l'esprit de l'escalier

prompts-and-pointers: babbleslime: Character development...

Wed, 17 Apr 2013 18:28:16 +0100

Plant's chart; he's an emotional little flower baby. He also places a lot of importance on physical things.

Quick's chart; Quick has a high need for spiritual fulfillment as well as social fulfillment.

prompts-and-pointers:

babbleslime:

Character development thing.

Plot points on this chart to represent how important these different aspects of a character’s life are to them. By doing that you can help determine what type of things your character deems to be most meaningful in their life, especially compared to others aspects.

A brief explanation of each aspect is below in case you’re confused about the meaning of any.

Physical Aspects

Strength: to have physical power and strength

Sex: to have sexual gratification and satisfaction

Possessions: to have objects and tangible things

Health: to have physical health and stability

Appearance: to have a good external appearance

Emotional Aspects

Love: to love and be loved, romantically or otherwise

Appreciation: to be appreciated by others

Attention: to be paid attention to

Security: to feel secure emotionally

Approval: to be approved by others

Social Aspects

Respect: to be respected

Friendship: to have friends

Intimacy: to be intimate with a partner or partners

Belongingness: to feel needed and belonged

Family: to be on good terms with/have a family

Spiritual Aspects

Inner peace: to be content with themselves

Purpose: to feel as though they are fulfilling a purpose

Self-sufficiency: to feel that they are able to provide for themselves

Growth: to feel as though they are growing and changing

Acceptance: to be able to accept themselves without consequence

This is an absolutely amazing exercise and I certainly recommend doing it.

OPEN THE SECRET DOOR DO IT DO IT OPEN IT EEEEEE

Tue, 26 Mar 2013 15:02:48 +0000

OPEN THE SECRET DOOR DO IT DO IT OPEN IT EEEEEE:

terribleminds:

Why Google Street-View was made.

Renegade Chapter 17 Update

Fri, 22 Mar 2013 09:38:14 +0000

Name: Renegade
Chapters: 1-17
Story Synopsis: Fudou Akio in between Shin Teikoku and Inazuma Japan. Also featuring Takahashi Shinobu and Fudou’s former posse member, now friend Cap.
Chapter 17 Synopsis: The past confronts Fudou. He gets the fuck away.

FFN / AO3

"An attractive, decorator-white on the walls set off several fine old pieces of furniture. An..."

Mon, 18 Mar 2013 22:53:33 +0000

““An attractive, decorator-white on the walls set off several fine old pieces of furniture. An inviting fire burned in a small fireplace. In that cozy, very comfortable place the fire was throwing many-colored reflections off the leaded glass windows and sending pleasant odors of pine smoke into the small dining room. Colorful flowers showed in an attached greenhouse contrasting against the snow outside.”
-
The writer here is making some effort to engage the reader … the passage fails on its specifics, however. “Attractive, decorator-white,” “cozy, very comfortable space,” “pleasant odors,” “colorful flowers” — these are what is termed adjectival, the writer urging the reader to feel something rather than causing him to feel it based on the precision of the language, the specificity of the detail, and the implications. In Noam Chomsky’s “Transformational Grammar,” a “hairy” word is one that is rich in implications — evocative, specific, but with larger connotations. Thus “Ferrari” is a hairier word than “car,” and “villa” than “house.” Not many hairs are showing here.”

- Oakley Hall, The Art and Craft of Novel Writing (via shannahmcgill)

Renegade Chapter 16 Update

Sun, 10 Mar 2013 22:06:01 +0000

Name: Renegade
Chapters: 1-16
Story Synopsis: Fudou Akio in between Shin Teikoku and Inazuma Japan. Also featuring Takahashi Shinobu and Fudou’s former posse member, now friend Cap.
Chapter 16 Synopsis: Sakuma and Genda are looking at Fudou for the first time since Shin Teikoku. They are not happy.

FFN / AO3

How to make a scary villain

Sun, 10 Mar 2013 17:53:51 +0000

shannahmcgill:

Nobody hides under their blankets when they see Snidely Whiplash or Jesse and James. Here are a few tips on how to make an effective villain that makes your readers sleep with a nightlight.

