/lit/ - Literature

To start off, I’d like to share the 700 word opening to a dark fantasy I’m working on.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1m5z7Gyv_yb2R7fI-7E8o4bsCijj1782rWzuXUs_brIE/edit

>>15734155
>https://docs.google.com/document/d/1m5z7Gyv_yb2R7fI-7E8o4bsCijj1782rWzuXUs_brIE/edit
lowkey reads off a little pretenious but it got me engaged, especially as I got closer to the end


https://pastebin.com/g4cx2tfY

email fourlitreview at yandex dot com for invite to secret club
must provide four books you've read
no plebs allowed

>>15734155
The prose it pretty good, It flowed nicely. You set the environment well, maybe spend a bit more attention on the weather or time of day? ( Is it dark just because it is night or is the environment, like an extremely heavy smog, what causes it be dark) although mystery is important. Also were the voices that were appearing his thoughts or some type of apparition or hallucination. I don't know anything about the environment he is in so when the first voice appeared when he fell into the hole, I thought there was a creature there, or some oddity (justifiably because it is a dark fantasy). I would just add in, "he thought," or specify it somehow. Besides that I really cant offer you an extensive critique.

I decided to write a sonnet.

O, sleep you set my ailing soul at ease.
She That softly looks on my resting head,
Quells my mind of its harping stormy seas
Letting me rest in innocence instead.
In My mind goes the raging tempest free.
A drifting lonely Ship should surely drown,
lest her caress calm waves surrounding me.
I love her so, she who subdues my frown.
I wish I could forever hide my face,
Within my lovers rolling, calming breast.
Alas, however much I want her grace,
She will as fated leave when I still rest.
When at daybreak I find I am alone,
I threat not, night will come, for this is known.

>>15734149
Where is this?

>>15735482
A backyard in Vermont

https://anchor.fm/rigamarolepod/episodes/The-City-Itch-edsfot/a-a25i666

Narrated short story. It's finished so really I'm just sharing it with you anons.

Here's the initial draft for the first quarter of my book, Kid Demiurge. I get that there's some drawn-out language at the start I need to process, go to page 28 if you want the dialogue-driven action (the section is about 19,000 words long).

https://www.docdroid.net/7jhsIhG/kdmocknovelwmaps-pdf

> Iranian elites are throwing an illegal rave in Tehran, with an opening performer no one's really heard of before
> He has fallen in love during his stay at his patrons' villa
> The religious authorities get involved in the party, with the performer effecting a very unexpected result
> The rave continues, with momentous consequences

I don't know how shilling goes on this general, but I'll keep on for now. At such a length, I figure it may take a few postings.

Here's something I wrote a little bit ago, my first attempt at writing fiction based on various members of a low-fantasy society and their individual approaches to dealing with an impending doom that will very suddenly befall their universe unbeknownst to anyone but the local town schizo/enlightened mystic science man. I plan on keeping the specifics of their identity relatively low-key and rarely if ever referenced to focus more on their character and development through this adversity. My goals are to keep it heavily descriptive, blending the inner world of the characters with the outer world of their surroundings and circumstances.

I don't normally read much fiction, so any recommendations for authors that achieve that kind of style well would be appreciated.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/13vW4D3Elty5BnWe1f3gXwcI7N6WFsAWZF56fxzUYbXA/edit?usp=sharing

>>15734149
The biggest critique I have is something I've noticed in most of the fiction I've read, which is the heavy use of indirect reference to people, places, or things in your descriptions that have no other immediate context to build the lore of your world. Using the lore to communicate your setting rather than using the setting to communicate your lore I guess (e.g. your description of the Advent Coast immediately switching focus to the curse plaguing it, rather than focusing more intimately on it's immediate relation to/affect on the character ("While one may think such destruction could serve no purpose..." and the portion after)). I find the later to be far more intriguing personally.

>>15735291
I don't know much about sonnets or poetry in general, but something about the cadence of this doesn't sit right.. Wish I could communicate why, sorry.

>>15734155

Decent, but learn how to use an em dash.

>>15735291
You've used the sonnet in a way it's not traditionally used. The first 3 quatrains usually build up an argument or idea, getting more complex with each quatrain, with the final couplet being a far superior counter-argument to what has been said before, and turns the poem 180° around. Your sonnet builds up this idea of Sleep as a calming lover, and two separate times, I think, the sonnet pulls the "turn" only to immediately reverse. Once here
>In My mind goes the raging tempest free.
>A drifting lonely Ship should surely drown,
But then reverses with
>lest her caress calm waves surrounding me.
Which is also grammatically incorrect, I think. Lest her waves surrounding him...what? Lest they what?
The more traditional turn you have, supposed to be in the beginning of the second to last line, but usually in the line before the final couplet, is also reversed, by reassuring that sleep always comes. But the narrator, and us, are reassured nearly the whole poem, so the turn isn't meaningful in this sonnet. That can be fine, a sonnet doesn't necessarily need to keep the rhetoric structure and stanzaic structure perfectly aligned, as many poets have deviated. But something to keep in mind. Two more things seemed weird to me. This,
>She will as fated leave when I still rest.
Why does sleep leave when you still rest? Even if you mean rest as in still in bed/half asleep, it would be more emotional to have the narrator arise suddenly, to have a sparse feeling, have him detect a faint trace of his lovers presence, only for it to then be swiftly gone. So for her to leave while he still rests seems a weird choice to me, and could be changed for the greater. Also,
>I threat not, night will come, for this is known.
Did you mean to say "I FRET not"? I don't think "I threat not" is what you intended or is actually a real saying in English, as I looked it up just in case and found nothing. It doesn't make sense on its face. This is completely besides the weird metrical variation you chose in the beginning of your 2-4 lines. They all begin with accented syllables, which is usually done to give the effect of suddenness or surprise/alarm, but you have done it three times in a row, which overdoes the effect, and does so in the beginning without a good reason. The meter also varies from iambic pentameter, but you have done so rightly in this line,
>lest her caress calm waves surrounding me.
[ca]"ress calm waves", this is three accented syllables in a row, which is a spondaic substitution used correctly. The spondee slows down the line, as it contains more long syllables than the normal iambic meter, and so enhances the effect of the calming waves.
Overall, liked it, but needs some work. I don't know how much you know but I always recommend Paul Fussel's "Poetic Meter and Poetic Form" over every other similar book. Maybe make it even more classical by representing Sleep as closer to the Greek or Roman tradition as a deity, with your own invention. Good look.

>>15735291
>>15736080
Btw here is my poem.

I can no longer be that man, can’t taste or smell
Can’t think about things long enough to bring myself to tears
I’ve wasted my time, wasted my mind these past three years
I’ve laid in bed too much, and lived in my head too much
In my life I’ve never raised the stake, so with pettiness I’ve had to overcompensate
I get battered over and over again, car goes out, lights go out, air goes out, and health goes out
Like oxygen in, and carbon dioxide out
Beer goes in, vanity goes in, lies go in, hatred goes in, rage goes in, nicotine vape goes in, ego goes in, burgers go in, butter goes in, all a big bunch of bullshit goes in
And that is why I am so vulnerable to each little bump in my road
And it is why, when I masturbate, there must be hatred in each load

>>15736080
Thanks a lot it was really helpful. And yeah I do not know anything. I am a complete amateur, I had to watch youtube videos and read guides on how write a sonnet and I found it really hard to figure out what syllables were supposed to be stressed/unstressed. Thank you for the recommendation as well. I read the poem posted above and liked it, so take that how you will as I have just professed my naivety regarding poetry. I wish I could give you a proper critique, but it would be a larp on my behalf.

>>15734155
I like this character. Makes me think a story with an arrogant child as the main character would be interesting to read. Good opening, I don't have that much to comment on aside from, good name choice. I'd keep reading this.

I also have an opening to a short story scifi I'm hammering out. I wrote this all today, my eyes hurt.
https://justpaste dot it/54k24

>>15736463
You're welcome. Keep it going! I also recommend reading many poets until you've found a style you want to emulate or branch off from. You could find an anthology with middle English to contemporary poets, or if you already have an idea, simply look up poets of a certain time period and read some of their work. If you like them, read more of them, and read their peers, etc. As for syllables, usually single syllable verbs and single syllable nouns are stressed, like "build", "work", and "Tom," "Cat". Things like "-ing" and other connecting parts of words, like prefixes and suffices, are soft. However, it's not that simple. Some words, like three syllable words, are more naturally spoken with two unstressed syllables and a weak stressed syllable. "However", "within", and many others like these can be used as words with no stressed syllables, or can be used in iambic perfectly well. It depends on the strength and regularity of your meter. Not all stressed syllables are the same. Some are stronger than others. Consider "height" and "dark". The meanings of the words themselves and their phonetic qualities seemingly fit. "Height" is a stressed syllable, but it is less harsh, less stressed, than "dark" is. It's hard to explain exactly, but you can also try saying words with a different pronunciation, by stressing different syllables in a word. Beautiful. Which syllables are stressed or unstressed? Is it BEAU-ti-FUL, or beauti-FUL? It's normally pronounced BEAUtiful. One stressed followed by two unstressed, but it can also be used iambically: the SETting SUN is BEAUtiFUL. So the meter can change how you pronounce words, and a strong meter, using words that are more stressed and in a more regular pattern, can make the reader pronounce words otherwise than they would normally. Hope the book helps, and with practice it will come. Scansioning works you like helps as well. You don't have to work too hard to get the hang of it. Glad you liked my unfinished poem. I think poetry should be enjoyable to read.

>>15735291
O sleep, you set my failing soul at ease
She That softly looks upon my resting head,
Quells my mind of harping stormy seas
Letting me rest instead in blessed innocence
In My mind roars the raging tempest, free
A drifting lonely Ship as I would surely drown,
Lest her calm waves caressing circle me
I love her so, she who subdues my frown
I wish I could forever hide my face
Within my lovers rolling, hillock-breasts
Alas, however much I want her grace
She will, as autumn, leave when still I rest
When at cock's crow I find myself alone,
I worry not, for night will come-
This is known

I tried

>>15736142
Are you the beer poem anon?

>>15736712
Lets instead of letting, in the fourth line. And a shakesperean e on the second e of blessed. Just don't know its shortcut. Furthermore, separate the fourth and fifth lines to make two stanzas. Replace "calm waves" with "calming," then break 9 and 10 into two different stanzas.

Then, break the final three lines off, and add a comma after "crow."

You sit on the toilet to jack off, but you begin to cum uncontrollably. After ten spurts you start to worry. Your hand is sticky and it reeks of semen. You desperately shove your dick into a wad of toilet paper, but that only makes your balls hurt. The cum accelerates. It’s been three minutes. You can’t stop cumming. Your bathroom floor is covered in a thin layer of baby fluid. You try to cum into the shower drain but it builds up too fast. You try the toilet. The cum is too thick to be flushed. You lock the bathroom door to prevent the cum from escaping. The air grows hot and humid from the cum. The cum accelerates. You slip and fall in your own sperm. The cum is now six inches deep, almost as long as your still-erect semen hose. Sprawled on your back, you begin to cum all over the ceiling. Globs of the sticky white fluid begin to fall like raindrops, giving you a facial with your own cum. The cum accelerates. You struggle to stand as the force of the cum begins to propel you backwards as if you were on a bukkake themed slip-and-slide. Still on your knees, the cum is now at chin height. To avoid drowning you open the bathroom door. The deluge of man juice reminds you of the Great Molasses Flood of 1919, only with cum instead of molasses. The cum accelerates. It’s been two hours. Your children and wife scream in terror as their bodies are engulfed by the snow-white sludge. Your youngest child goes under, with viscous bubbles and muffled cries rising from the goop. You plead to God to end your suffering. The cum accelerates. You squeeze your dick to stop the cum, but it begins to leak out of your asshole instead. You let go. The force of the cum tears your urethra open, leaving only a gaping hole in your crotch that spews semen. Your body picks up speed as it slides backwards along the cum. You smash through the wall, hurtling into the sky at thirty miles an hour. From a bird’s eye view you see your house is completely white. Your neighbor calls the cops. The cum accelerates. As you continue to ascend, you spot police cars racing towards your house. The cops pull out their guns and take aim, but stray loads of cum hit them in the eyes, blinding them. The cum accelerates. You are now at an altitude of 1000 feet. The SWAT team arrives. Military helicopters circle you. Hundreds of bullets pierce your body at once, yet you stay conscious. Your testicles have now grown into a substitute brain. The cum accelerates. It has been two days. With your body now destroyed, the cum begins to spray in all directions. You break the sound barrier. The government deploys fighter jets to chase you down, but the impact of your cum sends one plane crashing to the ground. The government decides to let you leave the earth. You feel your gonads start to burn up as you reach the edges of the atmosphere. You narrowly miss the ISS, giving it a new white paint job as you fly past. Physicists struggle to calculate your erratic trajectory. The cum accelerates. Cont...

