/lit/ - Literature

Alright homie, drop a sample.

>somewhat unfinished novel.
>Only a few pages long

This should be good.

>>1998713

Will do, just gotta find it first. Got alot of shit on this comp.

Consider me interested.

I remember myself as a shadow, runnin' through the night.
Like a painting, standing there, waiting. Not really moving at all.
But my perception was different from most at this time of my life. Or near-death-state as I would have called it back then.
The painting, or running shadow. Whatever I was at the time, I was waiting, waiting for the un-awareness to kick in.
And then, I would become aware once again, aware of the existing un-awareness. The non existance.
The paradox that is life. Or was. Or will be. Is and is not.
The relative truth. The medication.
The brain-fucking-pills for my fucked up brain.
Handed out to me from my Shaman witch doctor.
She said I needed it, that I needed it to stay sane.
To hide myself under a blanket of heavy doses.

And I belived her. because I didn't really care at the time.

As dawn closed in on me, telling me to stop chasing stars in the park.
That's when the drugs kicked in.
I walked out of the park, looking around.
Realizing how bizarre this particular painting really was.
As I stepped on cracked concrete, looking behind me was this big city forrest.
But what I couldn't figure out was if this forrest, wich was the park, had been here before the cloud peircing buldings, the starbucks on every corner where you buy yourself a peice of social life for a couple of numbers, before the civilized society.
Or if someone had placed it there, as a memory of what lies beyond this concrete grave I walk. You walk, We walk.
I turned around and walked across the graveyard. The graveyard with high healed buldings, wearing fancy lipstick with names on it.
Not the names of the many dead underneath me. But the names of what they all died for.
Starbucks, mc.donalds, the something bank, kalvin klein.

There was a commercial sign right outside my house. I looked at it. And I thought.
"This is what you should wear, this will make you appealing. Say nothing.
Be appealing."

Be appealing, were running a fucking business here.

I took another pill and climbed up the stairs.

As I opened the door and walked into the kitchen I saw a snake.
A snake almost as big as me. Sliding around on the kitchen floor. Doing the dishes.
It stared at me. Asked me something.
"I do not speak your language snake." I tried to tell it.
It got up and started shouting.
I tried to understand. I really did.
"What do you want from me?" I asked the snake.
It looked at me for a while. Frustrated.
Said something more.
Went back to doing the dishes.
I lit a cigarette. The snake had been there before.
And she could stay if she liked, as long as she kept doing the dishes.

As I stood there, watching the snake doing my dirty dishes I felt a strange, unfamiliar,
yet so well known feeling of guilt.
I had always been here before.
This place was my foreign home. The warzone from wich I fled, just to end up there again.

But no bullets in the shape of words passed me by, or hurt me anymore.
The ruins of unspoken truth and shattered futures, if not the past, was all that was left.
And I felt happy about it. Because this place would never change.

Unless the stains were to be washed away by the Snake.

That Snake must've been the problem at that time.
My trainrides biggest and most frustrating dilemma.

I dropped the ciggarete on the floor, hoping that it would be generous enough to feed the carpet, only inches away, with the flames from wich this place came.
It didn't. It just died, quietly and selfishly.

I felt like I needed something.
Something fresh, something warm, comforting.
Like a blanket to heal my wounds. The wounds I did not have.
The wounds that had turned into scars. bright disfigures on my body.
White stripes, like the tigers.

As the snake got out of the kitchen, into the hallway, and out through the door.
Throwing it behind her, taking it for granted that the door would close itself.
Wich it did.
I wondered what her final destination would be.
But I didn't have the time to reflect on it. I was still in need of something.
I figured that it must be food, so I put some fries in the oven.

When they were done I didn't want them anymore. So I put them aside.
Sat down on the floor, and had another ciggarette. My las one.

As I smoked my last paper wrapped stick of cancer I reached another dilemma. Choices, to be made.
I thought "This is my last paper wrapped stick of cancer, when iv'e smoked this one, there are no more. That leaves me with two alternatives."
"I either go out and buy a new pack of cancer. Or I quit smoking."