Give them an unusual, unsympathetic reason to hurt or kill.

If Lord Skulsanstuf kills for revenge, because of bigotry, or to prove how cool he is, he’s not as powerful. Readers hear about people in real life killing for those reasons all the time.

Instead, make him kill because he wants beautiful people never to have the experience of growing old and ugly. Make him kill because he thinks the only way to stay pure is to drink a glass of blood every morning. Then do a chapter from his perspective and show how delighted he is with his way of thinking. Instant chills.

Allow them to kill fully developed characters.

Nobody cares that Lady Lotsoblood burned an entire village to the ground and tortured all the children to death if nobody in that village is important enough in your story to have a name. Look at all your characters and figure out which ones are the most expendable. Then let Lotsoblood work her magic.

Go in detail about the strange deeds they commit.

I would never want to be stabbed, but I especially don’t want a knife to run down the side of my cheek, lifting parts of my skin so my assailant can brutally rip them off later. That sounds a lot worse because I can imagine it better in my head.

Don’t bog them down with too many evil traits.

A vivisector who kicks puppies and burns down buildings in his spare time is silly, not scary. Good, nice traits can drive in the fact that your villain is human and therefore anybody could turn into them, which is a scary thought.

Don’t make them annoying.

Professor Umbridge hits almost every point on this list, but she’s too annoying to be truly scary.

Give them control of every situation.

Until the very final battle, the villain should know more about what’s happening than the heroes. The heroes should have a hard time keeping a secret no matter what measures they put in place.

How Not To Be Boring

Fri, 01 Mar 2013 11:13:25 +0000

How Not To Be Boring:

mywritingjourney:

Click on the Link for Delilah S. Dawson’s refreshingly useful blog post on writing: How Not To be Boring.

(I’m currently at the redrafting stage where I just want to give up because the first draft SUCKS SO MUCH - I found this blog post to be reassuringly helpful.)

Trademark traits

Fri, 01 Mar 2013 11:06:49 +0000

shannahmcgill:

If you want a character to stick in readers’ heads for a long time after they finish your story, having a fleshed-out personality helps, but it’s not good enough. There’s an enormous difference between A) a character who is shy, tries to be brave around her boyfriend, wants to break free from society’s constrictions but is too lazy to do so, and can’t figure out how to care about strangers and B) the same character, only this time, she always wears a bright pink scarf and loves the study of insects.

Harry Potter has a scar, Katniss has a pin, John Egbert has a green ghost shirt, and Ash Ketchum and Finn the Human both have special hats. An item of clothing or extremely striking physical feature will stay in a reader’s mind far more easily than “defined cheekbones” or “large, blue eyes.” When you give physical description, try to give an unusual visual marker at least to your main character. Not necessarily to set them apart from the other characters or mark them as special within the story, but to set them apart from the hundreds of people your reader sees every day on their way to work or school.

Likes, dislikes, and obsessions make your characters pop off the page like no other character traits can. Sure, your protagonist is arrogant, but wouldn’t your story be more interesting if he were arrogant and liked pizza more than almost anything else? It doesn’t even have to be a plot point. Hobbies and interests make characters more human. Sadly, I’ve read many stories where the characters were only bundles of traits who only formed opinions about other characters and never on which TV shows deserved to be cancelled. Such characters are not fun to read about and probably need to be fleshed out more.

Renegade Chapter 15 Update

Wed, 27 Feb 2013 14:05:17 +0000

Name: Renegade
Chapters: 1-15
Story Synopsis: Fudou Akio in between Shin Teikoku and Inazuma Japan. Also featuring Takahashi Shinobu and Fudou’s former posse member, now friend Cap.
Chapter 15 Synopsis: Holy shit, they’re actually playing football.

FFN / AO3

thewritershelpers: thewritershelpers: Does your character have a particular voice type in mind?...