Nearly all of it to be as a wife has a cow, a love story. All of it to be as
a wife has a cow, all of it to be as a wife has a cow, a love story.
As to be all of it as to be a wife as a wife has a cow, a love story, all of
it as to be all of it as a wife all of it as to be as a wife has a cow a love
story, all of it as a wife has a cow as a wife has a cow a love story.
Has made, as it has made as it has made, has made has to be as a wife
has a cow, a love story. Has made as to be as a wife has a cow a love story.
As a wife has a cow, as a wife has a cow, a love story. Has to be as a wife
has a cow a love story. Has made as to be as a wife has a cow a love story.
When he can, and for that when he can, for that. When he can and
for that when he can. For that. When he can. For that when he can.
For that. And when he can and for that. Or that, and when he can. For
that and when he can.
And to in six and another. And to and in and six and another. And
to and in and six and another. And to in six and and to and in and six
and another. And to and in and six and another. And to and six and
in and another and and to and six and another and and to and in and
six and and to and six and in and another.
In came in there, came in there come out of there. In came in come
out of there. Come out there in came in there. Come out of there and in
and come out of there. Came in there, come out of there.
Feeling or for it, as feeling or for it, came in or come in, or come out
of there or feeling as feeling or feeling as for it.
As a wife has a cow.
Came in and come out.
As a wife has a cow a love story.
As a love story, as a wife has a cow, a love story.
Not and now, now and not, not and now, by and by not and now,
as not, as soon as not not and now, now as soon now now as soon, now
as soon as soon as now. Just as soon just now just now just as soon just
as soon as now. Just as soon as now.
And in that, as and in that, in that and and in that, so that, so that
and in that, and in that and so that and as for that and as for that and
that. In that. In that and and for that as for that and in that. Just
as soon and in that. In that as that and just as soon. Just as soon as that.

Even now, now and even now and now and even now. Not as even
now, therefor, even now and therefor, therefor and even now and even
now and therefor even now. So not to and moreover and even now and
therefor and moreover and even now and so and even now and there-
for even now.

Do they as they do so. And do they do so.

We feel we feel. We feel or if we feel if we feel or if we feel. We feel
or if we feel. As it is made made a day made a. day or two made a day,
as it is made a day or two, as it is made a day. Made a day. Made a day.
Not away a day. By day. As it is made a day.

>>15736661
Thank you for the help once again anon. You have been incredibly helpful. God bless you.

>>15734532
>>15735291
Thanks, I'll be sure to clear things up.
>>15735774
>Using the lore to communicate your setting rather than using the setting to communicate your lore I guess (e.g. your description of the Advent Coast immediately switching focus to the curse plaguing it, rather than focusing more intimately on it's immediate relation to/affect on the character ("While one may think such destruction could serve no purpose..." and the portion after))
You're right, I just thought it'd be more important to establish that Damian was aware of what he's getting himself into, and show that he's very knowledgeable despite his age.
>>15735892
I'll be sure to do that.
Again, thanks for your input, lads.

Anybody willing to read a part of my story I'm writing? It's about 6000 words at the minute but I feel like I've completely fucked it. I struggle trying to make stories longer so it could be too short while feeling far too bloated to me. I always gravitate towards stream of concioussness writing but have no idea if it's nice to read or even interesting. I take a lot of inspiration from Joyce which should be quite obvious but I'm not trying to copy Ulysses/Portrait to any real extent or for the former copy the different writing styles, I'm going purely on what I write naturally anyway but I'm afraid people will just read it and it say it's a shit Joyce rip-off when I'm desperately trying for it not to be that.

>>15736734
Did you write this in response to that cum prompt in the short story ideas thread the other day by any chance? That was my prompt. I approve either way. Thanks for sharing, anon.

>>15739117
Can't promise I'll reply, or read the whole thing, but if you post it I'll make the attempt.
>https://pastebin.com/yY8pp1Xf

>>15737264
God bless you too, anon.
>>15736712
I am the beer poem anon, but who's post are you referring to in the first place?

>>15739168
Thanks anon, it's fairly thick and has a lot of references to Ireland in case you're confused over some stuff. I liked your bit, it flowed nicely and reminded me a bit of the memoirs in Notes from the Underground.

https://pastebin.com/ARfUJqXZ

>>15739230
A pet peeve of mine I've noticed a couple times are things like "haha" and capitalized words in the manner you use them. If it were me, I'd go through and strike these things. I'm sure Beckett is no stranger to you, being Irish, and in my eyes he's kind of the peak of this style of writing. What I find most compelling about his usage of the technique is how seamlessly he weaves in the exposition. Yes, the narrator's experience is the primary event occurring from the perspective of the reader, but there are also things happening. It's an element I don't find in your writing (or in my writing, for that matter, when I dip my toes into it like I did in my linked passage). As such, I find the transitions between first person narration and third person exposition a little jarring. I'm guessing you're committed to making it work, since it doesn't read forced, but it does read a little jarring to my eye.

>>15739306
Thanks man, there's definitely a lot of mistakes in it because I haven't gone back and just edited yet so hopefully I'll stamp them out and get to wrok on improving the flow. Overall though did you enjoy it?

>>15739318
It ended up convincing me to read the whole thing.

>>15739340
Well that's a good sign! Thanks anon, if you have other works you want to share I'll give them a read.

>>15734155
Is your name Dylan? You write a lot like a friend I used to write with. If not, no worries.
I really enjoyed this. I could nitpick several things but if I made just one critique you would listen to it would be to break up the first paragraph a bit to avoid the wall of text which, and I may just be a pleb, is daunting to me whenever I first flip through a book. Little breaks, even if just visually, make your story more digestible - to me at least. The prose is strong and I would definitely keep reading this once I got through the initial large paragraph. Keep it up.
Mine, for your or others critique:
https://pastebin.com/6Df45def

>>15739230
You have talent.

Email
fourlitreview @ yandex dot com

>>15739435
I keep seeing you post, what are you shilling?

It looks like the most recent submissions to this thread have already been critiqued, but I'll give my thoughts on whatever comes after this.

So, this Fall I'll be taking a poetry workshop class in college. I don't write or read poetry. But here's my first wack at it - lemme know if I should just unregister for the class now while I have the time:

small ennui and
wayward boredom, masturbate

spoons and dumbness in unison yonic disappointment
memory a mumbling knocks a mawkish protest angry loud surrounding, screen

forebode and disregard heroes
came and sucked push plunge and powder dead or maybe doesn’t matter, mother

again the same and bitter maxims all too endless,
acquiesce

>>15739450
It's a review group for serious writers and editors--professionals or people preparing to go pro.

>>15739461
Poetry is a skill like any other.

>>15739479
why yandex lmao.

>>15739536
Because I'm not putting my real email on a Belisean coca paste manufacturing catalog

>>15620622
Sorry but I have nothing more to say about this other than I enjoyed it, though I probably shouldn't have spoiled myself by looking at the image first.
Wonder what other anons might think of it.

>>15739588
You not have like a group email? Seems a bit sketch anon. A website? A medium page even lmao.

Can I (>>15736501) have a crit pls?
https://youtu.be/El1BhIQFMfs

>>15739606
It's a review group, not a publisher. By professional I mean we have professionals in the group. It's not a commercial entity.

>>15735291
Nice poem

>>15739230
>Wonder will many show up?
Change this to wonder if many will show up

>>15739659
Can't my man, it's how we speak in Eire.

>>15739606
I'm not asking you to send your work to that email address, by the way. It's just to get an invite to the group.

>>15736501
>>15739615
People are lazy and probably aren't critiquing because your link requires effort instead of just being clickable. Pastebin is what we tend to use here. I read a bit of yours and will probably go back and finish it. Great effort banging it all out in one sitting, though editing will probably do you a service. The caretakers are humans? It's a little confusing to keep referring to them that way, I didn't know who was who in the first action sequence. I'm sure I would get the hang of it fairly quickly but I'm not sure others would be so ready to give you that lenience, considering no one yet read your unclickable link. Your prose is admittedly very strong. I really like your allusions as they flow pretty seamlessly in the descriptions and are easy to picture without seeming forced (dust flew like wedding rice). I don't read much sci-fi so it isn't really my cup of tea but I hope some anons that do enjoy sci-fi give it a go and let you know their thoughts. That being said I found it charming and easy to read and if it was a fantasy setting I probably would have devoured whole before stopping to rush back here and shill you my own
>>>15739416
Going back to finish yours now because by the time I'm through writing this I'm actually quite curious where it will go, so that's good too.

>>15736501
>>15739615
>>15739726
Well, I finished it. I enjoyed it. Alia sounds a bit too much like Alita, who is also a little robot with a "caretaker" so consider that. How is the other caretaker able to access her remotely? I'm curious now so you've accomplished something. It reads really well, only minor issues that would vanish with a little editing once you've fleshed out the full take. I like it. Looking forward to reading the rest.

>>15739461
Not my kind of poetry. I like regular meter and rhymes. Does the cryptic style make it better than if you were more direct in your meaning? I don't think so.

>>15735678
Do you have it written instead?

Realised I posted without critique.

>>15735754
I don't think you'll find anyone to critique the entire work in any sort of depth in these threads. However, while the idea seems great to me and I'm sure could be executed well, I think you've got a lot of work still to do. The prose is very purple- the first 28-odd pages are almost unintelligible. The reader has to care from the outset. Why should I care to go through those 28 pages? It reads a bit like a thesaurus at the expense of flow.

Past those 28, I had a look up to around page 32. There is an improvement after the initial verbal diarrhea, and I think you'd be better off binning those pages entirely. However, sentences are still clumsily constructed- why use "persisted a gentle voice" when you could just say "said?" It doesn't strike the reader as true. If you describe her voice as gentle, going on to call it "a tinkling, most agreeable breath" is overkill. "The new stimulus at his side" is another example of a sentence that seems clunky and overly verbose. There is passive voice in parts also, such as "the one with which he had corresponded" which should be changed (and in any case, would be "with whom").

However, if I had to highlight just one change that I think would increase the quality of your work exponentially, it would be to kill adjectives. An adjective is useful, here and there, when used sparingly, in eliciting a certain response in the reader. However, in a single line on page 32, you describe "a slight quiver from the prominent teeth set in her overbitten jaw amplified an ivory-bright eagerness... Her wispy hair... Breeze-swayed fabric". This would read immeasurably better as, say, "a slight quiver of the jaw betrayed her eagerness".

Hope that gives you things to play with.

>>15739916
This is an actually good critique. Please do me
>https://pastebin.com/6Df45def

As for yours I'm going to be biased because I've always enjoyed rhyming poetry that has nice-sounding syllable counts. I'm gonna lose some stuff in translation but for instance with yours in the second half I would have written it as
I drift amongst the shades of night
My path illumed by stars long dead
Which yet conceal with gentle light
the flame within, how faint I tread
Eyes averted, filled with dread
That foul heat which by surprise
Did lash proving I'd been misled
Now rare despite their kindly guise
Behold I stars which trick my eyes

This may not be at all what you're going for but it just reads so much cleaner to me. Take it or leave it

>>15740002
Hey, I will do yours when I get a chance.