This was very difficult for me. Because I liked smoking. But I also liked sitting on my kitchen floor.
But after a while I realized that I had a third option.

I could always kill myself. And no longer have to think about matters, such as these, ever again.

But killing myself would mean sacrificing the kitchen floor for a knife or some item alike.
And even if I did, there was no ciggaretes in hell. Because ciggarettes would be what I would want the most in hell.
And in heaven, there would be no flames. Too windy, as I figure it might be.

So I smoked my last paper wrapped stick of cancer, and fell asleep on the kitchen floor.

Definitely not long enough to be a novel (where the fuck did you even get that idea?), but the writing is gorgeous. I would publish it.

This isn't a novel. It isn't even a novella, or an unfinished one. It's free-form poetry.

>>1998742

Thanks, and I know. I just didn't know what else to call it.

>As dawn closed in on me, telling me to stop chasing stars in the park.
>That's when the drugs kicked in.
>I walked out of the park, looking around.
>Realizing how bizarre this particular painting really was.

good stuff

>>1998742
Disagreein'. It's mostly misapplied cliche and vague simile. It would pass for YA work, but not much else.

authentic, sensuous, red-blooded poetry
the kind I love
you might be able to make money off this

Have you heard of Daniel Crocker? Your writing is like an unfunny, worse version of his.

Some conventional errors here and there, but on the whole it's very good.

I'm not usually fond of free-form, but your effortless style and vivid images grabbed me by the lapels.

I appreciate the comments.
I'm only 17 and just started writing about a year ago.

Thing is, i'd like to publish it. But how?

>>1998757
>>1998750
0/10

anyways, I like it

>>1998762
since it's not a novel, you won't be able to publish it as such

my suggestion: try getting it published in a magazine somewhere, not a small college mag but something that's read by a lot of people

>>1998762
>I'm only 17
i jelly. i wasn't writing shit a tenth this decent at 17.

>>1998765

Yeah, maybe if id write some more stuff I could put it into a collection of works or something. But im no name, no one would recognize it.

I'll try that newspaper thing. Maybe.

>>1998767

Did you smoke pot?

Cus pot is a very good kind of fuel for creativity.

Atleast I think so.

Reminds me of Ginsberg a little.

Very polished, very genuine.

I really like it.

>>1998779

Thank you.

I'm from Sweden though. Not originally, but that's where I am at the moment.

Publishing something in this little shithole wont get me nowhere.

/lit/ has the most fantastic trolls

inb4 OP praises himself for 250 posts, just like in the last thread

>>1998787

What do you mean? OP's work was REAALLLY good.

>>1998799

Yeyeye. I don't excpect too much. I was looking for constructive critisism.

>>1998807

actually upon reading OPs work i concur good job OP you are like k.dick but with better flair, well done

>>1998829

Thanks, I haven't read anything by him.
Haven't read that much at all, maybe I should.

I've mostly read Huxley, Salinger, and that kind of stuff.

There are worthwhile aspects and almost quote worthy moments in there but I think /lit/ is going soft on you for some ungodly reason.

The biggest problem you have with this sample is the recurring trend of completely pointless lines. Half of your statements seem to be there for prose's sake alone and that hurts the message you are trying to send. Trim the fat then you've got something good.

not trying to be a dick op.

Your sentences feel very staccato or disconnected, definitely "independent" from the whole of your work. If this is a creative decision, well and good, but if you're unaware of this then you need to think about it.

Second, you have many misspellings/grammatical errors. If you want to get published, you'll definitely have to fix them. There's nothing worse than an asshole writer who doesn't (seem) like he gives a shit about his work.

3rd, I don't fucking care about the snake.

4th, don't reuse the same bit over and over again. "paper wrapped stick of cancer"? GJ carry on, I want to read that 10 million times. Oh wait, I DON'T. Fuck you.