Sun, 24 Feb 2013 13:04:47 +0000

thewritershelpers:

thewritershelpers:

Does your character have a particular voice type in mind? Do they have an accent? Are they monotonous? Does their voice grate? Is it silky? Sultry? Low? High-pitched? Do they slur? Stutter? What in the world is the difference between some of these? Here are some links below to help further identify your character:

Words to Describe Someone’s Voice ~ With definitions of each

An Article About Describing Voice ~ Includes some thought-provoking questions to ask yourself and some exercises

Voice Types ~ Describes and gives examples of types like soprano, alto, etc.

Panix.com Character Chart ~ An extremely in-depth character chart; scroll down to the Voice Quality category for examples of some of the many types of voices, ranging from aphonic to glottalized to yawny.

Vocal Qualities ~ Directly from the above link, for those who want to head straight for the quality types.

Vocal Impressions ~ Lists listener comparisons with examples from celebrities, such as Morgan Freeman and Marilyn Monroe. (example: “She sounds like… diamonds dipped in caramel.”)

Speech Patterns ~ With examples from different well-known folks

Gender and Speech Patterns ~ An interesting article about the observation of speech between men and women

Speech Accent Archive ~ A very broad archive that includes different audio samples of accents ranging from Afrikaans to Ancient Greek to Korean to Zulu. Can search by geography as well.

Speech Impediment (Wikipedia) ~ Includes links to different pages such as stuttering, cluttering, muteness, and the social effects.

What Makes A Man’s/Woman’s Voice Sexy? ~ Just what it says on the tin.

Other Words/Synonyms for ‘Said’:

Synonyms-Antonyms.com ~ Listed according to usage

TheCaveOnline ~ Includes categories and meanings for each one

550 Alternative Words for Said (HubPages) ~ Includes adverb / phrase modifiers

—

Have more ideas/links? Have a question? By all means, submit your input and questions to The Writers’ Helpers!

-J

Want to write a novel in a month without going insane? "How to Write a Novel in a Month (The Easy Way!)"

Fri, 22 Feb 2013 02:49:08 +0000

Want to write a novel in a month without going insane? "How to Write a Novel in a Month (The Easy Way!)":

thedoctorplusone:

I am normally quite sceptical about posts with titles like these but I found this quite useful!

The Square

Tue, 19 Feb 2013 14:34:44 +0000

The Square:

shutethesquare:

It would be a terrible lie to say that we writers aren’t sadists with a taste for drama, hating and enjoying every paragraph of torture, pain, and misery we put our imaginary friends and enemies through. And in a great sense, it would also be untruthful to say that our readers aren’t even more guilty of reading our stories than we are for writing them ;)

But if that’s all we write the trauma for, to get a rise, to get a kick, to stir up the surface of the reader’s emotions, then there’s a whole world of writing lying beneath our feet that we will never reach, no matter how much we dig for it…Are you writing for the simple pleasure or writing? To tell a simple story? To have little fun on the side of school or work? Or is there a deeper meaning you strive to reach with every word and sentence you put on a piece of paper? Is there a humanity within the symbols and letters you arrange for the people who are willing to try and understand it?

I’ve noticed a lot of writings and articles and pieces of advice on writing abused characters lately. So here’s my unconventional two cents.

When you’re writing, sitting there with your fingertips on the keys, staring at the bright screen in front of you, something magical happens. You go into a trace, where you’re no longer yourself. You are them. You are brought to life where you left off, the corpse of your character opening their eyes and standing up from the ground where they had fallen when you last disconnected.You’re no longer writing a character; you are a real, breathing person. And just like in reality, there is a great chance you are one of the millions, surely billions of people who have been abused in some way.

So tell me, how does it feel walking down a busy street side market, or grazing shoulders in the hallways at school, being part of such a large whole of “damaged” beings? The strange majority? Do their gazes glance over your face in a certain way, as if you have a dirty secret to hide? That they know that you, whether you have ever been or not, were helpless when it happened?

Helpless. This word I think is very much underestimated when it comes to abuse. You can’t do anything to stop it, like a hurricane or an earthquake, and when it happens something changes whether anyone notices or not. Whether it’s a subtle break in the crust of the earth or a tsunami. Something has happened that can never be undone or changed. That is helpless.