I have elected to write in Spenserian stanzas after reading Childe Harold, which demand iambic pentameter. However I appreciate the critique.

>>15740002
Also I'd go for a clean 16 bars and kill the surprise, guise, eyes part in favor of just two of those rhymes. Again, it just sounds cleaner to me and may not be what you're going for

>>15740029
Fair enough. I honestly don't have a lot of education in poetry and definitely don't have an eye for the finer things, just an ear for what sounds good to me. Probably due to being inundated with hymns from an early age and then turning to poetic potential to writing a lot of cringey rap when I was in my teens. Thanks in advance for your critique, looking forward to it

Do you guys ever feel "bound" by the type of poetry/prose you're decent at? I never get (You)s for my prose because its very basic but I've been told my poetry is decent; the thing is, I really want to write a shitty highschool setting novel about a fightclub and I feel like that's impossible to do in poetic form.
>>15735291
damn good sonnet imo
is it part of a larger work or a one-off?
I've been working on writing an epic that consists solely of haiku so I'm really interested in extended poetry works that have a plot.

>>15740046
>cringey rap
Please tell me you have some saved.

>>15740093
I'd really prefer to be critiqued on the beginning of the novel I'm writing which is here:
https://pastebin.com/6Df45def
But yeah, (un)fortunately I save everything that I write. Here's one my friends quoted constantly to tease me at parties.
>Yes it's that mister dream
>nightmare to this machine
>king without a queen
>a harem begging at my feet
>I. Am not. On a cross
>But I'm God's son
>Hand on my heart
>it's my pledge, you don't want none
>The saint bracelet rides on my wrist
>No shit
>Rosary on my chest, I'm the holiest since Swiss
>It's. the Green blur, cavalier no steer
>I'm done with the bull, now I run with the weird
>Clear out. Nixon! Impeach these freaks
>I come with perfection, no flaws no streaks
>Beat you to death with the beat
>You feeling froggy? Then leap
>I told y'all
>Now touch this like you're hoping that I'll bless you
>Anoint your wounds with care and maybe sex too
>But you shouldn't get it wrong
>So I'll just write this
>By hand, no keyboard
>You ain't my type, bitch!

>>15735754
What bugs me most about this isn't how overwhelmingly all-encompassingly purple the opening is -- and that really fucking bugs me -- but how once "purple time" is over, the writing is mostly artless, punctuated by intermittent attempts to impress the reader that seem perfunctory and tacked-on. I would recommend another heavy edit of everything with the goal of creating some consistency in tonality. It feels to me like you agonized over the initial part and then shat out the rest. It's not a good look.

>>15739168
can someone just fucking crush me please?

>>15740233
>critiques no one and adds nothing
>"Please spend time on me!!"
No. Follow the rules, fagtron

>>15740257
i've already posted multiple critiques in this thread. i post multiple critiques in every thread

>>15735774
Would still appreciate some critique on this.

>>15740409
Make it public. Nobody is going to request access.

>>15739916
>>15740181

Thanks guys, I mean it. Even if you tell me how shit things are, you've given me some good constructive criticism (that's why I'm on 4chan after all, I don't want the reddit circlejerk I normally get). My friends irl don't give a shit about literature, and even if they tried to help me, they wouldn't know what to say.

I have obsessed over elements of this story in my mind for over five years, literally every single day I do, and its details have been building up all this time. I have a very particular aesthetic picture of what I want to convey, and I even know a lot of the exact adjectives I wish to use, but I just didn't realize how difficult it would be to put them down into sentences, much less arranging those sentences into an engaging narrative. I would say I have a good understanding of when a sentence is grammatical, but being grammatical is definitely not synonymous with being concise.

And you're right, I did obsess over the beginning, and I did kinda shit out the rest. Since I have a tendency to abandon projects halfway through, I've written an outline for the story (which I want to be about 70-80,000 words), and I'm trying to give it structure so I can build on it later during revision. As I said before, I've never, ever written a prose story before, not even a short one; I've only written a work of poetry that was a few thousand words. I also mostly read nonfiction or reference books. I refuse to give up on this, because I know the story itself is phenomenal.

>>15739416
It was a bit jarring in the first sentence as you go from describing the persons, zooming out to the building, then zooming back in to the rugs and floors. Probably nothing and it was fine after a reread, but just a minor thought.

>There were several mirrors on the walls, as much to look at one's self wearing a piece of the jewelry on display as to give the cramped, basement shop a sense of being larger than it was.
Reads choppily in addition to the repetition of "as to".

Missing some commas here and there.

>[He turned], causing the many medals and chains of deed and office to swing menacingly.
Sounds weak and dry. Try to put 'swing' in the beginning, not the end of this part and I think it'll improve.

Nitpicking aside, it's a 50-50 from me. My main concern is the lack of setting. Where and when is this happening? Is it fantasy or historical? There's a modern Western name and a Latin name, and the rat-like jeweler in his shop with rugs suggests the Ottoman Empire somehow. The reader is left guessing. This may be intended but personally I'm not a fan, since I have no clue whatsoever where this is going and thus can't make up my mind if I want to continue bothering reading or not. But I understand you may be able to afford a long drawn introduction if you're writing a long piece, like a novel.

Thanks for posting. I look forward to what other people think of your work.

>>15734149
In the pasture, by the woods live the custodians of juniper dusk.
Coronated in Rorschach hides, with earrings of gold, they ruminate, emitting the scent of beast in that primeval Sicilian clearing.
In grace they condone the stareyed stranger, immersed from afar and after quick inspection, resume their call of cud and musk.
I should probably do the same.

>>15740474
That's okay, anon. Don't give up, it's not completely bad, just needs work. I may be wrong but my impression is that you don't find that much time to read? If you read enough, and widely enough, you get a sense of when to put adjectives and when not, etc. It's good to be concerned with aesthetics. Read short stories- Turgenev, Tolstoy, Chekhov, Mann, O'Connor, Maupassant, Balzac, Hemingway. Read Flaubert- a master of prose aesthetics- and Proust, read Henry James and Dostoevsky, read Shakespeare and Cervantes. You will improve.

Can I get your opinion on my Spenserian piece?
>>15739916

An old tale that only the remaining handfull of sages in rumania can tell says, that the gypsys were once the aristocracy of a prosperous kingdom. But they were vain and arrogant, spitting in the faces of their servants, beating their horses to death and threwing refuse from the walls of their palace on the poor.

One day, a buddhist monk came to them to teach them from his wisdom. The gypsys however didn't even listen to him and only laughed at his rags. When he kindly asked for food and shelter they chased him away. In the next year the monk came back only to suffer the same treatment.
He came back for five more times, but in the sixth year riders came from the far steppes and pillaged the land. They plundert and burnt the palace, taking all gypsys they didn't kill as slaves.

After 37 years of hardship, the gypsys could escape their masters.
But they could't return to their lands, where the people they once tormented would not let them stay.

So the gypsys were forced to roam the land, welcomed nowhere, spitted on by the inhabitants of the lands they tresspassed.
But still they remain arrogant. Even though they live like stray dogs, the gypsys are proud.

Seen this thread earlier and have just had a thought now, dont know where else to put it and my vocabulary is terrible.

-The nosey neighbour

A nosey neighbour sits inside his house
He sees someone outside and has the urge to spy
He knows he should not be nosey but can't help it
The person outside does not know there is a nosey neighbour inside
If the neighbour looks he will quell his urge and get satisfaction
If he gets caught looking he has creeper someone out and embarrassed himself
If he does not look he overcomes his urge for the sake of a stranger and the stranger will never know
The stranger would also never know if the nosey neighbour looked so why not look in the first place?

>>15740485
>>15740549
>>15740551
I refuse to rate those who don't rate others, on principle.

>>15740551
>A nosey neighbour sits inside his house
>...
>The person outside does not know there is a nosey neighbour inside
Maybe write 'hides inside his house' in the first sentence. You could then drop the second sentence I quoted because it's implied in the first.
English is not my first language so I don't feel qualified to comment on your vocabulary. The idea is interesting.

I wrote >>15740549 btw

>>15740569
I didnt rate qnyones because I am in no way good enough to, I am >>15740551 and I never write anything, I just had that thought and wanted to share it. Sorry though.

>>15740719
Thanks for the response and that is a good tip to write hides instead of sits, makes a lot more sense. Your English is better than mine and it is my only language.

>>15736389
there's a lot of ineffective repetition in this. also, this strattles the line in a bad way between being a joke and a serious deeppost. I'd recommend focusing more on imagery and exploration rather than going in this "i feel so much" direction (where you're essentially reiterating how bad you feel / how tortured you are the whole time).

>>15737145
I feel like there isn't enough build up. We're just kind of thrown in without any attachment to a character to a very intense situation. I know that it was probably meant to be jarring, but there is such a thing as TOO jarring. I think you could develop this into something really interesting, but the way it stands now, it has really big problems with pace and being a bit too up-front for a narrative poem.

>>15739461
nice sort of abstract slightly bare-bones association poem. you could chill on the alliterations, but I think that is just personal preference of mine; no need to heed. I recommend punctuating this a bit more with semicolons or periods to really draw lines between separate associations and ideas.

>>15735774
>>15740449

Ah damn, didn't realize it was private.. I don't normally use GDrive, my bad. Here's a public link I think.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/13vW4D3Elty5BnWe1f3gXwcI7N6WFsAWZF56fxzUYbXA/edit?usp=drivesdk

>>15739726
>>15739776
Thanks for the thoughtful crit man, helps a lot. (Shill your book, you forgot to post it.)
But yeah, you're right, caretakers are humans. Owners of robots.
The way that the Caretaker (aka Samuel, only difference between his reference and any other caretaker is the capital letter. Thinking of changing that.) was able to get into her system was because he has communication bits on his own literal person as well. It would have been all put together later, but I figured I'd answer.
I always hear about people wanting to see more of other's work, but I've also always thought that that might be hard to do here, especially when the general traditionally dissapears. I'm neutral about this but have we considered a Discord?

>>15741125
Whoops you did post it, that's the one I critted. But yeah, I'd keep reading that if I could find it repeatedly as it updates.

>>15741125
i'd definitely join

>>15741125
Not this anon but, only reasons I personally can't make a discord for this general is because a) I'm severely under-read and b) I'm a female. Too easy to laugh at as a server owner, but I'd love for it to be a thing.
Someone else gotta do it, someone more /lit/.

I made a discord for anyone interested. I'll set it up further once I'm off work. Any suggestions for changes/additions welcome.

https://discord.gg/cFFPZ7

>>15740546

I'll take a look at books by these authors, I read a few of Oscar Wilde's works (I love his writing, a lot), and The Stranger, then I stopped.

>>15739916

Sure:

Does "your echo" refer how the elegy extolls its object, or is the echo the object's legacy in the narrator's memory? Is "who would absolve" parenthetical to "the injured one"? It seems like an adjective should describe either the "shades" or "folds" of night, and you should take the undescribed one out. Was it a surprise that hellish fire lashed in punishment? Is the narrator not capable of beholding the tranquil stars, or does he refuse to do so willfully. ? It seems the second paragraph doesn't have a cohesive semantic transition from the narrator's chagrin over the elegies' object and how it continues to torment him when he tries to escape from it. Otherwise, pretty solid.

Would it be dumb to post a little thing I wrote about my city and my routine as a very new writer? I feel like I don’t have enough of anything short of a detailed blogpost and that there isn’t enough punctuation to be a story, but it isn’t just a green text.

>>15741624
go ahead man! I'll read it and give it a fair crit

>>15734149
Three

Three young men embrace in cold sea water. They are dancing over shingles and pebbles which wash their soles with the same energy the sea washed them with. It washed them from the clutches of sneering sheer faces, steely cliffs, and washed them from sharpness to softness and now washes them into a new sharpness upon the soft soles of men. Dancing the same dance they dance together in a moment of realisation.

