I have a terrible time transitioning from one activity to another. This isn't something that I'm alone in; kids have this problem all the time. In our lives, we learn to manage transitions.
My difficulty comes in transitions between writing-related activities. I blog. I navigate Facebook, which for me counts as maintenance of professional relationships as well as personal ones. I write - and right now I'm actively working on three different projects. Each time I have to transition from one of these to the other, I lose time.
I'm guessing I'm not the only one who experiences this, so I thought I'd share some of my ideas for dealing with it.
1. Transition-filling activities
These are the kind of thing that I put under "fallow mind time" in my earlier post. If you're in a solid stretch of three hours and have to leave off one thing and go to another, try spending five to ten minutes taking a shower, or running around the block, preparing tea, or scrubbing that thing in your house that you never scrub. Keep a time limit on it, and while you're doing it, try to empty your head. You may find it easier to go on to a new activity this way.
2. Compartmentalizing
I have different types of time. There's with the kids time and alone time. There's also before school time, during school time, and after school time. I try to keep Facebook maintenance and other social sites for times when I'm with the kids (but, importantly, not concentrating hard on a kid activity!), because such web activities don't require too much close attention. I then try to divide projects between the before school and during school times, taking advantage of the drop-off as a non-deliberate transition filler. It's so much easier if I can blog before school, and then write during school, and Facebook after school.
3. Using the Differences
I had a hard time knowing what to call this one. Essentially it means if I have to work on two separate writing projects back to back, I try to choose two things that are very different from each other. Given two short stories about aliens, I try to compartmentalize. Given a single block of time, I'll try to spend some of it on Japanese Fantasy and some on aliens, or Varin. On the other hand, it helps me if blogging is more similar to what I'm writing about, not less.
4. Scheduling
For a project that doesn't seem to fit well with others, try picking a fixed day when you'll work on it. That way, nothing else will butt into its space.
These are my thoughts. Share some of yours - I'd love to hear!
Friday, April 23, 2010
Thursday, April 22, 2010
More on the evolutionary history of homo sapiens
Today I ran across an interesting article that asked the question, "Did Neanderthals ever interbreed with early Homo sapiens?" Fascinating stuff based on worldwide survey of DNA.
You can find it here.
You can find it here.
Robot Attitude
I was at the grocery store this morning and said hi to my checker friend Kim, who was serving as queen of the self-service checkout area. We chatted about how the system was working, and she was explaining that self check-out is great when you have just a couple of things - maybe a coffee and a donut - but not so great when you have $250 worth of groceries and two impatient children. Because, she explained, if you pick anything up out of the bagging area before you've paid for it, the self-checkout system gets upset. Kim told me:
"She says, 'Put it back, put it back!'"
I was intrigued, and effectively said, "So she's like that, is she?" Kim explained that the checkout system is definitely a female, and "she has attitude."
"So she's OCD?" I asked. (obsessive-compulsive disorder)
"Yeah, pretty much," answered Kim. "She's all witchy."
We laughed about it and said goodbye, but as I was leaving, I knew I'd blog about it. These days we interact with computer systems all the time, and with talking computer systems too. The ATM might talk to us (it does all the time in Japan). The self-checkout system talks to us. The automatic flight information guy talks to us.
And darned if we don't feel that these things have personalities.
Our power to anthropomorphize is really quite astonishing, but at the same time, it must be taken into account. I'm absolutely sure that people have done A LOT of work to make sure that the computer guy who helps you with flight information is behaving really politely. I'm always impressed with him, in fact. He's polite, he's helpful and accurate, and if you're having trouble he'll immediately say, "It sounds like you need to talk to a representative. Let me get someone for you."
I'm sure there's a story there. Our assumption of the Cooperative Principle of conversation (H.P. Grice) is really strong. What if we ran into a real AI? Would we be able to tell? I've seen a bunch of stories where it's really clear the computer system is doing the impossible, i.e. thinking for itself, but I'm not sure in practice this would be easy to determine. The computers that talk to us now aren't utilizing a language system like the one we use to generate natural language. They're dealing with a microscopic subset of topics and have fixed responses. On the other hand, I know from learning foreign language myself that when you start out, you're pretty functional over a micro-subset of topics and then have to push yourself to get beyond them (even if your responses aren't entirely fixed).