Basically, I think you need to make the story more relatable. I do improv regularly: one of the things we stress in improv is creating a relationship, a believable character. Inventing externalities doesn't do it.

>>1998890

This is the /lit/ I know.
You explained it better than I did too.

Like I said trim the fat and your good.

>>1998740

>As I smoked my last paper wrapped stick of cancer I reached another dilemma. I also suspect you of being the hack from the other day who wrote about a woman with a star in her belly or some such shit. If so, then I've no idea what you're getting from this.

As poetry this is meaningless and ugly, as a novel it's a joke, as prose it's choppy, stacatto and unreadable.

You've very little talent, but I applaud your attempts to get this published. If I'm wrong, and the Paris Review snatches up your work, then I apologise, and I will show my cock on Tottenham Court Road.
> paper wrapped stick of cancer

Awful, and you used it twice. It's just fucking wretched.

I can only assume that at least a majority of the positive responses are OP samefagging

>>1998900

no sir, it is sincerely good!

it is as though a literary revolution is coming, and OP will front it with his chosen wepen: the mighty pen

OP, it's pretty bad. just because you wrote it on drugs doesn't make it good.

try again in a few years

>>1998900

Everyone seems to jump on the "hes samefagging" bus. every damn time. Is it so hard to believe that some people like it and others dont?

I mean there are people who call ALL fiction works shit-garbage. And there are people who eat shit-garbage. Just accept that.

>>1998737

>White stripes, like the tigers.

I hate to break it to you, fistpump, but tigers have BLACK stripes. Also, should that be 'like the tiger's', ie like the stripes of the tiger, or 'like the tigers' as in similar to a large number of tigers all together. Either way, they still have black stripes, but it would help with the comprehension of your execrable poetry or 'novel' or whatever the fuck this nightmare is.

PROTIP: Poetry takes a lot longer than prose to write, and your drug-addled first drafts are not poems. This is like bringing a sketch of a woman and saying please rate my painting of the crowd at Aintree racetrack.

If you work on the thing, polish it, think about your metaphors, about rhythm and scansion, about metre and rhyme (even if your thinking about it leads to the idea 'I don't want it to rhyme, and I want to fuck about with the metre'), then maybe it will be worth reading, although I'm not optimisitic.

In the meantime, this is unedited shit, nothing better than an idea, not even a first draft, and I'm irritated that you've wasted my time by bringing unfinished work to the table. Especially work of such disgustingly low quality.

>>1998753

>you might be able to make money off this

Fucking troll.

>>1998890
I'm this guy: >>1998914

It may be that some people on 4chan like this as it is. Doubtless many people do. But if you're publishing, you're not doing it for 4chan, because if so you'd never get a goddamn cent. TY copyright infringment. So in essence, OP shouldn't give a fuck about you and neither should anyone else.

Regards, Anon.

>>1998914
I know you might have spent a long time devising this troll, but no one is going to be too emotionally invested in someone else's work, unless they actually get some unsuspected recognition like tao lin.

4/10 for the effort

>>1998924

I wouldn't say a long time, a moment of furrowed brow at best.

>>1998920

Amazing, I somehow screwed up the links. Anyways, reverse the links above and it makes more sense.

>>1998763
Are you serious?
>As dawn closed in on me, telling me to stop chasing stars in the park.
It's like John Green meets an actual John Green character, a pubescent boy who thinks if he uses enough figurative language he'll be bound to write something profound.

I'm astonished by how much hate and praise there is in this thread. It's definitely one of the more polarizing pieces I've seen here.

As for me, I think it's pretty fucking good. Not revolutionary, or revelatory, but good. I don't share the sentiment some people are espousing that your images are weak and metaphors lacking; quite the contrary, I think both are in good form here, and they don't encumber your poem too much. You'll want to work on building the character and story a bit, but don't listen to the jackoff suggesting rhyme and meter. That would require a lot more surgery than you should spend on this. Work with what you have. This is solid stuff so far.