Three young men embrace in a dark sea. They are shifting in a circling dance over spiked shingles and smooth pebblestones, which roughly wash their soles with that same energy that so long ago washed them. Energy of always new waves from an always old source that snatched them from the clutches of sneering sheer faces, those proud and steely cliffs that stare out, adamant of their own significance, declaring it in their silence and in their seeming permanence. This very old thing washed them from sharpness to softness and now washes them into a new sharpness once more upon the soft soles of men. Dancing the same dance they dance together in a moment of realisation.

Three young men embrace, 3AM, stony beach. They are intoxicated, they are dancing a shifting dance which cuts their feet up on the rocks. They look like white africans hopping over hot sand. Cold sand. Hot and cold meet somehow. A girl once told me cold burns. She was a real bitch though. The rocks that cut their feet now are rocks in name only. They have been snatched from the cold visages of statuesque headlands, smashed and scraped against sea floors, landed here as curiosities: very new things, which seem very old. Pebblestones and grits, but they still bite, even in their learned softness. You can't shake the pride out of the headland, it can still despise you through a pebble. But there is another dance here. Very old things live beneath the surface of newness. And new sharpness joins the dance of young men who also contain something very old indeed. We love the proud headland because we see ourselves in it; we are not aliens to each other, man and rock. Dancing the same dance we dance together in a moment of realisation.

>>15741624
>>15741757
thanks :)
https://pastebin.com/KAK2M1cx

>>15741992
Not a bad scene but the protag is trite and 2 dimensional.
Also the language is plain, there's no voice.
Get inside the character more--don't make statements like an alien. To him he would feel something raw and not just make empty objective statements about shit happening to him. I don't feel his passionate resentment of the rich coming through--you're telling instead of showing

>>15741992
it reads a little too dry for my taste, but this is good if you're just starting out. the entire reason to go with first person narratives is to take a deep dive into that narrator's psychology. you shouldn't be afraid to reach for shit that you don't think you can pull off yet. i'm still pretty new to this whole thing myself in the scheme of things, but i like to think that it's in the reaching that you can finally get what you're going for -- not to wax too philosophical or whatever. but yeah, i'd recommend trying to get a little bit of a sense of what you're writing for. are you writing for fun? do you want to eventually write short stories? poetry? a novel? a big part of it is figuring out what you like to read, and then to learn from other authors all you can, the greats, the shits, the in between. if you're just writing for fun as a hobby and don't care about anything except writing things you like, ignore me and just go to town.

anyone up for a bit of crit applied to >>15739168 this? be mean if you want to, i was mean in another post in this thread and deserve it.

>>15741922
2. My crit
>>15736734
Bad dream?
>>15737184
Couldn't say I follow.
>>15739461
Sounds nice, what does it mean though? I like this word "yonic".
>>15740151
You are either using too many commas or not enough, so it doesn't always flow well. Also the tone is off sometimes. Don't write: "Calvin guessed" if the vibe is period.
>>15740549
Sort out the spelling and grammar bro.

>>15742129
Thanks, what you’re saying gives me something to think about. That’s basically my first serious attempt, but you’re right about how I should reach for something deeper to be unique and interesting. I’m going to try train myself more on that. I think I’ll just need to write and read more to develop my style.

>>15741922
3. Thought I'd chuck in a poem

Something Missing

Last rain
Is washing out the winter.
White noise, so comforting, helps the
Forgetting.

The queer sadness of my mother,
Never spoken or addressed.
Felt in her private stares
Right through things;
And my father, fumbling
At the corners of his life,
A picnic blanket on a gusty day.

Now the rain is gone,
leaving the pressure of spring.
There is no time.
How shall I fare?

>>15742223
i don't think you necessarily need to think about it too hard. the important thing is probably to just be reading and writing, and not to force something unique or interesting, but to be open to it when it occurs and to reach for it even if it doesn't end up materializing.

>>15742285
4. So more crit.
>>15741992
Not perfect, but I like it. You have me intrigued and I want to know more. You have to find that balance between internal and external observation with a style like this. I think you can find it!

The child with a million empty ideas
reads the book with fading attention
Just a dancing blur
Rinsing words into feelings
But maybe
just maybe
He’ll flip the page
and throw another one back

>>15741008
crit plz?

>>15741922
Flows well, and has some nice imagery, but all the repetition is somewhat off-putting. You could probably achieve the desired effect with a little less of it

First bit of a novel scene that I recently returned to and fixed up a bit:

Tristan Thompson, G.E.D., lighting an American Spirit Black, got off work and stepped into the guts of Crown Hill. The ground was queasy and slick, cratered with oily puddles, slabs of concrete surrendering to fungus. The trees were pathetic. Crows jabbed at soaked litter in the curbside rain-rivers. Slugs dragged their entrails across the sidewalks.

“Scuse me brother,” someone grunted.

Tristan stiffened like he’d hit an invisible wall. The man gaping at him carried a bulging THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU shopping bag and wore an unstable assemblage of coats.

He squinted at Tristan. “Yo, did I talk to you before? Did I speak to you before, brother?”

“Mmm I don’t think so,” Tristan murmured through his cig.

The man smiled broadly. “No, I definitely did. I did speak to you before. And I meant every word I said, brother. Every word.”

“Okay,” Tristan said. The man shuffled away.

Tristan squelched down Holman Road towards 85th St., his thin slip-on shoes flopping and draining water. Their ragged soles had carried him through nine hours of standing and dashing between the cash register and grill, his mandate to serve 25 customers in 30 minutes, taking their orders and rushing to get their burgers and fries and rushing back to charge them and thanks have a good one and next in line please and hey what can I get started for ya. His hands were covered in little burns from scooping fries into paper wallets. His right knee twinged with every other step.

Tristan passed the abandoned Pizza Hut and reached the corner of 85th and 15th. A major node of northwest Seattle pumped and churned before him. 85th was the spine of the city, stretching through the core of Seattle’s mono-counterculture – past the glistening chromesleek dispensaries sprouting like polyps in between condemned houses, in the smothering incense drooling from medieval potion shops around Greenwood, by the rainbow flags displayed in various Chase Banks and Wells Fargoes.

He stood and smoked as cars rumbled past, banging his palm on the walk button every few seconds.

My boy Sammy did a pretty good job on this, it'd be cool if you guys could critique it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjY9eFdqn9s

>>15742961
wow

Gonna crit some more, mind is a pussy and won't write.
>>15739416
>There were several mirrors on the walls, as much to look at one's self wearing a piece of the jewelry on display as to give the cramped, basement shop a sense of being larger than it was.
If you're just trying to say that the mirrors make the basement seem bigger and more impressive, then there is probably a way to make this more concise. Could just be me, but I tripped over the sentence. The sentence immediately after was great.
What you made feels comfy to me, it's a pleasant opening. Your dialogue is very natural sounding and I never questioned it or laughed at it in my head, didn't feel fabricated. I felt as if I did hear their voices, your descriptions of them was enough to give me things to go on when they started talking.
I'd read more of it.
>>15735754
A bit wordy, yeah. However, I think that's something a reader would get used to and end up enjoying if just led in through shallower waters. If you want to write like this, it can be done and there is an audience who likes it. But, leading in from a less complex tone to what you have currently from the get-go might help you out. I think you got a good vision, I think the thing you have has some potential, but it may not be for as many people as other writing.
>>15739230
I think the best compliment/critique I can give is that, being someone that hasn't into-ed Joyce properly yet, I'm intimidated, too intimidated to try and crit it on the level it should be. So you are at least up there, whether you're a mimic or not is up to those who know Joyce better than I do, and I hope they get to this to help out.
>>15740233
It's good. However
>I'm not much of a Jew, or a Mormon for that matter, but I carry with me at all times, upon my person, present time not excluded, a marriage of sorts, of Jews and …
Holy shit man. You remind me of Machiavelli, you put ten sentences into one. If you wanna roll like that, go ahead, but making that the second sentence is going to scare away some readers. Could also be a filter.
After that, your prose goes from stark literal to distant conversation of the narrator concerning himself. I personally find it super jarring, but some may find it interesting.
Really what I would say as a baseline is, try to figure out what you want your work to say and do, pick how you want it to feel to readers. Do you not care, or are you trying to evoke something specific? Your energy might be better spent honing in on one kind of theme to your narration than bouncing all over the place, but that's just me.

I'm >>15736501 if anyone is in the mood.

>>15739916
I like it as far as technique, but I don't get what's ultimately going on in the poem. Someone died which the narrator had something against, but didn't bring that forward and now are haunted by that? It leaves me confused, but that might just be me.
>>15741008
The medial caesura was usually accompanied by alliterative stresses that made up the meter of the poem in old English. Not that there's any problem with doing it, but if there isn't a good reason to use it then I probably wouldn't. I'm not sure it adds anything. However, I like metered rhyming works, so take my words with that in mind.
>>15742285
Not very interesting. Perhaps some more original imagery? If it's not going to be metered or rhyming, I feel like the imagery, and therefore the words you choose, need to be very well done to keep the reader engaged and caring. The picnic blanket being blown away was pretty good. I think the fact that there is no, or little, time left at the end could be told to the reader in a better way. Perhaps, "the roofs drip drip, stop, and the puddles bathe but worms" or something.

My poem pic related.

>>15743259
You've executed this flowery old-timey style pretty well, but I hope you're not intending this to be entirely serious, as I can't help but laugh at "them blooms enwreathe, breezes serenade"

>>15739618
so what, you lurk these threads for good writers? and you choose to use something as clanky as email to have a writing group? why not just make a private discord and invite those you deem worthy in?

>>15742285
I quite like the feeling you're trying to give off. I find the picnic blanket quite striking as it seems to be the only warm part of this poem. If only the corners of the blanket are fumbling, I wonder what is holding it down. I also find the title interesting, as it's 'Something Missing', but the problem seems to be that You're There. I'm not a good critic imo, just posting my thoughts. I hope you fare well.

/d/ to Pure Imagination from Willy Wonka
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-DuOmA75lI

Come with me, and you'll be,
In a world of pure degeneration.
Take a look, and you'll see,
Past your mental isolation.

There's no sin, just jerkin',
Travelling in the world of masturbation.
Only pleas of a white, desperation.

If you wan't to view paradise,
Do not go to /d/ to view it
This pictures will haunt you, do it
Why are you still here?
I fucking knew it

All these no lifes I know
You can't bear with their imagination
If you leave, you'll be free.
Do you truly wish to be?

If you want to view paradise,
You can go to /d/ to view it,
Anything you want to, screw it.
That's barely a girl,
But you can do it.

There's no wank I know,
To compare with pure degeneration
Going there, you'll be free
Do you truly wish to be?

I think some of my cadence is misplaced and would appreciate any opinions.

>>15743630
What the fuck. I’m watching Willy Wonka right now.

>>15743643
After listening to the song I realized it's about escapism and how when you grow older you should leave imagination to the younger generations. Kinda bummed me out because I felt like it was directed to me ngl.

>>15743500
Jesus fucking christ.
The group isn't in email.

>>15743707
not that anon but lemme in

>>15743748
the email address is above

>>15740080
It's just a one off.

>>15740080
>I really want to write a shitty highschool setting novel about a fightclub and I feel like that's impossible to do in poetic form
That would be infinitely better in poetic form

>>15743775
What do I even email you

>>15743968
I'm not the joyce mimic btw

>>15743171
put >>15736501 it in a pastebin since apparently justpaste isn't fun for anyone
https://pastebin.com/NNMkT9pb

>>15743973
Just email me and we'll see if you're cringe or not

>>15744074
Emailed almost an hour ago lol

>>15744074
it’s cringe

excerpt from something weird im working on

https://pastebin.com/7ZDSGDKk

>>15743386
As serious as a poem is, and thank you.

https://pastebin.com/ngvwSx9v

>>15744161
>https://pastebin.com/ngvwSx9v
somewhat overdid the exploration of scene / surroundings in the first part

careful of re-using the same word for verbs. makes for immature writing. Im looking at the transitional sentences between the first and second part.