I'm teaching my kids manners, and I always say to them, "If you're polite, people will like you and be happy to help you." It's amazing how much this is true. It's also true that politeness reflects on your personality, and that language learners can be wrongly thought to be bad people if they make errors of pragmatics. This principle that allows people to extrapolate back from your words to imagine the quality of your personality is the same one that allows Kim to tell me that the self-checkout is "witchy."
I think this is fascinating.
"She says, 'Put it back, put it back!'"
I was intrigued, and effectively said, "So she's like that, is she?" Kim explained that the checkout system is definitely a female, and "she has attitude."
"So she's OCD?" I asked. (obsessive-compulsive disorder)
"Yeah, pretty much," answered Kim. "She's all witchy."
We laughed about it and said goodbye, but as I was leaving, I knew I'd blog about it. These days we interact with computer systems all the time, and with talking computer systems too. The ATM might talk to us (it does all the time in Japan). The self-checkout system talks to us. The automatic flight information guy talks to us.
And darned if we don't feel that these things have personalities.
Our power to anthropomorphize is really quite astonishing, but at the same time, it must be taken into account. I'm absolutely sure that people have done A LOT of work to make sure that the computer guy who helps you with flight information is behaving really politely. I'm always impressed with him, in fact. He's polite, he's helpful and accurate, and if you're having trouble he'll immediately say, "It sounds like you need to talk to a representative. Let me get someone for you."
I'm sure there's a story there. Our assumption of the Cooperative Principle of conversation (H.P. Grice) is really strong. What if we ran into a real AI? Would we be able to tell? I've seen a bunch of stories where it's really clear the computer system is doing the impossible, i.e. thinking for itself, but I'm not sure in practice this would be easy to determine. The computers that talk to us now aren't utilizing a language system like the one we use to generate natural language. They're dealing with a microscopic subset of topics and have fixed responses. On the other hand, I know from learning foreign language myself that when you start out, you're pretty functional over a micro-subset of topics and then have to push yourself to get beyond them (even if your responses aren't entirely fixed).
I'm teaching my kids manners, and I always say to them, "If you're polite, people will like you and be happy to help you." It's amazing how much this is true. It's also true that politeness reflects on your personality, and that language learners can be wrongly thought to be bad people if they make errors of pragmatics. This principle that allows people to extrapolate back from your words to imagine the quality of your personality is the same one that allows Kim to tell me that the self-checkout is "witchy."
I think this is fascinating.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Keeping The Balls in the Air
My new novel is complex. Those of you who know my writing probably won't find this surprising, since everything I write tends to be complex and develop extra layers. So I thought I'd share a few thoughts on how I keep that complexity under control.
#1. I outline. I'm not talking about the standard-format Roman numerals and then letters etc. but I will write an outline. If my vision on the story is foggy - which it often is for latter portions of long novels until I get closer in the process of writing them - then I just write down an unnumbered list of critical events that have to happen, in the order in which they happen. Those can include things as big as "X character gets killed" or as small as "Y character makes a decision." The closer I get, the more things start fleshing themselves out into scenes and chapters, and then I write down a general description of what should happen.
#2. I manage my worldbuilding. I design until I'm blue in the face, and compile lots of files full of notes. After mostly finishing the design, I try to wrap this all together into one bundle which I call point of view. Once I have the point of view right, it pulls a lot of the worldbuilding and basic character elements together at once and lets me work with them together instead of separately. As I write, I then selectively deepen my understanding at different points depending on the needs of the story.
#3. I keep explicit track of plot and character arcs. Plot arcs and character arcs often parallel one another, but are not always the same. If there are only two or three arcs going, I can usually keep track of them in my head, but my current novel has about six, all of which are interrelated, so what I'm doing is making a list of them and appending it to the back of each chapter. Then once I've got the chapter sketched, I can check to make sure all the arcs are addressed in the action I'm planning - and again after I've finished writing I can write notes about how each arc has been pushed forward. This is information that I can then carry forward into planning and writing the next section. So as an example, my initial arc list looks something like this:
Ongoing arcs:
Catacomb/Kartunnen Ryanin/Akrabitti
Kinders Fever
Reyn/Fernar jealousy/Della/Yoral
Tagret/Imbati
Nekantor/Speaker of the Cabinet/Garr
Tamelera/Aloran
As you can see, it's pretty much incomprehensible to anyone but me (and others who know character names or to whom I've mentioned plot elements!). I stick notes on the end of each arc label to track what I've done. Ideally, each chapter should do something for every arc. It's probably okay if one or two of them don't develop through a single chapter (due to the pov character I'm working with) but I want to make sure I don't drop them for too long.
