Iron Pen 3: Pirates! - Stories, Comments, and Voting

[Valka D'Ur]

For the record I hated the secret theme. I'm not fond of pirates and I almost freaked out when I learned of it. Perhaps because I mostly write free verse poetry I have taken a liking to subverting, so I decided to skip the actual tension releases that the battles could provide, thus sketching simply a premise, an initial situation, and a character that arises from it.

The more I think about it, the more content I am with what I did, even though, as a story, I know it's not easily accessible. I just thought it's a bit like modern art.

I'd hoped it was a theme that would be fun. After all, are there any people here who haven't read or seen stories or movies about pirates? I hadn't realized that some might not enjoy it.

But the thing is, I try to choose themes that can be interpreted in many different ways, which is what happened. The stories are very different, and have prompted a good amount of discussion. That's one of the goals of Iron Pen - to encourage writing and discussions about writing and what makes a successful story.

BTW, I mentioned before that one of the themes I was handed when I competed on the other forum was "Cabbage." Yes, I managed to turn out a 600⁺-word story about cabbage, although it wasn't easy, and I remember thinking at the time that the host must have had supper on his mind when he chose that theme.

I'm not opposed to suggestions for themes, but I make no guarantees to use them. It would give me a better idea of what kinds of themes to have, though. Above all, I want this to be interesting and fun for the participants.

 

[Blasph23]

I think the theme was very good, it offered a tremendous potential in execution.
I had at least three ideas of how to pull this off, though probably only one would have allowed me to fit within the word limits.

 

[JohannaK]

To address jackelgull, the Turk is an abstract representation of the Turkish pirates. Clearly Jachiam is no Turk (why would he attack a Turkish pirate base?). I just had been wanting to title something "Days/Times/Ages of Something".

I have to disagree here. It is a two-way process.
Take this for example: A writer introduces two opposing characters and a setting for a scene and interaction between them.
A reader, depending on his particular mindset, morality, experiences etc. will expect one character to prevail and every aspect of the narration that deals with the advantages of his preferred protagonist will be eagerly and carefully read.
Another reader might choose to root for the other character and likewise interpret the text differently.
The writer spoke to both of those readers, each responded differently and in return the text rewards them with two possible points of view.

This is a clear indication of cause and effect, an event and a response to it.
This is typical communication and the most successful written pieces are those in which the reader finds a part of himself and perceives the action through that perspective.
The written work communicates to him its story and characters, he communicates to the book his interest and his stance towards presented content.
The same book can be read twice and depending on the input (that is, the mood), a reader may experience two quite different outlooks.
With many characters to choose from, there are many readers that respond differently to the same piece of work and continue to respond to it in their individualized ways. It's a definition of two-way communication.

By two-way communication I understand the simultaneous feed of information from a source to a receiver and back. I believe such a thing does not exist and when it seems to happen it is in fact two different acts of communication taking place simultaneously.

The abstraction that each person makes of a piece of work pertains to that very same person alone, and even if that person decided to share his view of that previous work, the interpretation would have to be interpreted by the receiver in turn. By which I mean that an interpretation of a work never informs the work itself but rather other interpretations of the work. It's not a two-way process because the text isn't going to change unless you rewrite it and somehow manage to replace the original with your version. The act of communication is in the reading. Then this has to be interpreted, but this part does not feed back into the text (rather the text keeps feeding the reader until it considers its interpretation to have been completed).

 

[Terxpahseyton]

I think the theme was very good

Me too, was really happy about it. And the occasion was very good, as well.
I think Johanna's reaction is just weird because he, by his own account, isn't that interested in writing... let's call it "story-stories".

 

[JohannaK]

I feel the need to explain myself.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

I think the theme was very good, it offered a tremendous potential in execution.
I had at least three ideas of how to pull this off, though probably only one would have allowed me to fit within the word limits.

Well, now that the voting is over and we know who wrote what, there's no reason why anyone else who might want to share a pirate story can't do so.


And for people who like extra-long lengths in their stories, I've been considering how to tweak the contest format and rules to allow for this. It's partly a matter of figuring out what is a reasonable number of words/day for people to manage (I'm not going to expect more than what the November NaNoWriMo itself expects, which is 1667 words/day), and partly a matter of what the forum software will allow. I'm not sure what the current limit is on how long a single post can be - and it's also a matter of how long a PM can be. I absolutely do not want to risk any mistakes in posting anything because it had to be sent in two separate messages, so this is something I'll ask about.

 

[JohannaK]

I think the limit of characters per post is 50,000.

 

[Buster's Uncle]

Just curious; should we be anticipating getting to see new drafts of either story?

For what it's worth, I'd like that.

 

[Thorvald of Lym]

I think the limit of characters per post is 50,000.

For reference it's 30K, half that for PMs, 5000 for group messages and 1000 for VMs.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

Just curious; should we be anticipating getting to see new drafts of either story?

For what it's worth, I'd like that.

Not from me. To make it work right I would have to rethink the whole concept and it would end up being a completely different story and a whole new project. That would miss the necessary element of continuation to fit into the context of this contest, I think, and with regards to a whole new project I already got two literature contests on my plate.
But thanks for the interest, much appreciated

 

[JohannaK]

I may try and do something.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

If you do, there's no time limit on it. I'm glad to see the discussion is still continuing.