I see that this is supposed to be a funny scene, and it is, but the fact that we don't have any background on the characters, their journey, their backstory, etc. makes this a very difficult excerpt to judge your ability. This shouldn't be a focal point; this is filler for the idea of a comedy-fantasy novel.

also spellcheck.

I wrote the story opening with Calvin Dall and I really appreciate the anons that critiqued it. I am making some edits based on your critiques and I'm really excited that my dialogue seems natural as it is what I consider best about my writing.
I would like to do a more in-depth tit for tat critique but it's very frustrating trying to follow all of the quotes and replies to see who is who and sometimes it's actually not possible.
This is the only time in over a decade of 4chan that I have wished we were more like reddit. If we are going to be dedicated posters in this thread and others like it, it seems to make sense that we would name ourselves or start a discord or something. The anonymous format doesn't work for sharing and critiquing work on the level that I'd like it too. I value everyone in here for putting themselves out there. How can we make this run a bit smoother without compromising the integrity of the anonymity that brings us here in the first place?

>>15744246
I’m no psychopath, as many have suspected and informed me of their suspicions.
But the whole time I’m smiling at my coworkers who are hot women and the people I rent to, I just daydream and visualize cutting their fingers off and squeezing their eyes with my thumbs. As I point out the wonderful rooftop patios, I visualize crushing their head by lifting the giant potted kentia majesty palm above their stupid fucking heads and dropping it on them before dropping them off the edge onto other faggots. I ALWAYS make that sale, baby.

I walk down the sidewalk, goose stepping to the faggoty dance music in my AirPods and my dandie dinmont terrier dog, Bella, struts at my side as I hold her with a show-dog leash hold; one hand at my left hip, and my right raised up, to keep the leather leash taught across my crotch. She’s in my control. The sun is above me, but more in front of me. The song reaches its chorus and I throw my head up to god, and bask in his light. If my eyes weren’t closed, I’d be looking him in the face. I rub my head, (my hair is growing back from a recent cleansing shave) as if I’m showering in sunlight. The rays of light brush off between my fingertips like drops of light in liquid form. I’m a brushed brass statue of youthful piercing. Piercing through light, awash in eternal water. My skin feels warm with my sunbath, and my legs strut even harder, as if a solitary aryan soldier is marching through this filth, baptizing the scum of Seattle in gold. Someday I’d love to leave fire behind me as I turn every street corner. I don’t care for love. It’s not something I feel I need to get by. As long as a woman cooks my meals and does the chores saved for Mexicans

>>15744284
Woops, didn’t mean to reply, I’m not the same guy as >>15744246

bumperino into the abyss

bump

>>15735754
tapping deep Persian archetypes here (Hafez, romanticised guardians of the flop houses and social pariahs); with tightening the purple prose can and ought to be reigned in

>The sun lavished the regal spectrum upon a lone basker’s rooftop seeping through Araxes’ yonder canyons.
A model for what the next editorial pass should accomplish (one 'dollops' creamy food items and nothing beside.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwWP75r6owQ

There's purple prose, then there's purple prose (which would normally be offensive/ponderous). This is actually intriguing and shows promise. Keep on with it.

just fired this one up:

I choose women
over Grieg
all the time;

I decide to
rake the leaves
for my ailing grandmother
over writing
often

there is worry there.

Am I
not cut out for it?
– ah, but there is
the catch:
to think there is
something to be
cut out for

it only struck me
like dew and lightening
that the Buddha
had no answers – only
responses

and as I parse away at
my own self,
like slicing down on
a blade of grass
I am struck with
a sense of
things never having
really ever
mattered.

a page out of the short story i'm working on. not really sure where it's going yet

>>15739461
This would do for flash fiction improvising/asemic (automatic) writing.

>>15739916
>overwrought, blogpost tone, maudlin
Radically depersonalize and abstract down to the quintessence of the image

>>15740002
Put it to music, nice to see rhymed that isn't an eye & ear sore.

>>15742285
2/3 stanzas decent, let down by lack of structure in the first (with otherwise fine imagery).

>>15742346
Good as is. Nice.

>>15743630
Magesterial bardery

>>15744665
I like it. But you need to trim the fat. The descriptions become too clinical and repetitive. Keep them shorter and they’ll pack more of the punch you want the description to land with. It’s boring to read about something as mundane as that if the prose isn’t good and dragging it out for as long as possible doesn’t help. The dialogue is fun but go easy on it aswell, especially if it’s a short story.

>>15744710
i see what you mean. reading it back, those issues are definitely apparent. thanks anon :)

>>15744659
>>15744132
>>15741008


i've contributed and crit multiple plz crit i am screaming into the void and that is, as the based would say, major cringe

>>15744132
Wow, that definitely kept me engaged. I was actually a little disappointed after the first paragraph because I would love an actual story with the same crazy energy as that.

>>15744828
oh it's still going! it covers various short stories but im 34 pages deep. thanks so much man, it means a lot!

>>15744862
Post more!

>>15744284
Reads like American psycho but less polished. It's not bad per se, just lacking the verbosity and prose that justified Ellis's obscene edginess

>>15744873
ok! this is in the simultaneous short-story and character-analysis direction

https://pastebin.com/SUk2uNuc

"bump-kun!" she said with a strain in her femboy voice, "y-you're gonna make me...y-you're gonna make me...AWOOOOOOO"

>>15745289
[Jesus Christ, dude.]
>>15744609
>>15744601
We have these but no answer to this
>>15744246
Is there really no shot at getting a dedicated group of semi-serious writers to reliably critique each other under only semi-anonymity? I think it would be easier to keep up with each other with names or something. Or is this general just for quick crits and those of us that want to go the distance should find that kind of group elsewhere?
Not that yandex homo, btw lol

>>15745308
if you want to start something like that I'd be in. I like anonymity. Prefer it, even.

>>15744654

You hit it on the head, on the damned head what I’m trying to do. That’s why I tried to get the prose in the beginning purple, on purpose. But the other anons are right: I need to add a little reality in the first part, because it’s too detached and self-reflective at the outset.

I’m trying to split my narrative style into three contradicting methods weaved together into the same work:
> the premodern, “Hafezian” (I’d call it Ferdowsian for now) purple prose (which should be less awkward) which provides exposition to the mythical, primordial characters of the story (the main character/self-crowned “shah”/inheritor of the “khvareneh”, the cypress-thin princess/Rudabeh-like, the ravaging Kurds/forces of Turan, etc)
> the hyperreal, operational characters who exist in the realm of the technological entity and the idea, both at the expense of the “real” (the Iranian and American ambassadors who dictate peace solely based a map w/o any consideration of reality on the ground, the NSA undersecretary who reprioritizes his translation team to finding out about the main character rather than armed groups involved in Iran’s ongoing insurrection, because of the greater danger in the idea the main character stands for)
> the more low-level, critical, modern style present in the everyday characters manipulated by the mythical/hyperreal characters (Asif the angry wrestler who lives in a low-income neighborhood and dislikes the rich, Roberts the mid-level intelligence translator who works with such-and-such contractor and comes home tired from work, etc)
Right now, I’m reading a bit about Foucault’s thoughts on the Iranian Revolution, and how premodern archetypes might lead to its populace handling revolution differently than Europe does. I’ve also read about Dugin’s concept of Iranic “wars of light” on the Eurasian civilizations. Fascinating shit, I can’t wait to syncretize it all.

>>15745308
>>15745384
https://discord.gg/mJfuTUb
this exists?
But yeah I'll start using a name for the lols. I'm >>15743171

>>15744654

And by the way, “lavished” is a better word. I hate myself for not seeing that, I agonized over that damned line kek

Thanks

>>15745384
>>15745715
Okay well I'm gonna start using this for a name. I plan to work on my Calvin Dall story a little more this morning and I'll post a the edit in a pastebin. As for >>15740477
It is going to be a novel. it is a fantasy setting and the prologue establishes this but I had left that part out because I'm still tweaking it. I just wanted to get a sense of if this is a decent attempt at setting a scene, having dialogue, and introducing a main character. In regards to the names being western and also Latin, I was planning to go all Latin but I don't like that most of them end in "-us" or "-as" so the names need more tweaking. I mainly want them to be easy to pronounce and all have a kinship to their region. I find it completely immersion breaking when every character in a fantasy book has a completely different sounding or looking name. Admittedly the names of people and places are the thing I'm having the most trouble with right now. Thank you for your critique and hopefully you'll read the changes you had a direct effect on because I think they were good suggestions.

Looking forward to reading more of everyone's work and I'm glad I discovered this general

Bump

>>15744665
>>15744710
here's a re-do

>>15735048
Post critique or a piece, shill.

>>15745308
Don't worry, this "yandex homo" did not invite you to the group to begin with. Enjoy your consolation discord :^)

>>15736080
Could I get your input with my sonnets anon? I've studied contemporary poetry, but I'm not sure about older forms. Pic rel

>Crits
>>15736142
Love this poem. I think you have a such a good eye for rhyme. But I did find the lack of rhythm a bit lacklustre. It would have been better if you hadn't had such long lines followed by such short lines. It needed to flow a bit better, you should switch tempo to emphasise concepts, but here it felt like it was stopping short for breath for no reason. 8/10

>>15737145
Love this title first off. The second stanza isn't exactly surreal but it gave me chills, recalling such a memory was powerful. However, your poem still needs to work on its diction and precision, right now it feels too loose, even if the concept is supposed to be humorous and loose. Also having one hanging line on the next side of the page is just lazy and looks bad. "whalebone comb" is marvellous, very well done. 7.5/10

>>15744659
Not sure what the random capitalisation of some words over others is supposed to illustrate. I would tell you to only capitalise "I" and no other word, or ditch capitalisation altogether if you're not going to capitalise the rest. The ideas themselves are interesting but I still don't know what this poem is really about by the end of it. I read it twice and then I get a solid idea maybe. Please try to convey one idea or premise per poem or short story. Also some of this is just awkward, particularly the second stanza ending with "often".
>– ah, but there is
>the catch:
>to think there is
>something to be
>cut out for
This reads like someone put that "herein lies the rub" from Shakespeare through Google translate a few times. Please try to make it clearer what is being said here.
"Only responses" is also awkward. What does that mean? He responds with no final answer?
The simile at the end is about the only redeeming part of that stanza, everything else is vague and not in a good way. It honestly all reads like someone trying to copy the vagueness of contemporary poetry with no solid idea of what to convey. Feels jumbled and confused. 6/10

>>15746914
I have critiqued several pieces in here already, but I have no reason to prove myself. It is you who must prove yourself adequate.

That's the one thing a discord would do a benifit to this place. Anonymity sort of ensures you can get away without critting.
>buh same post critting desu
Some people "crit before or after."

>>15735048
>>15747064
>>15747730
>I'm putting together a team

Edited my opening a bit, per the suggestions and critiques I received here. They were very appreciated. I hope that this looks a little cleaner and a little stronger.
pastebin.com/9AFM82b9

>Noooo you can't just make a club where entry is based on merit! Everything has to be equal!

>>15747817
fucked up the link
https://pastebin.com/9AFM82b9

>>15734149
Needed to write this after I found out what buxom meant

Buxom Bitch
Short and Loud
Lots of Heart
but soul without

>>15747818
>Claims his secret club is based on merit
>Refuses to show any merit to warrant any validity to his self-imposed position as judge

It's a gay op bro.

>>15748007
You fundamentally misunderstand the situation here.

I am offering something of value (a group in which professional editors offer free critique of your work).
You, on the other hand, are an amateur writer, who offers no value.

You must prove YOUR value as a writer to access the value that I am offering. Whether or not you join, my group continues to function. I am not the one who must prove himself.

And that's the last time I'm going to bother explaining basic social relations to a midwit.