#4. I keep track of characters' mental states (psychology). This is related to plot and character arcs, obviously, but I do track it independently. Given that I place a lot of importance on characters' decisions (related to romantic or platonic relationships or to any other critical plot element), and I like to have my characters build up gradually to those decisions. Motivation is really important - so important to me, in fact, that it's the reason why I write chronologically. What a character thinks at any given point will change what they do, and thus what the story does as well. I can't be certain whether an event will happen - or more critically, how it will happen - unless I have a continuous process of development in the mental states and motivations of the characters and their interactions. If I don't keep track I will have to go back and find the lost thread of psychology where it dropped off, and rewrite everything from then on (which makes me scream and want to bang my head on walls!).
#5. I keep track of "arrows." Literally, this is what I call them; my friend Janice will say to me, "You need to line up your arrows," and I'll know exactly what she means. I'm not sure whether to call it "theme" but I usually have an underlying issue that I want to have going on in a story. The plot and characters tend to serve it on some level; descriptions will also serve it on some level. In my linguistics stories, it tends to be the critical social or linguistic issue that underlies the misunderstanding between human and alien characters - so a good many of my arrows serve as clues to the hidden solution. The arrows can be words, phrases, word repetitions, dialogue elements, events, etc. so long as they contribute to the drive and focus of the story. When I write with attention to arrows (and believe me, I give the arrows a great deal of attention in revisions because they're tougher to track in a first draft), it's not just a question of just finding a cool way of describing something, but finding the right way: the precise description that will align its arrows with the character, the plot progress, the worldbuilding elements, the dominant metaphors, the theme, etc. This may all sound rather abstract and possibly a bit frivolous, but "lining up the arrows" often makes the difference with my beta readers between a story being cool but not having much impact, and a story being vibrant and amazing. Another way to talk about arrows is in terms of "alignment" and "focus." They're worth some attention, because they can make a huge difference.
One last note: I don't feel I have to keep track of all levels at once. I bundle things together to get them going (like pov, which subsumes worldbuilding and character and elements of character arcs etc.). I don't try to keep my outline in my head; that's what the written outline is for. The only part I keep in my head is the immediate section I'm working on. I keep my focus in the character's point of view and develop the plot along with the mental states. I try to keep my arrows aligned on a basic level but if I don't quite manage it on the first go, that's okay. That's what revisions are for!
Those are my thoughts on complexity for today. Now I have to go do some juggling.
#1. I outline. I'm not talking about the standard-format Roman numerals and then letters etc. but I will write an outline. If my vision on the story is foggy - which it often is for latter portions of long novels until I get closer in the process of writing them - then I just write down an unnumbered list of critical events that have to happen, in the order in which they happen. Those can include things as big as "X character gets killed" or as small as "Y character makes a decision." The closer I get, the more things start fleshing themselves out into scenes and chapters, and then I write down a general description of what should happen.
#2. I manage my worldbuilding. I design until I'm blue in the face, and compile lots of files full of notes. After mostly finishing the design, I try to wrap this all together into one bundle which I call point of view. Once I have the point of view right, it pulls a lot of the worldbuilding and basic character elements together at once and lets me work with them together instead of separately. As I write, I then selectively deepen my understanding at different points depending on the needs of the story.
#3. I keep explicit track of plot and character arcs. Plot arcs and character arcs often parallel one another, but are not always the same. If there are only two or three arcs going, I can usually keep track of them in my head, but my current novel has about six, all of which are interrelated, so what I'm doing is making a list of them and appending it to the back of each chapter. Then once I've got the chapter sketched, I can check to make sure all the arcs are addressed in the action I'm planning - and again after I've finished writing I can write notes about how each arc has been pushed forward. This is information that I can then carry forward into planning and writing the next section. So as an example, my initial arc list looks something like this:
Ongoing arcs:
Catacomb/Kartunnen Ryanin/Akrabitti
Kinders Fever
Reyn/Fernar jealousy/Della/Yoral
Tagret/Imbati
Nekantor/Speaker of the Cabinet/Garr
Tamelera/Aloran
As you can see, it's pretty much incomprehensible to anyone but me (and others who know character names or to whom I've mentioned plot elements!). I stick notes on the end of each arc label to track what I've done. Ideally, each chapter should do something for every arc. It's probably okay if one or two of them don't develop through a single chapter (due to the pov character I'm working with) but I want to make sure I don't drop them for too long.
