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It's ANOTHER weird universe!!!!
 

Writing Lessons on BART

"She kept her clothes on more and more. I noticed that. She came into the bathroom, once, she never dreamed of knocking, she hadn't got a stitch on. Me neither, I was just drying off after my bath. There we both were, captured in the mirror, me young and slim and trim and tender, she vast, sagging, wrinkled, quivering. I couldn't help but giggle. I shouldn't have. I could have slapped myself, afterwards. But I couldn't take that giggle back.

'That's all very well, Dora.' she said, 'but one fine day, you'll wake up and find you're old and ugly, just like me.'

Then she cackled. I'd never even thought that, years back, she might have been pretty. She cackled and she cackled. All the same, she went to get a dressing gown before she came back to have her wee and there was a coolness between us, after that, lasted for months."

--Angela Carter, Wise Children, pg 94



Characters: Do not spare your characters or let them off the hook too easily, this is one thing that really great writers taught me. Writers must not be weak and give in to glorifying or excusing characters, because a reader will always see through that. The best writers put their characters up to the light. Every flaw and strength exposed. If that character is worth any salt, he can withstand the reader’s judgment. This is not an issue of morality on the writer's part, but one of the integrity of story and character. We don't trust characters when all we see is their strength. In turn, we will lose trust in the writer too. For this, the writer has to trust that the reader is willing to forgive. This is one of the best things about literature and stories, it appeals to the readers' magnanimity and their willingness to follow you wherever you want to lead them. If they are giving up their common sense to follow you, they want you to bring them places worth going, and they trust that you won't short change them for purpose of censoring or false righteousness on the parts of characters.

Technique: Sentence structure. "There we both were, captured in the mirror, me young and slim and trim and tender, she vast, sagging, wrinkled, quivering." Amazing, amazing sentence. Reads a poem. And the meaning is revealed in the structure.

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