>>15748039
Not him, but how does your group function? How frequently do you critique each others' work? Is it like a workshop, where different people take turns to be critiqued? Or a different writer each day? I'm interested anon.

>>15748075
More or less instant critique.
No more explanations until I get proof

>>15748095
Proof of what?

>>15748095
what's your motivation for doing it?

>>15748095
Prove yourself first. I bet none of you have published fiction.

>>15748122
Email and provide your reading list/ samples of your work.

>>15748134
See: >>15748039. I already know from your attitude that you are a nobody, though.

>>15748132
>durrr what is a review group
Brainlets need not apply.

>>15748160
>professional editors
Where? For all I know you edit schoolbooks.

>>15748172
See>>15748039
You are not the judge, I am.

>>15748176
>All this grandiosity
OK Schizoposter

>>15748177
Either prove you can write or go cry to your moma.

>>15747093
>>15747133
I'm these two. >>15748181

>>15748188
Only interested in prose. Poetry doesn't get published.

>>15748201
>>15748188
>>15748181
>>15748177
>>15748176
>>15748172
>>15748170
>>15748160
>>15748134
>>15748132
>>15748122
>>15748095
>>15748075
>>15748039
>>15748007
Yandex guy is clearly a supreme gentleman masquerading as a published author with a legion of doom-esque table of professional editors ready to propel nobodies on an anonymous image board to super stardom. And anyone replying to him should be well aware that they are intentionally joining him in his fantasy realm and derailing an otherwise decent thread. So! Now that you dweebs have had your shit flinging escapade, can we get back to writing and critiquing?

>>15748327
The publishing world is not egalitarian.
Rather than type that huge spergpost you could have proven your worth.You failed.
ngmi

>>15748201
I mean that's just wrong. It's far, far easier to have poems published than it is short stories, since poems are typically shorter and by nature they have looser judgement criteria. There are entire journals which will only publish poetry with many catering to beginners.

Short stories on the other hand need to arrest attention from the outset and maintain it throughout. Fewer can be published in any one magazine or journal due to length. Don't get me wrong, I think it's harder to write an excellent poem than an excellent short story, but it's easier to get poems published in general in this day and age.

>>15748457
I meant full works, not shorts.
In any case, poems are super subjective and we don't really edit them in the group.

>>15747093
Okay, so what are you going for with this piece? Are you trying to make the poem more contemporary by letting loose the meter however if goes, or did you just not think about it? I could sort of figure out the story. Young love, boy too smothering, girl finds some way around him? (I was confused by the tendrils finding sustenance under the bricks part) and then she becomes beautiful. Im not sure what the ocean represents, her emotion or his when he finds out she doesn't want him or that other guys might take her away. Like I said in the post you replied to, you aren't using the sonnet traditionally. There doesn't seem to be a flipping of ideas or arguments in the poem, and instead of one turn you have a gradual turn away from the boy, under the bricks, then she's redder than rouge, then the ocean part, then the other boys. It's not being turned on its head. It's fine to use the sonnet without that use in mind, just like with the last sonnet I critiqued, it's something for you to be aware of. Many of your rhymes are clumsy. Like Spring and coiling. Coiling ends without a stress whereas Spring ends with one, there's an imbalance there. I'm not familiar with the best way to rhyme stressed to unstressed syllables, but I imagine in needs a lot of metrical work too and a context that would benefit from such a thing, but that doesn't look like what you have. There and err, is also not a good rhyme, mostly because you haven't setup a specific "there" which the reader can imagine. You've only said it's under bricks. Err is fine, although it sounds a little strange next to the rest of the poem which almost sounds contemporary language wise. The only other rhyme I thought was off is rafts and witchcraft, one ends with an s and the other does not, but many would consider that alright, unless your going for a more strict classical poem. Then there are some things that don't quite make sense, like her roots growing under bricks to "find a better, smarter ploy." Is the growing underneath not the ploy? Or does the rose grow beneath the brick to search for some ploy? I think you mean the former and therefore should change it to make it clear. The other thing was that the storms "sparked asunder" but that doesn't quite make sense either. Asunder means to break apart, so unless it's supposed to convey something different, I think you meant something else. Also, the last line is clumsy and wouldn't the giving of a ring mean a proposal inherently, and therefore you wouldn't need to say "to propose" after they give a ring to her?

My other poem
>>15743259
And another pic related.

>>15747133
I think poems about explicit sex are either extremely hard to do or simply don't work. The sonnet structure is also not used as traditionally purposed, like I've said in other posts. The meter isn't regular enough, as the foot variations don't seem to add anything usually. "Daddy," and "is this my sup?" don't really blend, see?
It's like two things combined,
One jammed into the others behind,
I could fit in one more rhyme,
Nevermind.

>>15748525
>There doesn't seem to be a flipping of ideas or arguments in the poem, and instead of one turn you have a gradual turn away from the boy, under the bricks, then she's redder than rouge, then the ocean part, then the other boys.
I have no idea where you got this idea from that it has to be an argument. Can you please cite your sources? I was told sonnets should emphasise one idea per four lines and then finish it up with the couplet, not that it's 'arguing'. The sonnet was about love being floral, then natural or oceanic, then that love is in vain.
>off rhymes
They're called near rhymes, not all poems need to have perfect rhyming.

>>15748558
Not a formal argument, but an idea that is increasingly complex with each quatrain, and the ending couplet is the reverse of the entire poem, turning the idea expressed before on its face. Shakespeare does this famously well. Read Fussell's Poetic Meter and Poetic Form, where he discusses the sonnet. I also said the near rhyme of raft and witchcraft was fine, just something I would note. Honestly, the lines themselves before the rhyme do more to stunt it than the near rhyme itself.

>>15748558
To explain further, take this famous sonnet of Shakespeare.
https://poets.org/poem/my-mistress-eyes-are-nothing-sun-sonnet-130
He starts off saying his love is nothing like the things poets would usually compare their lovers to in order to exalt them. He is nearly, if not, insulting her, until the turn, the final couplet, where he turns the whole poem around by saying that she is still more rare than any other and can't be compared to such things.

yandex man flooded the thread so fuck it, reposting
I made like five crits and got one back so eat my farts I guess
https://pastebin.com/NNMkT9pb

>>15748699
I would have crit'd, but you namefagged. Oh well.

>>15748731
just trying to show I critted someone else man, you really think I'm trying to attention whore with a dumbfuck name I made up while taking a shit?

Bumpu

1/2

2/2

>>15748937
>>15748947
Good. Ctrl+F yandex ITT and send email.

>>15748999
He doesn't want to join your soiboi club.

My breath slows as I wait behind the screen,
and time like a wistful bubble slugs about the air.

I see villages outside, a field mouse steal a plum,
a hand break through a glass window,
the necks of swans bent savagely and drowned.

And emptiness itself blankets the screen,
I lay under its bridge and listen to the crossing years,
their memories of gentle eyes, safety, and fresh rain
pass over me like beetles scuttling into the sea.

ESL anon here, I seem to lack the vocabulary to even attempt translating my things. Hungarian really lends itself to schizo free verse ramblings and I feel like it all loses its edge in translation. Here's an attempt:

Mother, an
old circular saw
a dull edge,
getting ever duller.
Now out, for cigarettes.
The sin of loving
the kids,
the job,
the husband,
nicotine,
is to be a slave but
with consent.
An inkling of fear
of the masters
and more of that
of losing them
is ever present.
Lurking.
Yet, trembling as
she ascends the stairs
she always returns.

My breath slows as I wait behind the screen,
and time like a wistful bubble slugs about the air.

I see villages outside, a field mouse steal a berry,
a hand break through a glass window,
the necks of swans bent savagely and drowned.

And emptiness itself blankets the screen,
I lay under its bridge and listen to the crossing years,
their memories of comfort, gentle talk, and summer rain
pass over me like beetles scuttling into the sea.

>>15749073

it's not bad, has a certain style to it that works well

>>15748937
Good flow in general but I'd break up the paragraphs a bit. In particular, start a new paragraph after the opening line of dialogue - the lack of punctuation separating the dialogue from the next sentence is awkward otherwise.

----

This was kind of an experiment, idk if it's a bit too much:

Time had dilated around Gabe Vogel. That was the only possible explanation. That was why it said 6:07 PM on his phone when it clearly was 8 or 9, at least. Some Einsteinian shit was going down in this Safeway. Gabe was travelling at .99c.

An inexhaustible supply of people spawned from somewhere and came through Gabe’s checkout line, every type of human being imaginable, buying everything anyone could possibly sell, and Gabe said the same set of words to them in the same order, with the same facial expression. Gabe imagined that the line was actually a circle, the old trope of the snake eating its own tail – that the customers went back into the store through a different entrance after they left, and bought more groceries. There was no past, no future in the Safeway. Even the existence of the present seemed doubtful.

It was 6:11 PM. Time had a nasty habit of becoming a capital-T Thing during Gabe’s shifts. In his free hours, Gabe was fully inside of time, a cork bobbing on its waves. In the store, Gabe hovered above time and contemplated its shape, exiled from it yet bound to it. He dragged time behind him, carried time on his shoulders like Atlas. Space became less and less important. Space was now just the stage on which time performed, the marble time carved into whatever shape it wanted.

Gabe was not Gabe Vogel anymore. He was Gabe; he had no surname. He knew only what his nametag told him, which was that his name was Gabe. Sometimes a customer would read his nametag and call him by his name, as if they were old pals, which unnerved him. But the Vogel was gone. It was an emblem of history, and there was no history here. Whenever Gabe clocked out and took his apron off, he had to gradually relearn who he was. As he bussed home, he would remember himself, and by the time he reached his house, he was Gabe Vogel again. He wondered if the real Gabe was the Safeway cashier – perhaps the Gabe who existed off the clock was merely a legal fiction. Time would tell.

>>15749024
Nobody asked you

>>15749122
Thanks for the kind words anon

>>15748937
>>15748947
Good prose, would read

>>15748999
I'm a newfag and have no goddamn clue what this means

>>15749439
It means email fourlitreview at yandex dot com

>>15749477
Not good enough for you?

>>15749530
No

Is it just me or does most of the poetry in here fucking suck

>>15749530
email me.

>>15749937
this isnt me

>>15749952
it's not just you

>>15750089
This isn’t me?
There is no point in trolling me, I am just trying to gather impressive writers.

>>15748334
>>15748999
>>15750121

Thanks for bumping with your pompous faggotry, a lot more people have been reading and critiquing my "sucky poetry" since you've been opening your tampon in this thread :^)

this email faggot should fuck off

>>15749937
>>15749952
>>15750089
>>15750121
>>15750191
>>15750217

Salty guy who got rejected pretending to be me.
Sad.

>>15734149
The boy

Burning in the chambers, tar smoke fills our lungs.
I don't know what the matter is with you boy.
I am heading to the promised opium pod,
where tubes will fill me as I gasp to the otherside.
And you will always have coding if things bring you down.
Do you know what DMT is?
I've been searching for the Northern Irish dream in colleges.

You've been searching for love for England.
You're so lovely, you have your mother's face.
My readings say to betray you outright and take all that can be got.
But I feel alive right now.
Society will see the best of us, under the brutal heat of the sun.
You don't need a speech or a push.
Just failure, eventually it will be numb and you'll be harder.
Then there will only be bliss.
Good luck, boy with the lovely face

>>15749073
Very nice anon. Especially impressed due to ESL. Kind of reminds me of the new york school poets.

>and more of that
do you mean "and more than that"?

>>15749104

stanzas 1 and 3 are nice, particularly 3, it has lovely rhythm and is a pretty good end.

I would swiggle 2 around abit, phaps something like this:

I see villages outside where field mice steal the berries
and hands break through a glass window;
the necks of swans bent savagely and drowned.

Working on my first novel and just want to see what people think of it. https://pastebin.com/5y8gvTJ8

living in late stage pandemic paranoia
fear is the currency
freedom loses all meaning

>>15751249
Amazing

>>15751249
really makes you think

Bump

>>15751218
Funny recipe

>>15751249
I agree, we live in a society

>>15751420
Recipe?