#4. I keep track of characters' mental states (psychology). This is related to plot and character arcs, obviously, but I do track it independently. Given that I place a lot of importance on characters' decisions (related to romantic or platonic relationships or to any other critical plot element), and I like to have my characters build up gradually to those decisions. Motivation is really important - so important to me, in fact, that it's the reason why I write chronologically. What a character thinks at any given point will change what they do, and thus what the story does as well. I can't be certain whether an event will happen - or more critically, how it will happen - unless I have a continuous process of development in the mental states and motivations of the characters and their interactions. If I don't keep track I will have to go back and find the lost thread of psychology where it dropped off, and rewrite everything from then on (which makes me scream and want to bang my head on walls!).
#5. I keep track of "arrows." Literally, this is what I call them; my friend Janice will say to me, "You need to line up your arrows," and I'll know exactly what she means. I'm not sure whether to call it "theme" but I usually have an underlying issue that I want to have going on in a story. The plot and characters tend to serve it on some level; descriptions will also serve it on some level. In my linguistics stories, it tends to be the critical social or linguistic issue that underlies the misunderstanding between human and alien characters - so a good many of my arrows serve as clues to the hidden solution. The arrows can be words, phrases, word repetitions, dialogue elements, events, etc. so long as they contribute to the drive and focus of the story. When I write with attention to arrows (and believe me, I give the arrows a great deal of attention in revisions because they're tougher to track in a first draft), it's not just a question of just finding a cool way of describing something, but finding the right way: the precise description that will align its arrows with the character, the plot progress, the worldbuilding elements, the dominant metaphors, the theme, etc. This may all sound rather abstract and possibly a bit frivolous, but "lining up the arrows" often makes the difference with my beta readers between a story being cool but not having much impact, and a story being vibrant and amazing. Another way to talk about arrows is in terms of "alignment" and "focus." They're worth some attention, because they can make a huge difference.
One last note: I don't feel I have to keep track of all levels at once. I bundle things together to get them going (like pov, which subsumes worldbuilding and character and elements of character arcs etc.). I don't try to keep my outline in my head; that's what the written outline is for. The only part I keep in my head is the immediate section I'm working on. I keep my focus in the character's point of view and develop the plot along with the mental states. I try to keep my arrows aligned on a basic level but if I don't quite manage it on the first go, that's okay. That's what revisions are for!
Those are my thoughts on complexity for today. Now I have to go do some juggling.
Monday, April 19, 2010
Amazing Pictures of Eyjafjallajokull
I hadn't seen many pictures of the Icelandic volcano until I found this site today. These photos are AMAZING!
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/04/more_from_eyjafjallajokull.html
And on a more TTYU note, here's how that word is pronounced in Icelandic.
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/04/more_from_eyjafjallajokull.html
And on a more TTYU note, here's how that word is pronounced in Icelandic.
Companions
Companions. Doctor Who is famous for them - Leela, Peri, Sarah Jane Smith, Adric, etc, etc - but almost everyone has them. In some cases they're sidekicks of a sort for a single main character. In other cases a larger group sticks together. Frodo has Sam. Aang has Katara, Sokka, Toff (and Appa!). Zuko has Iroh. The list could go on and on.
Why are companions so important?
One reason is social realism. There aren't that many complete loners out there. People have friends that they live their lives with.
Another reason is that the main character needs help. When you look at the Avatar group (Sokka wanted to call them "team Avatar" I believe), it's balanced between different types of people. There's an air-bender, a water-bender, an earth-bender and a warrior. That gives them a wide range of skills and strengths that they can use to get through their stories successfully.
Another big reason is information management. The Doctor has mountains of specialized skills and knowledge - because he's a Time Lord! - but without the companions he'd have no reason to explain any of it. If you have a major character who's an incredible specialist on some topic, you can always show him or her doing what he/she is good at... but if you build in an information imbalance between that person and someone else, it gives him/her an opportunity to explain where that skill came from, or how it works, or any number of other things that would otherwise feel like blatant infodumping.