Now think about abuse. You could easily write about a drunken father smacking his son across the face, or a little girl kidnapped and raped by the neighbor. You can write about the woman needing that promotion at work, or the kid at school who was made fun of for his pimples. You can write about online friends who turn vicious, so he turned to a rope. You can write about the feeling of a burning welt on your skin, the sound of a voice putting you down, or cold fingertips trailing up your thigh. But push yourself to write the whole story, the front and back, the shell and all the cringing within. Write the truth in all that it is, and do the character justice. Do your writing justice. Do reality justice.

You don’t like to be helpless. You don’t enjoy being trapped within a body you can’t escape that becomes the one thing you hate just as much as the person or people that hurt you. What are you going to do about it? Because whether you will realize it or not, you will do something about it. That’s all you will think about, just like your first celebrity crush or your first rock concert or first touchdown. But instead of basking in that fluttering cloud of joy, it will be a film of grime and panic pasted to your skin that you can’t wash away.

Will you lift more weights to beat the bullies? Do more crunches? Star on the football team? Get straight A’s? Will you withdrawal from speaking because your voices trembles, and will you find that gun beneath your father’s bed and think about what to do with it? Will you grow tired of trying to fight and simply give in? Let it happen? Hope it will stop soon enough?…But what will happen if your teacher notices the bruises around your eyes? Will anyone believe you if you told them what happened or who did it? If only you could first say it aloud to your own reflection in the mirror, that you were powerless. That another person had you, for that one moment, and there was absolutely nothing you could do to stop it…

Adding Tension

Tue, 19 Feb 2013 14:24:12 +0000

Adding Tension:

adventuresinwriterland:

New blog post -> Adding Tension - My list of questions to ask to add more tension to each chapter.

fuckyeahcharacterdevelopment: mirrepp: HELLO CHARACTER REF...

Mon, 18 Feb 2013 01:54:40 +0000

fuckyeahcharacterdevelopment:

mirrepp:

HELLO CHARACTER REF SHEET

Well, this is quite helpful. Here you are.

I think it’s important to remember that these aren’t categories, but different ends of the spectrum. It’s perfectly reasonable to have someone who is in the middle. Apart from that it’s good inspiration fodder!

Droemar's "5 Ruts You'd Better Not Fall Into As A Writer"

Sat, 16 Feb 2013 01:01:20 +0000

towakesleepingdogs:

I really love this lady. She gives fantastic, if not snarky, writing advice that your English teacher really should have mentioned before. I have permission to repost some of her lists, but please make sure you check out her deviantart for more of them. She also has a novella, Highsong, about futuristic dolphins (it’s only 99 cents, c’mon now) and her book, The Sarcastic Guide to Writing, about exactly what you think it is.

—

5 Ruts You’d Better Not Fall Into As A Writer
By Droemar

1. Seeking validation on the outside and getting shocked when you get critique.Validation comes from within, folks. Hard life lesson, but there you are. First of all, every artist of any kind has to learn to tell themselves they’ve done good work even in the face of their detractors. (One just hopes they balance it out with taking valid critique into consideration so they improve.) If you can’t, you’re not going to accomplish much. Second, I’m not saying that encouragement and fans and book deals aren’t very nice things, but to the creative process they can be massive distractions. I read recently that a core of stillness is necessary to the creative process, and the more distracted I get, the more I understand it. I have seen entirely too many writers (and by this I mean full-grown adults who should be emotionally mature and everything) seek validation in a desperate and pathetic way, and get outraged when — gasp — someone tells them their writing could improve. I have seen people (mostly women) backbite, backstab, cold-shoulder, ostracize, and instill hierarchies of “published” and “not-published” that resemble cliques a high school would envy. And these cliques ain’t got a decent writer among them. What they do is flock together so they can all preen and stroke and tell each other how wonderful they are. And those that aren’t published latch onto those that are, as if attaching oneself to these people will give up the great secret on How To Get Published. (Psst. The answer is: BE A BETTER WRITER, STUPID.) If your self-esteem is low where your writing is concerned, it can be so, so easy to seek comfort. Especially if your Real Life at large is littered with terrible choices and even worse consequences. But if you fall into that hole, the best you can hope for is writing the kind of stuff in Rule #5 that makes me hate you.

