Day 295: Masculine prose

So I think it's official. I've read too much Hemingway in my lifetime, and now it's messing with my writing. See, I turned in that application for the writing center, and I had to turn in an academic paper, but there was an option for a creative writing piece. Upon consulting Del, we decided that my writing is too morbid and depressing to be shared with the general public, so I didn't send in anything. I'm not much of a poet, but it's true, my short stories are pretty weird. And then Del challenged me to write a happy story. Between Hemingway in American Lit and the Russian writers, especially Chekhov, in Euro Lit, I'm going insane. So I wrote one short story, and had another on hand that, while it wasn't happy all the way through (which can be misconstrued as sappy), at least ended happy. Usually I'm down with the details and the descriptions, but ever since Hemingway and Chekhov I've been going in fear of adjectives and adverbs. Ack. I'm cool with Pound and Eliot and going in fear of abstractions, but adjectives and adverbs? I was so paranoid about writing badly. I'm not really down with the minimalist, paratactic deal that Hemingway is known for, but his style at least emphasizes concision and precision, which I should get better at. I've been writing like mad, though, trying to do happy stories. I don't think that I will ever be a fluff writer, but I could at least learn to write different things, neh? But everyone describes Hemingway's prose as "lean and masculine." I think that's an implication that females are incapable of concision. That's just a rude stereotype. But I've been writing lots lately, which is nice. It means that the writer's block is gone. I think I should give up on the novels and go for the short fiction. Once again this proves that I write best for challenges.

This week has gone well. I'm nice and caught up on all of my homework. Latin is becoming painful once again, but as long as I set aside some time and work through the declensions and conjugations I can get through the sentences okay. Although I think that I have developed a specific distaste for reflexive pronouns.

I wrote Mal and K this week. Hadn't written poor K in a very long time, so I sent him a long letter telling him what's gone down in his virtual absence. Del seems to be getting better, as is BenTen, but she still coughs. Her presence is hailed by wracking coughs that make my ribs ache in sympathy. And Klinky may or may not be coming down with pink-eye. I'm going to work hard this weekend, and hopefully get that conference paper done sometime soon, and get many other things done, but also play DDR and game and watch some anime. Mwahaha.

Nagi is happy. I think Brad is despairing.