Conflict is another reason. Conflict can serve the purposes of information management, as when two people start arguing and that lets them divulge information to the reader that the characters already know (without using as-you-know-Bobs), but I've separated it out because it actually does a lot more than that. Conflict is an enormous source of drive in the plot. Ongoing disputes (of the right variety) between a character and her companion can influence where the story goes and keep us wanting to see what happens. Conflict can also drive character development.
Dealing with an introverted character is a lot easier if that person has a companion. You can make good use of internalized thoughts when you're working with the written rather than the visual medium, but still, internalization can only take you so far. A companion gives the introverted character a reason to try to speak - or perhaps a reason to try not to speak! A companion will bring certain topics into the introverted person's thoughts. Appa gives Aang a reason to talk out loud even when he's alone, which is very useful to the storyteller who can't make any use of internalization.
Companions also create wonderful opportunities to explore language. Some companions maintain an ongoing banter which can really add to the ambiance of the whole story. Their talk can be helpful for a story not only for content reasons, but for dialect reasons, and for the way it reveals aspects of the social contract in the community from which they (or each one) comes.
I'm not going to end this by saying you need to go off and give your protagonist a companion. Sometimes that's the right thing for a story, and sometimes it isn't - but it's worth considering. Even if the companionship is short-lived within the story, it can still be a valuable addition to what you're creating.
Chances are that if you've gotten much of a story written (especially a novel) you already have companions built into it. If you do, then it's worth looking at them and thinking explicitly about how they are functioning and what kind of work they are doing for you, the writer, as well as what they're doing for the other characters. That way you can deepen them, tune them, and strengthen them so that they're making a bigger difference for your story.
It's something to think about.
Why are companions so important?
One reason is social realism. There aren't that many complete loners out there. People have friends that they live their lives with.
Another reason is that the main character needs help. When you look at the Avatar group (Sokka wanted to call them "team Avatar" I believe), it's balanced between different types of people. There's an air-bender, a water-bender, an earth-bender and a warrior. That gives them a wide range of skills and strengths that they can use to get through their stories successfully.
Another big reason is information management. The Doctor has mountains of specialized skills and knowledge - because he's a Time Lord! - but without the companions he'd have no reason to explain any of it. If you have a major character who's an incredible specialist on some topic, you can always show him or her doing what he/she is good at... but if you build in an information imbalance between that person and someone else, it gives him/her an opportunity to explain where that skill came from, or how it works, or any number of other things that would otherwise feel like blatant infodumping.
Conflict is another reason. Conflict can serve the purposes of information management, as when two people start arguing and that lets them divulge information to the reader that the characters already know (without using as-you-know-Bobs), but I've separated it out because it actually does a lot more than that. Conflict is an enormous source of drive in the plot. Ongoing disputes (of the right variety) between a character and her companion can influence where the story goes and keep us wanting to see what happens. Conflict can also drive character development.
Dealing with an introverted character is a lot easier if that person has a companion. You can make good use of internalized thoughts when you're working with the written rather than the visual medium, but still, internalization can only take you so far. A companion gives the introverted character a reason to try to speak - or perhaps a reason to try not to speak! A companion will bring certain topics into the introverted person's thoughts. Appa gives Aang a reason to talk out loud even when he's alone, which is very useful to the storyteller who can't make any use of internalization.
Companions also create wonderful opportunities to explore language. Some companions maintain an ongoing banter which can really add to the ambiance of the whole story. Their talk can be helpful for a story not only for content reasons, but for dialect reasons, and for the way it reveals aspects of the social contract in the community from which they (or each one) comes.
I'm not going to end this by saying you need to go off and give your protagonist a companion. Sometimes that's the right thing for a story, and sometimes it isn't - but it's worth considering. Even if the companionship is short-lived within the story, it can still be a valuable addition to what you're creating.
Chances are that if you've gotten much of a story written (especially a novel) you already have companions built into it. If you do, then it's worth looking at them and thinking explicitly about how they are functioning and what kind of work they are doing for you, the writer, as well as what they're doing for the other characters. That way you can deepen them, tune them, and strengthen them so that they're making a bigger difference for your story.
It's something to think about.
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Australopithecus Sediba
Here's a really cool article from the New York Times about a 9 year old boy who went with his paleoanthropologist father to South Africa and literally stumbled upon a new hominid species when chasing his dog. I can't even imagine how totally cool that would be.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/09/science/09fossil.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/09/science/09fossil.html
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