>>15751249

happy guy fawkes day

>>15751676
fawke you

Bump

>>15751619
Yeah you know like a manual

>>15751837
It’s a Roman a clef

>>15751249
Concise and correct. Not a proper haiku however. Thanks for reminding me we are fucked.

fuck you
I hate you
don’t love you no more
so stop knocking at my door
peace out

>>15751843

>>15751965
do whatever you want but I’m sorry if you’re upset and I’m not sure why

>>15751218
Why are you posting Bukowski?
Are you trying to prove that the critiquers here don't know shit?

>>15751218
wow, this is fucking great. i would read more of this anon.

BUMP

ay baws can I have a CRIT pls??

am >>>15743171 (You)

>>15734149
i know that your heart
beats a loud staccato-
to see life bitten again
burns the strand

reality ages, but your heart
undoes itself, loves
expires upward
does not remember itself

from death, space, the non-ocean
from which life draws its name
this divot questions us
all creation is in pain

hearts ravage books
finding an appeal:
words that taste like love
I am and forever will be

among some rocks, he is dying
man like a flower cometh up, spits his soul
goeth back down, lives there forever
no one knows when the good lord will come again

https://pastebin.com/ng5tvBZ5
I don't know if this could go anywhere, but the concept seemed funny to me.

I think that the first part, with the automation playing piano, that you could set the scene a little better. The prose flows well but I have a hard time picturing the room and the events taking place. Being a short story this might well be intentional, but you said you wrote it in one go so maybe you plan to polish it. If you do I think it could be stronger with some more descriptions to help the reader picture what you're seeing when you wrote it. Like I said before, I don't really care for sci-fi but I like the concept and I think you could have something there with a little editing. Another part is the saviour, Samuel. He might be an automation himself, no? If that's what your going for you might be alluding to it too directly with him saying that he doesn't know (if he is or not) when the piano boy asks him. Biggest take away: the prose is nice and I had no trouble reading it and getting the idea, I just couldn't picture it at all. Try to pepper in some hard description with your cool, but vague, prose. I'll read it again when I'm not phone posting and take some better notes for you to play with in a couple of hours.
This is what I edited in mine based on anons and your suggestions.
>>15747827
Let me know what you think

>>15754130
>>15755719
god damn.

>>15750659
Thanks for the kind words, anon, and you are correct! I found the original lines, "manifeszt szolgalélek a kétség, egyszerre félni tőlük, de rettegni a hiányuktól" immensely difficult to translate.

I always get the feeling some of my lines reek of wonky english, I definitely need more practice.

>>15756808

How hard is it to learn Hungarian, lad? Asking because I'm interested in learning about your culture

Results are in. The perfusive details and minutae of ones entire week, month or periods much longer; the infinitesimal vacillations of moods, motivations and feelings which have ebbed and flowed, too rich to ever be put on paper, are rendered futile when the results are in. In the one monolith in Wall Street, floors of salarymen, who were unable to assert their usefulness, perhaps due to it being unbeknownst to themselves, were stripped of all rank and pay for their ineptitude. Yes, analysists chauffeured in from far flung advisory committees and auditing services have crunched through the data and have found that, with abundant statistical likelihood, that the men of the thirteenth and fourteenth were in fact, doing nothing at all. The booming tycoon of the company, in mercurial fury, wiped the slate clean, so to speak. Within a day, the thirteenth and fourteenth were stripped of all appurtenances or distinguishing features. These offices were stripped ti their original grey concrete. It become a common induction ceremony in that company to leave new graduate trainees stranded in these concrete floors, partly to test the fortitude of the newly inducted, and partly to impart onto them a feeling of permanent and elusive fear.

it's a struggle it's
wanting to escape childhood

it's anafter that
has always been a curse


it'slaughter and promises of
laughter and cuddles

thathave only made loneliness
worse

I know I’m not supposed to open up a novel with a three page description of setting, but if I’m 10,000 words in can I put it there?
I’m just trying to make shit cozy...

>>15757643
You can do whatever you like. Just don't expect anyone to publish it, or even read it for that matter lul
If you haven't hooked the reader in the first three sentences it's over

>>15757643
nm misread
still though, unless you've really engaged the reader then no don't

>>15757643
It better be an unfuckingbelievably good description of setting if it's three pages long, no matter where you put it. Probably a better idea to divide those three pages into multiple rounds of exposition throughout the text, if you can.

>>15757125
Flows well, entertaining overall. Maybe a bit unnecessarily verbose in spots (i.e. "appurtenances")

>>15749144
Crit this please lads, genuinely can't tell whether or not it works

>>15757874
okay 3 pages is hyperbole, my bad, I’m talking ~100 words
also the setting is getting laid out well I feel, I just know at some point I need to give location backstory for certain, as yet unseen places that just felt tiring in the opener.
obv, this is impossible for someone to really advise on with reading it, in just being autistic

>>15757874
critiquing >>15749144 since you asked

>first P
reread and tighten up the punctuation, but I'm digging it

>second P
gimme some more detail. eg: you talk about everyone buying everything, detail the things and the types of people, this will give you oppprtunities to emphasize their characterizations as well.
also give more detail when addressing ideas-- i like the oroboros concept, but state it more clearly or frantically(at least I would)

>third P
I'm meh on the capital T thing, and the fragment about exiled and bound. I like the emphasis but I'd try some other forms of expressing it. otherwise this P is nice.

>fourth P
I like it. like the first, I'd reread and try to give it more of a stuttered, frantic flow, but the ideas are nice and its a great place to start.

cheers

>>15749144
Work on tightness and creativity. Your metaphors are trite.

For Gabe Vogel, time was a tranny's dilating vagina; time was a slow turd creeping down a glass roof.
Time didn't pass, but people did. Endlessly. Mouths agape and trampling through the aisles pushing trolleys jampacked with anything not nailed down: basedmilk, vienna sausages, workout dvds from the discount bin, you name it.
The loose cunt of time dribbled out 6:11 and Gabe Vogel knew he was fucked--doomed to wade through temporal sludge, a river that refused to run at regular speed.

Gabe Vogel became GABE, timeless, nameless, jobless--free of the clock, a lost soul trapped behind the face of a broken clock and screaming--but no one would save him. Not the grandpas buying adult diapers, not the overweight women and their cosmetics, not the gauge-eared teenagers and their fake IDs buying 18oz Miller Lites and drinking their way through high school until it was their time to get their souls sucked out by a low-wage job.

He was destined to spend the rest of time there, and the Gabe beyond the clock, beyond the apron became just a figment of a future that could never happen, because Time refused to move its fat fucking asscheek off his face. GABE's face--flat and unmoving, trapped in time.

bum

>>15755305
crit anyone?

>>15760877
>asks for crit while providing no crit
everytime

>>15755305
bad

>>>/adv/22425285
>>>/adv/22425294

>>15762162
No no, anon. He's already critiqued multiple times in this thread :^)

>>15755726
: (

Here's my critique:
Everybody ITT posting horrendously cringe poetry please evaluate your lives.

>>15763687
Even my sonnets?

>>15763714
Yes. The first one is full of hackneyed imagery. Nobody wants another fucking poem about spring flowers.
The second one is just low tier erotica that comes off as crude and forced. There's no passion or real emotion, both feel artificial. I wasn't moved except moved to cringe.

I'm willing to bet 99% of people here writing poetry are doing so not because they actually like poetry but because they're too lazy to write prose, yet still want the dopamine hit of people reading their work.

There's little point in critiquing poetry in the first place, since no medium is more dependent on talent. Either you have it or you don't.

>>15763843
>There's little point in critiquing poetry in the first place, since no medium is more dependent on talent. Either you have it or you don't.
But I got the top of my course of contemporary poetry at a university. Is my life a lie?
>I'm willing to bet 99% of people here writing poetry are doing so not because they actually like poetry but because they're too lazy to write prose, yet still want the dopamine hit of people reading their work.
Not true. I got a short story published in a journal with a wikipedia, so it's not some obscure wordpress website with a masthead of a bunch of bored MFAs.

>>15762484
I'm no expert, but I think there needs to be something more than just fancy if you want this to be taken seriously. I'm not trying to be mean, but the writing itself isn't enough to carry these passages. In order to make something like this really work, it needs to be pulled off through amazing writing, not just passable or competent, but amazing. Things which work for Joyce probably don't work for the rest of us since we're not Joyce. Mixing tenses and made up words don't work on their own merit. They're just mixed tenses and made up words. When it works, it works in spite of itself, because the author was talented enough to force you to overcome the native tendency to just look at it as nonsense words and grammatical errors. I get the feeling you just wrote it for shits and giggles, but you posted it in the crit thread so here's my criticism.

If anyone feels like hitting me with some in turn, here's my shit, a fresh excerpt:
>https://pastebin.com/f6xEiRrb

>>15763900
If you have talent, it's not coming through in those sonnets. My guess is the need to conform to the sonnet format is stopping you from actually writing poetry.
Congrats on getting your short published, however.

>>15764094
the voice is wishy washy. It works in parts (the 'he knows he knows paragraph is decent) but others like the Moses thing are cringe and feel artificial. The math is out of place, both for the voice and the character who is presumably a recruit

>>15762484
you don't 'see' sound.
sensory modality error is a very amateur thing to do

>>15760877
If no one is critiquing it's usually because the piece is just too bad to even give advice on.

Restart from step one. Better yet, stop writing poetry altogether.

>page 10

>>15763549
?
>>15763687
Based

come om guys lets crituueque

CRTIQUE MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE I HATE YOU GUYS WHAT THE HE:

>>15735754
Honestly, this is incredibly overwrought and overwritten. Try to relax into your prose a little more, it's clear that you are well-read from the word go, but don't be the guy with the huge cock always pulling it out. You need to seduce the reader a little more before whipping it out.

>>15765587
Was that a good godamn or a bad godamn?

>>15765817
It was me cursing myself for not directly replying to you in the post above

>>15765835
Oh now I see it. I had no idea that was there, thanks for the crit. Reading your thing now.

The grimace and grimace back is a little on the nose. I think it's good that you're trying to set the fact that they are not happy with each other early is good, but I think a different way of saying it is going to nail it right on the head if you just make it a little less direct. Air of the room maybe? I still like it though.
>returned later, not settling for anything less than the best
that second part is implied, so you can cut it off if you so desire. Some people may say you are stating the same thing twice.
>Fortunately the small, basement shop was given a sense of being larger than it appeared by several mirrors hanging on the walls
again it's super direct. Is it fortunate to this guy that the place seems bigger, or would it be fortunate to actually be bigger, better? The vibe I got from that part in the previous version was that the guy acknowledged the trick, and it did not trick him, he coyly saw the basement for what it was.
Nice rearranging of who is what and who feels how in the beginning, it makes the rest of it play out much smoother. I think the only step further this part can take is editing that probably would be done post-finishing the project sort of editing, if you are the kind to draft entirely before getting into the real persnickety stuff.

>>15765817
bad
you should give up and find something you have talent in

>>15734149
I wrote some bs after smoking a cig. What do you guys think?

* some remarks
when the individual is confronted by the depletion of perceived
possibilities in life and feels cornered by reality. As in they feel
unable to conceive any meaning out of his surroundings


** say something about craving for control
and any frustration that might come of out of it.

** this duality of what is to be and what is ought to be, as in the will of the individual and his conception of his possibilities.
I think I need to think better about this

** one must
get back into means of being and getting reattached to reality. To
regain the reins of its own life. First, one must investigate what is
hindering him from doint it.

** what reality is composed of or our perception of reality and how do we put meaning into it

*** time itself is a fundamental concept
if all days feels the same, one doesn't have control of its own
time. It doesn't matter if he is achieving anything else in life. Time
is perceived through novelty and meaningful experiences.

