklore actually is symbolic of men being afraid that when women get older we’ll realize how shit they really are and eat them which is fair and they should be
Oh sure, when nature draws a perfectly triangular cave it’s “a syncline-anticline fold” and “used by shepherds as a shelter since ancient times, but when I do it suddenly it’s “bad worldbuilding.”
There’s a quote that I can’t remember well enough to do a search to find, but paraphrased it’s this: Writers have a more difficult job than God because God is under no requirements to make their work believable.
Hey can I just say that it’s utterly fucked that George RR Martin and Patrick Rothfuss are revered as gods of modern fantasy writing when neither of them has been able to produce a book in years and they also can’t write women
plus George RR Martin just copied wars of the roses
and Rothfuss made a legit plot point that Kvothe fucked a fairy for months
I’m not saying that I don’t enjoy these books, because I do, but I am just saying that I read fantasy books 10x better by women all the time.
meanwhile, there are so many female fantasy authors who produce brilliant work, but because it is marketed towards women, it’s either YA or it’s paranormal romance (BOTH OF WHICH I STAN OK) and therefore doesn’t get considered “serious” fantasy even though they have better world building, magic, and writing style than most “masters of the genre.”
like, why is it that fantasy books written about women and by women are ONLY READ BY WOMEN AND MARKETED TO WOMEN, meanwhile fantasy books written by men about men are READ BY EVERYONE AND MARKETED AS THE NORM.
like male fantasy nerds are just sleeping on Ilona Andrews because they write about women and add a romance plot line, meanwhile Kate Daniels is one of the best damn fantasy series I have ever read with some of the best world building and plotting e v e r.
And I’m not implying that authors have to produce 3 books a year to be serious authors, but it’s a bit ridiculous that the fantasy genre and pub industry keeps pushing asoiaf and kingkiller chronicles at us when we don’t even have a date for the sequel. WHY DON’T YOU PROMOTE BOOKS BY WOMEN WHO KNOW HOW TO WRITE GOOD FEMALE CHARACTERS?? WHY NOT PROMOTE FANTASY BOOKS BY AUTHORS OF COLOR??
WHY IS FANTASY ON THE SAME WHITE MAN BULLSHIT ALL THE TIME????
One of my favorite fantasy series of all time is N.K. Jemisin’s Broken Earth trilogy. In which every book in the series has won a fucking hugo award! but do you see it getting the same amount of press that these male fantasy authors do? no. and that pisses me off because her books have such amazing fleshed out female (and male) characters and a complex world.
the following are concepts that i quickly learned my way around when growing up in fandom, but that seem to have fallen out of use recently. i’d like to propose a revival of…
NOTP: a pairing that, for whatever reason, you simply cannot stand. it can be because the ship repulses you morally, or because you hate one of the characters, or love them both but despise their dynamic – or just because looking at it makes you uncomfortable, for whatever reason.
different from labeling something a “bad ship” in that it implies an entirely personal preference.
calling a ship your NOTP informs others that you really, really, REALLY dislike it, while also acknowledging that you don’t know what other people’s reasons are for shipping it, or what interpretations they may have that makes it work for them.
a cool way of avoiding stuff you hate while also not morally condemning thousands of complete strangers for liking it.
squick: similar to notp, but goes for anything, not just romantic pairings. something you just don’t like, either for specific reasons or just because it irrationally repulses you.
not as severe as a trigger in the sense that it doesn’t cause any extreme and potentially harmful reactions – it’s just something you’d rather not see, because it grosses you the fuck out. and that’s okay.
decent people respect other people’s squicks, while also remembering it’s cool for other people to like things they personally are squicked by.
this works as long as everyone agrees not to be dicks and shove stuff in people’s faces in unwarranted ways.
crackship: a ship that just doesn’t make any sense. there’s absolutely no chance that these characters would ever end up together.
perhaps they’ve never interacted. perhaps they are on opposite sides of a war. perhaps one of them died a thousand years ago. for whatever reason, there’s zero possibility of this becoming canon.
still, you’d like to see how they’d romantically mesh, to explore their dynamic or a what-if scenario – or maybe they’re just two characters you really like to imagine smooching one another.
the fact that it isn’t and never will be canon doesn’t matter, and can even be part of the appeal. it certainly does not invalidate the ship’s existence. the ultimate form of doing something just for fun.
these words all help describe the cool concept of doing stuff you enjoy, while also realizing others may be doing things you hate, but not in order to victimize you personally. live and let live! give people the benefit of the doubt! it’s a good time. we should all try it.
So today pulling into Stop and Shop, this lady cut me off and nearly drove into me, and then, when I tried to pass her, she swung to the right and nearly hit me again, and then flipped me off.
So somebody is having a bad day and taking it out on me. That’s fine. It’s harmless, and I don’t know what’s going on in this woman’s life. I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt she’s not just a piece of shit and is just having a bad day.
But then I park and she follows me, and gets out of the car and starts swearing at me and getting in my face.
Now I go from “indifferent” to “I’m gonna fuck with this woman’s head.” Now I would say I’m a gentleman of size, and in all black and bemohawked I probably look spookier than I actually am, so props to this lady for getting in my face. Now of course I’m not going to hit her, or even threaten violence. That’s shitty. Nobody should get threatened with violence.
Instead, I take a step back, narrowing my eyes like I’m studying her face really closely, and then I touch one of the several piece of “occulty” jewelry I’m wearing (none of which, by the way, are magicked in any way at all). Then I mumble some nonsense under my breath, and then make the fig gesture and the horns at her.
She stops, wide-eyed.
“WHAT THE HELL DID YOU JUST DO TO ME?”
I chuckled, and shake my head. “Nothing at all.” I say in a not-terrible convincing voice. “But every time something bad happens to you today, you’re gonna be thinking of me.”
Artisan Scribbles 