OOC : A curiosity, a whine.

[sythyry]

(This is all OOC.) I don't often submit things for publication. (I dunno what, if anything, to do with the Herethroy Love Story Novel That Needs A Title, but that's a harder question.) But an ezine I heard about had an interesting theme: write a 300-word excerpt from a nonexistant work, to be published as a fragment. Inspired by the fragments of the Necronomicon and the King in Yellow, I presume. They didn't have to be fiction, or even in any extant language.

So I tossed together a bit of oddness. I should have known better: I am allergic to the very name of the ezine. Anyways, it got rejected. There's not a lot of other market for such things, so here it is... afterwards, there's an angsty little survey.

[From "Tsurallaa Sykku", a collection of traditional Vairihani advertisements with facing English translations]

KASKAUN (title): [A common name for a pet rabbit, in the optional/possible future form]

Mihaunnu kylly chaioi	At some point in the near future, we will fail to understand
Atsully kyrryat 'toi.	the desired proportions of our privelege (atoi)/life (otoi)
Ksaksauitellen too	Neither learning more about sacred cabinet-making
Chero vyellenoto	Nor finding several new and brightly colored sexual partners
Mirri	will
Psirri	be able to restore all the lacking pleasures/contentments after they have been so terribly eroded by constant exposure to thick salt tears,
Tallasessat yoto.	as you already understand.
Kammenat psasella tive	There's no use
Rauen nirnaanat nanive	Making pilgrimages to your beloved birthplace, from which you have long departed,
Loipsertele hanaprissa.	For it has been delivered to your tribe's traditional enemies as weregeld for the crimes of your ancestors.
Koi chavenka kanvenkissa	Partial paralysis induced by eating too much underripe fruit
Mirri	will
Tirri	render futile
Tar tirtavattissa!	All your performances of vigorous country kissing-dances.
Maane mepsaakaan maelle	Drinking the hot musky words from the dry pages adorned with coiled illuminations drawn in ink or semen voided by the poetic squids of yesteryear
Maakenmaa psysala selle.	will not melt long-established ice glaciers of ennui into an ocean of passionate blood.
Vaakara raakyi raakyao	Nonetheless, a pet rabbit, small and happily furred,
Vaakanka Kasta takyao'	Which you can name "Kastyie", as is traditional for pet rabbits, if you so wish,
Mirri	will
Ksirri	diminish those aspects of your soul which are receptive to despair
Vaaktenkrastattak vao	and can be served as a side dish if, by some misfortune, it dies before it has done so.

[OOC: Grr! This was gonna be an actual poll, but I couldn't persuade that to work either.] So what should I do about this? Write more stuff like that (or other views of alienness) and post to LiveJournal? Try again at the allergic ezine? Put non-Sythry stuff in the bard_bloom account, and keep sythyry for Sythyry? Write more Sythyry and things like that? Apologize to the bunnies? Stop moping and whining?

Comments

[secanth.livejournal.com]

I enjoy reading your posts, OOC and in. They always fascinate me and have given me wonderful images and ideas. If you're going to put your other writings somewhere else, can I add you? More Sythry, because it's lovely to read...and other views as well...and to heck with the ezine if they don't recognize talent.

[aynjel.livejournal.com]

I think what you should do about all of this entirely depends on what your goals are...

I think that if you want to submit pieces you're posting on LJ for publication elsewhere, then you should lock them as friends-only posts because a lot of places consider things that appear on websites to be published as far as "do we take reprints? no!" is concerned.

As far as what you should post where... that's also dependant entirely on you. Do you want to keep Sythyry's journal IC? If so, then keep it that way and post whatever you want in the other journal.

I would never apologize to the bunnies. Honest.

And as far as the e-zine is concerned... Roach has particular tastes and particular ideas; that can be said of most editors. Roach is also more willing, than most, to give feedback (at least she was when she was producing Jackhammer). If you want to write more pieces of fictional books, then by all means, do so. If you want to see them published somewhere, then by all means, submit them (and yes, this is a pretty limited market niche). You might hit on one that floats Roach's boat.

[hypothermya.livejournal.com]

amen to the locked entries....i forgot to mention that if any magazine wants to publish, it will likely want first serial rights, and depending on its market, it will want these rights to be international or national....e publication is considered international and that kinda kills any chance at selling first rights anywhere.

