Hey all. Well, Nalo’s gone, and like all of our tutors so far, we miss her. She was sharp in critiques, friendly both in and out of class, and she spent extra time with us outside class, including a special session depicting people of sexualities that may not be exactly like our own — about tackling the heterogeneity that can exist in imaginary worlds, and which can make those worlds more interesting and exciting. But she wasn’t just great on diversity/sexuality-related writing, and it’d be unfortunate if she were typecast as being mostly about that, when in fact, she’s mostly …
Tag: Clarion West 2006
Clarion West Week 3
A great, busy, hard-driving week. We had Ian MacLeod in from UK and he focused on character and how things can flow from that. Character connects to plot and setting and setting connects to character and plot and plot connects to character and setting, yes, but what are the mechanics of character? What are the mechanics of creating a plot and then choosing a character who fits into it? What are the mechanics of working with settings to frame or give birth to characters and plots? How do we generate characters? Why do they have the quirks they do? How …
Clarion West Week 2
It was an excellent, amazing week. Maureen McHugh is rock’n’roll. She said a lot of very great, very simple but not necessarily straightforward things… or rather, straightforward things I’ve never heard before, and somehow already heard before at the same time. She is bristlingly intelligent, wonderfully friendly. I some really good advice one-on-one, and lots of great thoughts in critique sessions. Maureen did some wonderful exercises with us, including one which was directly useful to me in writing the story I handed in on Wednesday night. It was due tonight (Sunday, a long time later) but I drafted it — …
Chirality @ Clarion
Brief note: mainly posting this so as not to lose the link or have to hunt for it: The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2001 was awarded for work in chirality, which is something that looks like it will be an important science bitlet in the story I’m writing now. The link above is a really good explanation of what the hell chirality is. Working like mad, hoping to finish this at midweek and, barring objections, submit it for crit on a day when fewer submissions are currently scheduled. If it’s okay with our very cool new instructor, Maureen McHugh, who …
Clarion, Day 6
I’m about a week into Clarion; the first week of instruction, which was with Paul Park, has finished but it’s only Saturday so the first week isn’t over. Paul has this excellent ability to cut to the heart of the matter of things, or, perhaps, more importantly, to get us to look at the heart of the matter of things. Socratic method — questions, spinning out of implications, changing direction and starting again with more questions, until we seem to have reached somewhere. And storytime: I will really miss hearing him reading stories. The man should be reading audiobooks. So …
Probably the Last Post for a While
I am jetlagged, but not as badly as I could have been, and I am here. Got a room, got a futon mattress for the floor, got a desk and chair. HAven’t unpacked. Will think about it after breakfast. Got wireless internet, which is how I am connecting now. Got lots of bread. TONS of bread. Met almost everyone, which is cool — interesting mix of people. There’s a scary frog. Not scary — more disturbing. Must go get breakfast. No more blogging for a while. Best, all…
Clarion Blog Hiatus
I’m not planning on blogging regularly here while I’m at the Clarion workshop, though intermittent posts might make their way here on the backs of digital pigeons. But basically, for the next six weeks, I’ll be writing other things. And that also means if you email me, I may not reply for a while. Even a few weeks. But I will probably read my mail regularly, so if something’s urgent, of course I’ll reply! I hope all my readers have a good summer and subscribe to my RSS feeds so they won’t have to check back — they’ll know when …
Almost there…
YAY! I have finalized all the grades I can tonight — which means all but three grades. Everything else has been submitted, has been marked, and has been shown to the student or will be shown tomorrow. Small adjustments might be required, but nothing earthshaking, well, as long as my luck holds out. (My luck holds out until the moment an adjusted grade affects the curve.) So now, after having finished all of that grading, here’s my to-do list for the next few days: Finalize 3 remaining grades: one for a student presentation to be delivered tomorrow, one for a …
AAAAAAAAAAARGH!
You know, I had a bad impression of the Academic Affairs Office where I work even before I was hired. I don’t know what happened, but twice they claimed not to have received my transcripts — transcripts that somehow arrived everywhere else they were sent. Ahem. Well, getting final, official clearance to match the unofficial permission I’ve repearedly to go to Clarion West, this seems to have become well-nigh impossible. Almost. But fill out this one more little paper, and maybe we’ll see. Oh,and this one. And can you fill out that form? And retype this letter, but leave this …
Twitchy
Looks like I’m not the only Clarionite-to-be who’s having eye troubles. I do feel somewhat better, and maybe it’s nerves, that are compounding the general fatigue, but my right eye — that is, my one good eye — is not doing so well these days. I credit lack of sleep, stress, and strain. The eyedrops the doc prescribed me are helping, but aren’t erasing my nervousness about it. I mean, when you have only one good eye, you kind of have to take care of it, you know?