**** whatever novelty and meaning are to the person in question
this can be achieved through means of art, writing is an easy way to
get back into reality. And the therapeutic

*** love also seems important
this is basically the social aspect of life. Forming bonds with other people
**** romantic partners

**** family

**** friends

**** pets?

*** making things that will remain in some way

**** children

**** planting trees

**** building things

** ways out of it

*** suicide
this is to abdicate any possibility of change. Which is the coward's
way out, unless it is to achieve some kind of meaning as in
martyrdom. But one must never strive for it, because when one's crave
for death it is definitely bound to poor meanings to be conceived and
will be remembered as a fool. As in one must be confronted with the
possibility of death before considering instead of running straight
into it.

*** denying reality itself i.e. madman's way out, drugs, whatever else
This is pure waste of time, worse than innaction depending on the
approach used. As the mind itself is subject to deterioration if it
isn't mainteined properly.

**** quote aristotle and some other bs stuff on this kind of stuff

*** reconstructing one's own reality by experience
This is Nietzsche's way out ot if. Remaking reality through will and
to overcome the nihilism. Art is a decent mean of doing it.

*** religion
This is the common approach, most people do it. It involves all things mentioned on the what reality is composed of, and it is the easiest way
out of this.

>>15766286
: ((((

>>15735754
You posted this in the last thread and have failed to heed the criticism given. Everyone keeps telling you the same thing, you need to either listen or stop asking. No amount of reposting is going to make it any better. If people want to read dialogue-driven action then they aren't going to slog through those opening pages to get there, they'll go find another book that gets there quicker. And if someone can just skip to page 28 to see the story starting, then maybe pages 1-27 aren't all that critical. I read your replies in the last thread about how you're attempting to emulate the style of classic Persian epics. Great, good job, nailed it, but narratives have evolved long past that, and for good reason.
You seem to think that readers somehow owe you their time and attention. They don't. The reading public is not a jizz-rag for your to jerk yourself off all over. Take this crap you've written and stick it at the back of your book, let the interesting stuff happen first so the reader feels somewhat indebted to you and your story, so when they get into this wall of pedantic sophistry they'll think "Hey, this guy entertained me for 200-some-odd pages, maybe he has something to say with all of this" as opposed to "Wow, this fuckwad has absolutely nothing to say and he's taking forever to do it."

The reason I'm being such a dick here is because you deserve it for two reasons. One: you keep reposting this drivel, and two: you have obvious talent and a story worth telling. Have a little goddamned faith in yourself and your story instead of thinking you need to dress it up in someone else's style to get some attention.

I'm retard. I want to use the verb Flit to indicate a single instance of flitting, specifically something like the reverse of springloaded blinds reeling up. Do I have to say Flitted in the past tense? I don't like the repetition of the T, it sounds plural to me in a way, but just Flit might look like a tense change.

>>15766321
>What do you guys think

I think you're too lazy and/or lack the self-respect to even write a 1st draft before showing it to people and therefore do not deserve critique.

>>15766520
Are you part of the group?

>>15766898
>I'm probably publishing this on Amazon to start ishygddt

>>15766520

>>15766520

I'm working on getting the structure of the next section down before I return to changing it, so it can make more sense to me when I do; I posted the same draft again only because I wanted more people to see it, being that the previous thread was closer to dying. I've gotten the critiques I was wanting now (I'm just seeing what else people have to say until the thread dies), and I will probably re-post once I feel I have addressed them, which will be a while.

All that being said, I appreciate the frankness in your post (thank you sir, may I please have another kek). I'm probably publishing this on Amazon to start once I'm done writing, and it certainly helps to know reality there, especially if I'll spend more out of my pocket for marketing. Thanks, anon.

>>15735754
>19,000 words of dialogue
my nigger please tell me I’m reading this wrong— are you writing a book or a three hour screenplay?

>>15766929
>>15766934

I'm a total noob with publishing, I haven't done the proper research yet on where to go for that. I saw a lot of those blogs saying Amazon was the go-to for self-publishers, that's where I get that idea

>>15766949

>19,000 words of dialogue

Oh hell no haha, 19,000 words is the total word count so far for the first puarter of the book, including exposition and descriptive paragraphs along with dialogue.

>>15766763
KEK I said I just wrote it down while I was smoking a cigarette. This is the second draft. The first one is on my note block.

>>15735754
couldnt get through the first page, my man put the thesaurus down, even fucking nabokov, emerson, and thoreau were tasteful with their thesaurus bashing, maybe read some of them,

>>15735754
literally undecipherable

>>15766994
I don't care about the circumstances. You took a shit and expect us to read it? Fuck off and stop being lazy

>>15766950
I intend to post mine there as well. If you're going for Amazon then you definitely need to try a different opening.

Would someone be kind enough to critique the opening chapters of my novel? I think I more or less have the same problem as this guy, the set-up is probably too long and I fear it will tire out readers before I get to the actual plot.
https://pastebin.com/F1AiUKP6

>>15766994
theres literally nothing you wrote we can crit because its just random vague ideas

>>15757125
I'm really inexperienced with English so this might not be very good/very surface level.

Overall I really liked it. It flowed well and I could really picture myself being there and sweating over whether or not I'm losing my job or not. First few lines actually make me feel a bit uncomfortable cause of this. I like how it dissects wall street, while it's obviously intense when you're there it seems quite pointless when you mention how everything is stripped before the new grads arrive. It reminds me a bit of an ant colony or bee hive where the workers slave away without really thinking about why they're doing it (money of course but no amounts of money could make up for what you describe). Really gives me a cold vibe throughout and you paint the picture of it being a very brutal place to work well, gives me a bit of a military vibe when you use words like fortitude and inducted.

>>15757132
I'm really inexperienced with English so this might not be very good/very surface level.

I struggled to follow it a bit (is anafter a real word or a typo?) but I get the feeling it's describing someone desperate for his abusive parents approval after leaving home?

>it's a struggle it's
>wanting to escape childhood
Wanting to move on but can't, speaker doesn't really know why but finds it difficult.

>it's anafter that
>has always been a curse
I'm going to take anafter as basically meaning how the speaker likes to see his parents (loving) contrasted with how they are (abusive)

>it'slaughter and promises of
>laughter and cuddles
Parents promise laughter and cuddles but once he arrives nothing but abuse (slaughter).

>thathave only made loneliness
>worse
Again seeking acceptance.

After looking at it again I misread laughter as slaughter on line 5 lol. Looking at it again it seems a bit happier, is it talking about someone whose just left home and has conflicting feelings about living alone. Struggling with responsibility as he leaves his home, "anafter" means something like dream but now he's got it he realises it isn't so good. Lines 5 onwards give me a bit of a military vibe, laughing on the phone with his family while discussing when he returns home for more laughter and cuddles, longing for it which makes loneliness worst. I could also see it as a soldier laughing with his buddies on line 5 and discussing what they're going to do once they get back on line 6. I like it a lot more now I read it properly.

>>15766321
kinda just sounds like cope for smoking a cigarette, probably deal with that, also nothing was said very prettily, which would make of for the immense trite nature of the rest. its all been said before and theres not enough personality or skill to make it seem unique


Would you anons read this? I have about 60ish sonnets-type poems like this, and then am currently making other 'journals' i kind of like writing under a vague psuedonym, like an impressionistic kierkegaard for poetry.

A Hunter's Journal Entry #1

I am a hunter, call me hunter too,
but also add addendums to my tomb,
for I'm a fool and meagre man, a tool
who's very implements devoured his soul.

I entered in this wood some time ago,
the days or weeks or months evade my count.
I've lost myself inside this darkened place,
no fire-starter left, neither a trace

I cannot find my way, much less my mind,
I haven't slept in a time; I've no time,
I run and run all day compassed by beasts,
my cleverness that sent me here now saves

These beasts are all about, I feel their breath
and yet I turn and find no tracks no heat,
am I a hunter or a fool; I find
there difference very slight, and not quite right

>>15767061
Reads like YA with swearing
Know your audience

>>15762484
>1st one
Feels like gibberish or bad translating. The 30 seconds of pig was the most amusing thing, and computer-shell was interesting. You write "it" twice in a row later.

>2nd one
>underneath the covers there's a thing outside
and then you mention the covers immediately afterwards anyways

Make the question mark a period and make the next line not sound like a stroke.

>these days being more like the ones after the days before it
So you're just going back to yesterday and then back forward to today? What? Yeah, real interesting similarity, 0 = 0 - 1 + 1, horray.

>>15764191
>hey anon let's go see what that sound it
>umm ACTUALLY you mean what's PRODUCING the sound
your complaint also implies figurative synesthesia is ameturish

>>15767171
>what that sound it
sound is

>>15767061
its kinda like stephen king, read more

>>15767281
My main goal with my writing is to make a lot of money, so I'm taking that as a compliment.

>>15766520
Based. Do me. https://pastebin.com/9AFM82b9

>>15767322
phony

>>15767327
>calvin
stopped right there, what a shit way to start

>>15767327
There is some awkward phrasing and missing punctuation which would probably stand out more if you let the story rest for a few weeks and came back with fresh eyes. Stuff like this:
>It wasn't terribly convincing, but the effort was there Calvin supposed
Should be:
>It wasn't terribly convincing, but the effort was there, Calvin supposed
Aside from the grammar problems there isn't much wrong here. Characterization is your strong point, description is middling (try to figure what matters most in the scene you're writing and save the wild adjectives for those images to emphasize them) and your dialogue is the weakest.

Your dialogue could be improved by remembering that positive statements sometimes imply negatives as well.
> "Oh shut up." Calvin said, annoyed. "Everyone knows what you mean when you say something isn't unique enough or when something is very unique."
"Or when something is very unique" is redundant and that kind of statement is jarring compared to the picture you've painted of Calvin as a businesslike military man.

>>15767444
Absolutely heard. Thank you. As far as dialogue I was trying to go for natural-sounding and people tend to be redundant in person but you're right that it doesn't fit the character. I'll tighten up the descriptions and repost in this or the next thread. I'd like to read yours if you've posted in this thread, you seem pretty knowledgeable

>>15767485
I posted mine here
>>15767061

Let me say that even with the grammar issues (and even though I don't like fantasy) I'd probably still keep reading your story. Usually in critique threads I use grammar and awkward phrasing as an excuse to stop reading, but with yours I would have kept going because I like the interaction between Calvin and Jocsa. They're opposites that complement each other well.

>>15767521
Thanks. I like them too. Read yours.
Right off the bat your prose is really easy to read. You've got a strong, consistent voice throughout and the characters are relatable and believable. What I would need to continue reading is a synopsis. I don't really care about test scores and highschools so the story became a slog as I had no idea where it was headed. What sort of book is this? I agree with the other anon that your writing has a Stephen king-esque vibe radiating off of it but in my favorite king books he makes it clear very quickly what sort of story he's telling. Sinister? You'll get that feeling in the first few pages. Slow-burn? He'll set it up with a dopamine hit of action before he drops into the background and the character development. I'm not saying you're trying to be king but you said you wanted to make money. I would advise making it very clear what kind of story it is in the first page or two. But again, this could probably be cleared up by seeing the book cover and reading the synopsis before diving in. If I was interested in the synopsis and I flipped open your story and read what you posted I would certainly keep reading. It's comfy and easily digestible, like a book you would buy at an airport to blast through in one-sitting on the plane.

Listen up fuckheads!

You roodypoo jabronis arent gonna make a dime on amazon unless you've got a huge rack and a twitter following of thirsty simps.

Write well enough to be actually published, not fake published, or don't bother.

>>15764464
what is step one of poetry?

>>15767984
Finding inspiration to put you in the right mindset for writing

Someone make a new thread

New bread:
>>15768119

>>15734149
I had a pitch for a trap harem anime that I wanted feedback for, but it seems like this isn't the place.

>>15766520
Based harsh but honest and still encouraging anon.
https://youtu.be/wMUvKNAhq0k

I'll crit you if you crit me.
https://pastebin.com/NNMkT9pb