[sythyry.livejournal.com]

*nodnods to Aynjel and Hypothermia* Definitely right.
I don't put anything I want to publish on the web.

[rowyn]

OK.

I read that once.

Then I went back and read it again.

Then I checked the work from which it was an excerpt again.

I am greatly entertained.

And I mean that. I am not often greatly entertained, particularly by short fiction, but that was just ... sublime. A wonderful layering of concepts of and ideas, poetic and sad and funny all at the same time. I wonder if the allergic e-zine people just weren't paying enough attention. All right, I'm going to stop waxing enthusiastic now before I overdo it. :)

I would tend to say that Sythyry should be kept for Sythyry, if only because it has been for so long. Since you're not using Bard Bloom for anything else (as far as I can tell) that seems like a good venue for non-Sythyry material.

This is contingent on your still being interested in writing more of the Great Herethroy Love Story, however. If you're pretty well tired of Sythyry by now, subsuming this journal (with its built-in audience) does make more sense than starting to write other stuff in a new one.

Beyond all that ... I wanted to answer your question, but now I'm not sure what you're asking. Do you mean 'What should I do to make MYSELF happy' or 'What should I do to make my AUDIENCE happy' or 'What should I do to gain a bigger audience' or 'What should I do to make YOU, specifically, happy'?

Great Herethroy Love Story vs. Sythyry

[sythyry.livejournal.com]

Thank you! (Well, thanks to all who replied, too.) Thanks for reading, thanks for paying attention, thanks for telling me.

Sythyry's journal isn't the Great Herethroy Love Story. The Great Herethroy Love Story is a novel sitting in first draft on my hard drive, simmering while a few readers might or might not give me comments. It's an actual story, with beginning, middle, end, plot, characterization, and all of those things. For publication reasons I'm not putting it up on the web. (Well, and of course it's not that different from Sythyry. Casamint and Sythyry might even get along.)

I’m not bored of Sythyry, though I was somewhat neglecting zir when other projects were getting attention.

I wonder if the allergic e-zine people just weren't paying enough attention

They said that they felt that there was an in-joke that they weren’t getting, more or less. Or at least that it gave the feeling of an in-joke, even if there wasn’t an actual one there. *shrug* I suppose that there was one, sort of, but with a pretty big in-group, of people who’ve dealt with written material from distinctly foreign cultures.

Re: Great Herethroy Love Story vs. Sythyry

[rowyn]

Ah, sorry for the confusion, there. :)

Funny; Sythyry's journal often strikes me as an in-joke that I don't get. Zie feels like a real person living in a world at right angles to mine; there's all this overlap that ought to make it perfectly accessible, and yet I still find myself getting lost with my head tilted to one side. But I think it's mostly that I don't have a good grip on the names / appearances / relationships of the people who populate zir's life. Still an interesting read, though.

I liked this piece because it was all there. Yes, I had to read it a few times to absorb it all, but it's short. Reading 300 words three times isn't arduous. It's, you know, zen-like. I don't know if it'd work to keep doing the same thing -- more translations, for example; the novelty of seeing the initial concept unfold is a lot of the fun. But it's no less beautiful for that.

Re: Great Herethroy Love Story vs. Sythyry

[sythyry.livejournal.com]

Sythyry's journal often strikes me as an in-joke that I don't get.

It is, sort of, I suppose. It's set in beetiger and my rpg world. I didn't expect anyone who didn't have the World Tree book to be interested.

There's a lot of detail in Sythyry's journal that's not in the sourcebook of course -- Vheshrame gets a quarter-page, and that's mostly history and politics. Everything not in the sourcebook should be taken as fanfic ... um ... can you write fanfic for your own published work? Not canonical anyways.

I should make a Dramatis Personae and Glossary and file them under Memories.

Re: Great Herethroy Love Story vs. Sythyry

[eetmewithtoast.livejournal.com]

I should make a Dramatis Personae and Glossary and file them under Memories.

Ooh! Please do! I love reading Sythry's entries, but I can't remember the difference between Herethroy and an Orren. Or anything like that.

Re: Great Herethroy Love Story vs. Sythyry

[sythyry.livejournal.com]

Done! (It was a boring meefing, but I had my laptop.)

