The most recent 20 comments posted to Making Light by Jack Ruttan:

@Madelaine #63:

He also mentioned the value of real science, which was cool.

That was a dismaying 8 years, but as a Canadian, also part of a western-style democracy, I'd like to comment that I'm pleased how the management can change so peacefully and gracefully.

I love sketching, and as a writer take lots of notes, but never caught on to the Moleskine (however it's spelled) love. Maybe the spirit of Bruce Chatwin is thinking I'm terribly unhip.

Oh yeah, I had to retype my contact info because I clicked on the spelling list. Better than losing one's entire comment, but still good for a "gasp!" I suggest a pop-up box that appears when you mouse over, or a similar aid.

All right. I've read back further, and saw the statue story about John Ruskin in message 283. I read a biography (forget which one, and am too lazy to look it up) which says that tale's a canard, and nobody knows the real reason for the annulment. But Ruskin liked alarmingly young girls, and would probably be facing jail time these days, or at least a taunting article in The Sun.

Which story involves Ruskin, Constance @ #287? Gaudy Night?

All I get on Google is the Dorothy Sayers novel, and that's set in the 1930s.

#267 Erik Nelson wrote: "I, for one, can see that it's easier to have a good idea than to follow through on writing a good idea, and I am sure many others who have had not-yet-written ideas see that too."

It's a dream, coupled with deep-seated lack of self confidence. I used to be a little like this, but discovered that hard work, combined with a modicum of talent, can go places.

I'm still working on getting rid of bad artistic habits, such as jealousy of others more successful or talented than I, an ability to take criticism constructively, and general self-confidence without going too far the other way into egotism. A lot of it is, as Serge says, social skills.

Serge @ 264 wrote: A severe lack of social skills that borders on the dangerous?

Yeah, it's too bad. Of course the best one can do is to work on not being vulnerable to such characters.

Maybe next that guy is going to pay some charlatan to write the book for him, and get plagiarised Tom Clancy in return. Then we can have another fun 1000-post thread.

Serge @ 260.

My choice is more apropos for semi-stalking. Now I'm playing "Get Back!"

Seriously, my adventure's not a problem, at least on my side. Makes me more careful about whom I'm e-mailing, however.

Did have one nutty writer years ago leave poems in my mailbox, read things into my answering machine, and then make threats when I, with my mighty connections (I'd been published once in a magazine, and was a columnist in a free weekly paper) didn't get those poems published for him.

What is it about the sort of person who thinks this kind of odd behavior is better than a polite query and an SASE?

Mind you, when I used to work at a funky used bookstore, a person once told me I was supposed to help get him a job there, or he would commit suicide. I don't think he followed through.

Serge #251 - I Wanna Hold Your Hand?

Those big ones by Dickens (Great Expectations, David Copperfield, Nicholas Nickleby, Bleak House)

60s experimentalism: Gravity's Rainbow by Pynchon and Giles Goat Boy by John Barth, The Magus by Fowles. Enjoying and slowly making my way through The Sunshine Dialogues by John Gardner at the moment.

That's enough for now.

What drove me to post was a thread drift (I'm pretty sure this is an _open_ thread!).

Does anyone have links handy to good posts or an article by somebody about not wanting to collaborate with wannabe writers, (ie. the other person has this great idea for a graphic novel, but they want you to completely write and draw it, and we will split the profits 50-50. )

I know judicious googling would bring up stuff, especially on Neil Gaiman's blog, but this sort of question seems to be something you people are particularly good at.

It turns out not only famous writers have these problems. I was a little less than smart in not cutting off a conversation because I didn't suspect this was what the person wanted, and not just fun chatting about stories. (I tend to talk through my stories a bit too much).

Now he's in tears, I'm a backstabber who wants to steal his ideas and ruin his career, he hates me forever Baggins, etc.

I'm not going to send him an e-mail, but articles on this topic will make me feel better, and might make a good blog post (with proper credit, etc. But not a lot of renumeration, sorry.)

This thread's been dramatic, but like most, the themes get drawn out too long.

I'm not going to talk about dating in this forum, and have had already my ins on the bellicose crustacean front, so just want to wish all a happy, peaceful holiday.

Was given a script to read that was prefaced by a seven-page single spaced essay on angels. If you hadn't read the essay, you wouldn't understand the script.

So far, nothing's grabbed me, except that Don Quixote thing.

I like posts about comics. Also SF movies, and dastardly writers' tricks and misbehavior.

#151 NelC: That's exactly as I remember it. :)

I Robot played for me like a standard futuristic cop action movie, with robots instead of zombies, or whatever.

Mind you, Bicentennial Man was much closer to what I remember of the Asimov stories, but that film was pretty dire. AI, as well, though it wasn't an official adaptation.

These stories and Heinlein, too, work better for me if they can recapture some of that old-fashioned idealistic "can-do" feeling, which in visual media I saw best in "Forbidden Planet" and old-school "Star Trek."

That makes sense, NelC #137 (wasn't that a Hugo Gernsback book?), except that there was little idolization of the leadership. Where were all the brave and decisive generals we could grow to love?

#83 Steve C. wrote: What got me most riled up about Starship Troopers (the movie) was the idiotic way they had of portraying military operations.

I wondered about that, and maybe they had some satirical point about a George W-style gov't finding it useful turning surplus population into cannon fodder, and making big contracts for the star-ship and artificial-limb builders.

Anyhow, the movie doesn't really work as satire, maybe because (so I gather) the director was DUI most of the time, and the second unit did most of the work, which was to make things blow up real good.

It's obvious they didn't feel the Heinlein fan base was big enough to worry about. Didn't hear much complaining about the Will Smith "I Robot," but assumed the fans had given up by then.

Obviously, someone should write an online novel in ROT13. But not entirely. There has to be the fun of selecting little bits of text, and then trying to find the converter.

I'm very fussy about art materials, but notebooks... usually they're filled so quickly I have to grab new ones from the dollar store. A thick one would be nice, with the aforementioned college ruling. I really don't care if it has a kitten on the cover, or the Transformers.

Thr trouble is indexing, so nowadays I'm trying to write a list of contents on the inside cover as I add them, so that will cut down on trying to page through lots of them to find an idea. Indexing tabs also help, but I'm pretty haphazard in my notetaking, so subjects will switch around a lot before I can add another tab. Adding page numbers might help more.

(my poor previous message got wiped out in the Great Migration)

Something way back, but it's my bag. Not looking forward to Tim Burton's "Sweeney Todd," though he's probably the only one who could have got a film financed and made.

It's really my favourite music theatre piece. But the trailer tries to make it look like anything but a musical! Then there's Johnny Depp miscast, I think, as "Ape-neck Sweeney" and Tim Burton's wife in a role that was owned by Angela Lansbury.

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