/lit/ - Literature

>>13011557
good company. writing is a solitary career.
plus low maintenance and needs, dont give a fuck about too much stuff, no need to be taken for a daily walk etc

Also, I'm not sure if it's helpful, but the following just came to my mind:

The question you pose is obviously a valid one from the perspectives of sociology, psychology etc. which try to describe a human being from the outside, as a part and a product of vast network of relations. However, when you adopt such a perspective with respect to yourself, you start to consider yourself as an empirical object (a sociological/psychological/etc. being) rather than the completely free consciousness you deep down know yourself to be. But authenticity isn't something detectable from the outside; it is only relevant from the point of view of the project of your own life.

Hey /lit/. Rate the first paragraph of my novella. And feel free to post your own first paragraphs. I'd like to discuss what makes an engaging opening to a story.

The arrival on the platform was disorienting. As always, it took a few moments for my vision to adjust and for my stomach to settle. Right away, I noticed things were amiss. The lights in the large, white, circular chamber, usually oppressive, were dim. The gawky lab technicians assigned to greet all new visitors were nowhere to be seen. A steadily increasing burning sensation was affecting the soles of my feet. But it was the violent whirring noise coming from the circular platform that alerted me to the danger. Without a second thought, I leapt from the platform and dashed for the arched white door, which slid upward for me at its normal, speedy rate. Behind me, a great electrical discharge erupted, which briefly cast an odd shadow of myself on the wall that I was facing, and fragments of the platform shot into the walls and ceiling of the chamber. The sound was horrible, like a bomb going off in a thunderstorm. I turned around to see that the destroyed platform had caught fire and that small wires were poking through the holes in its ruptured frame like headless snakes. Then the door shut itself and I was alone in a dark hallway.

Micro-critiques are strongly encouraged. In particular, I am unsure of the word "amiss" (too antiquated? - the protagonist is a marine biologist and might therefore use a stuffy word like that) and the simile "like headless snakes" following the denotation of the wires jutting from the damaged platform.

>pic unrelated: some nerd and his cat

The name of the cat is Nothing

“Authors like cats because they are such quiet, lovable, wise creatures, and cats like authors for the same reasons.”

Why don't you have a cat yet?