Re: Great Herethroy Love Story vs. Sythyry

[collie13.livejournal.com]

I'm enjoying reading Sythyry's stories because I love picking out the nicely-done anthropology. Plus Sythyry is rather cute, and reminds me of my own college years. Gad, were we all that clueless? ;)

Re: Great Herethroy Love Story vs. Sythyry

[sythyry.livejournal.com]

[Bard grins at the anthropology.] I'm glad I'm using that degree for something! And, well, we were all that clueless, though I exerted my cluelessness in different directions.

Re: Great Herethroy Love Story vs. Sythyry

[sythyry.livejournal.com]

Glossary and dramatis personae is now there!

Re: Great Herethroy Love Story vs. Sythyry

[blither.livejournal.com]

Oh, thanks! Clarification! (I need all the help I can get)

I, too, want you to write whatever makes you happiest. However, that being said, I'd really miss reading about Sythyry!

Re: Great Herethroy Love Story vs. Sythyry

[sythyry.livejournal.com]

Aieee! I have no intent of stopping Sythyry!

Re: Great Herethroy Love Story vs. Sythyry

[blither.livejournal.com]

*wingchirps* Good!

Re: Great Herethroy Love Story vs. Sythyry

[rowyn]

Thank you! That'll be handy. And to think, all this time and I didn't know Beetiger was your wife. :)

[lediva.livejournal.com]

I am allergic to the very name of the ezine.

It's called Walnuts?

[sythyry.livejournal.com]

Eggplant, kitty.

[lediva.livejournal.com]

Right, darn. I was going to say that, but I second-guessed myself.

"Walnuts" is kind of a dumb name for a zine, anyway.

[chipuni.livejournal.com]

Pets are so useful! They give comfort -and- food.

I love your writing, Bard. Do things that make you happiest, or that you most want to do. I love Sythyry's story for the alienness of it... but I don't want you to be limited by that.

[hypothermya.livejournal.com]

i really enjoyed reading this. it rocked. it made a pleasant departure from the typical submissions that I read in Transfer... I'd really like to see this sort of stuff in your journal again, and i'd also like to urge you to submit here: NFG I can't promise that you'll be published, but if I get ahold of your submission in the slush pile, it's going straight to the staff voting section. Thanks for posting this in anycase....I would definitely welcome more of the same.

[volatie.livejournal.com]

I just about fell out of my seat giggling from this, but not until after the deep contemplation... Someone else already said it was sublime, so I guess I don't know how to put it. *looks up synonims*

as for what you should do: yes... and no.

[falconcat.livejournal.com]

But......but......I enjoy your posts! They are so creative and I really love reading them!!

[postrodent.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Well, I love pretty much everything you've done with Sythyry, and this from someone who doesn't normally care for fantasy. On the other hand, I suspect I'd also find your OOC musings very interesting, since it's the same mind at work. So -- in the end, I'd say you should do what gives you pleasure first and foremost. Your writing will probably be better for it anyway, no matter what voice you use. Whatever you choose, I'll look forward to reading it.

[sirhc-warrior.livejournal.com]

i agree with the goals thingie.

um, probably would make more sense if i explained it.

if you want to write because you love to write, then write. write here, write there, write everywhere! (and eat green eggs and ham; they're good for you)

if you want to write and be published, that's a whole nother sack of turnips. amen to the stuff held back from general linking and to finding committed beta readers and editors instead. amen to the continual submission of pieces to various places, ad infinitum. you're reading nihilstic_kid, nes pa? he's trying to make a living off it, true, but that's the route in store for you if you want to get published. i doubt it's gonna work to lose your blood pressure over rejections.

my god, nick would have exploded into a million pieces if that was the way it went.

Richard Dansky, too - a friend and working writer - intimated a writer can't take rejections personally. you can't take criticism personally. you have to be able to listen to critiques objectively, and still write. and write some more. and yet more writing. i think Rich might be the hardest-working person i know, and i know mike.

if you just love to write, we're here to read. :) but if you want to publish, keep trying. but please don't explode into a million pieces. we'd miss you!

(plus, someone would have to clean it up...)

[koogrr.livejournal.com]

Oh this is very neat.

And Marriage of Insects made it out!

[sythyry.livejournal.com]

Man, you're digging deep in the past!

[koogrr.livejournal.com]

I was looking through someone's favourites...

[sythyry.livejournal.com]

Oh? Whose, if ... um ... maybe never mind.