Raises hand.

Oh! Oh! Can I help? :D

@Negrostotle YES

Is there an area you’d be particularly keen on writing about? Going off your contributions I thought maybe something about how formalized systems of meter/rhythm have affected your own work?

@stephen_j_p

I think I can definitely do our intro.

and @Alcaeus The Great Gatsby is about 50k words. Harry Potter 1 is about 72k words.

So, 130k words is a very big book, but page count depends entirely on formatting. For an initial novel, I think it’s too big, which is one of the reasons it’s on hiatus. Later on, novelists can realease much bigger books. I believe Storm of Swords(? the third one) by George R.R. Martin is nearly 300k words. But I want to trim and change a great deal of that novel. The one I’m working on now is unrelated.

The first is sci-fi – the undercurrent are about the ethics of genetic modification and treatment on A.I. but I don’t like things to be to preachy so one should be able to read it in its finished state as just a sci-fi military romp.

The second is closer to fantasy and deals with a drug addict and an orphan – so undercurrents are really about dealing with addiction / what’s right and what’s wrong et cetera. I’ve just begun that this semester and turn in about 6-12 pages a week to discuss with my creative writing prof who is a published author.

@Bradapalooza Your ideas are really cool. Did you ever read any of Lois McMaster Bujold’s Vorkosigan Series novels? They’re also fun military sci fi books that double as trenchant explorations of various issues.

@Abraxas01

Yeah I’ve actually read almost everything she’s ever written (although after I started the first novel). The drug addiction problems are an issue I’ve explored in various topics – a short story, a feature length screenplay, and a few other things – that I frequently return to and am focusing on for this novel.

@stephen_j_p – I just might do that! Lol.

@stephen_j_p Amazing distribution/game planning! We would definitely have the market on meter if we could put something like that up. Also, I’d love to hear about theory regarding meter, whatever it is, it sounds fascinating.
I’ll get on my bit tomorrow-ish probably. Do you think we make separate pages and then combine them when they’re all finished and/or make a sort of album page that links to “intro to english meter” “meter in spoken word” etc?

@jeeho You’re welcome :)

@Bradapalooza interesting stuff with word count, so the great gatsby’s only like a 100 page word document single spaced. I guess I should work on making my stories shorter…

Both ideas sound really cool. Although I don’t know much about sci-fi, the other one sounds like a sort of infinite jest meets golden compass, ha, but I’m sure you hear the former comparison every time you mention that the book deals with addiction.

What’s your prof’s name?

@Alcaeus

David Haynes – I’ve never read any of his novels – I believe he mostly writes children’s novels. However, he knows a great deal about the craft – which is what’s helpful to me + he’s an extra set of eyes. I like some of what I’ve read by him but I believe he also sometimes writes in present tense – which I’m not a fan of.

As for romantic poems to look for – Keats’s “On First Looking Into Chapman’s Homer” and his odes; WW’s Lucy Grey poems and The Prelude as well as his prose “Preface to Lyrical Ballads; STC’s "Dejection Ode”; and many many more. Those alone should keep you busy for a crazy amount of time if you go into any depth.

@Alcaeus Thanks dude– my plan was to make an “album” of the different pieces, yeah. Though we’ll see how things go. I should’ve mentioned before, if anyone would like any help proofreading/copyediting/conceptualizing, or you just wanna chop it generally on this topic, feel free to hit me up.

Re: metrical theory, my memory’s kind of dusty, but the earliest quotes I remember come from around the 16th century. This piece by Thomas Campion from 1602 kicked things off– i.e., talking about English in Greek/Latin terminology and clouding the debate from the start.

I was pushed pretty hard to read The Rhythms of English Poetry back at uni, which is really, really good but unfortunately out of print now. It deals with English poetry as English, kind of complex, but makes a lot of sense if you set aside some time to understand it.

@stephen_j_p awesome game plan! I’m totally with the blog post :) I’ll hop on that soon!

So excited about all that’s popping off right now!

@stephen_j_p Heck yes. I may end up writing a manifesto on why we need more metric analysis of rap, but I’m sure I can cut that into a guide with relevant examples (el-P and Earl Sweatshirt will figure prominently).

@Bradapalooza Cool, I looked him up, seems pretty legit. And at any rate, as you say, an extra pair of eyes (particularly experienced ones) is always helpful. And c'mon, present tense for vividness can be cool :p

I know Keats fairly well, but do need to read more Wordsworth, so I’ll get right on those when I find the time. Ha on that particular Keats poem, it reminds me of how Byron apparently used to hate on him for not knowing Greek. I once had a spunk student’s intro to Homeric diction that began with something along the lines of

If Keats would have been able to look into Homer’s Homer as opposed to Chapman, western literature might look a bit different today…

Not sure how true that is, but definitely funny.

Chapman’s*

@stephen_j_p No problem, bra. Yeah album definitely seems like the way to go.

The Campion stuff sounds fascinating, I’d love to give it (or your intro) a look and maybe incorporate that some into my own, quantitative piece. Lol obfuscating the discussion with foreign words is always the best way to go :p

Thanks for the book rec as well!

The Heroical verse that is distinguisht by the Dactile, hath bene oftentimes attempted in our English toong, but with passing pitifull successe: and no wonder, seeing it is an attempt altogether against the nature of our language.

lol