2. Trying to make writing a social event. I don’t understand why people do this. From the get-go, I heard the phrase “writing is the loneliest profession.” And pretty much accepted that as my lot. But I watch people in Real Life and online constantly avoid the reality that the only way to write is to sit your ass in a chair and hit the keys. Mostly by trying to see if someone’ll do it with them. NaNoWriMo is not the worst offender, but it’s a good example. Classes and writing conventions can be helpful, but I have seen people pay good money for years on end and never get anywhere. Because they’re not writing on their own. They might scribble a few things, but for the most part they want to talk to you about all these great ideas they have. One of the few hard and fast rules of writing I’ve discovered is: if someone’s talking to you about what they’re writing, they are not writing it. I guarantee you. I will bet you anything that the babbling ideamonger in the center of the room has barely written a word, while the surly introvert in the corner logged a hundred thousand words last novel. Writing is lonely, people. We explore worlds and journeys and emotions entirely on our own. Because if someone else were there with us, it would screw up the process. Leaving alone the whole “stillness is necessary to the process thing”: I don’t know if you’ve experienced the fresh hell that is collaboration, but believe me when I say it’s one of the worst things I’ve seen people try to do. They are ready to kill each other by the end of it. People who collaborate well most of the time can do it because they’ve completed independent projects on their own in the first place, and bring a certain level of self-discipline to the table. Do not think that there is a magic feather. Writers write. And nobody’s gonna make you do it but you.

3. Asking people or conventions to hold your hand. I recall talking to a group of ladies at SCBWI that were talking about a rather elite writer’s program (the name of which escapes me) that had resulted in several people getting published. There was quite a bit of clucking and patting of feathers as these ladies assured themselves that such a pedigree ensured success. One of them turned to me and said, “Don’t you think that would help you be a better writer?” I was unaware I was part of the conversation and happened to be doodling ponies at the time, so looked anything but the picture of literary aplomb. I replied by paraphrasing Stephen King: “The grit of sand is what makes a pearl, not pearl-making seminars with other oysters.” Proverbial pin drop. (I later found out that many people who graduated from that writer’s program were still struggling to break into print.) Conventions are good for the uninitiated: if you don’t know anything about the marketing side of writing, they’re valuable. If you don’t know anything about writing: they are less valuable, but still valuable. If you know both, conventions become maddening events in which you shell out several hundred dollars to hear the exact same stuff you’ve heard before, spend ten minutes with an agent, then get to stand around in a mixer trying to talk over everyone else’s ten-second pitch line before you realize all the literary agents are hiding in their hotel rooms because this crap is insane. Conventions and writer’s retreats are inspiring. I will give them that. Going to one, it’s impossible not to come home fired with new zeal. Therein lies most of their value. But the shine is off the apple in about a day. You’re back to the realization: you’ve still got to sit down by yourself and type things out. And really, talking to some “writers”, that’s more than they can handle. So they just sign up for the next convention with all their friends to keep that high going.

4. Strangling an idea to death. I’ve only personally experienced one person who couldn’t let go of an idea. I joined SCBWI about four years ago, and met a lady from England who had an idea for a book that was a feel-good romp with five children who travel the world solving mysteries. She kept insisting it was a middle-grade, but it read like a chapter book. I dutifully did my critique, saw her at meetings, and life went on. Four years later: she’s still hocking that book. Still going to the same old conventions over and over and trying to pitch the thing. My writing group consists of far more sociable writers than myself, and they assure me this happens all the time. That elite writer’s program I mentioned? Apparently one luckless woman in SCBWI has taken the exact same book there three times in a row, year after year. And this is $3k a pop deal. I have also seen people write total staleness into their first chapter. After changing one line and asking me to critique it again, and again, paring down the spontaneity of the writing the same way someone chews their fingernails bloody. Digression is important. You have to know when to let an idea go, when to let it incubate, when to realize when it just ain’t gonna work and you need let it die, and when its time to try something new. There are books that have taken decades to write. Your new project could teach you something that will give you a totally new insight into how to solve a problem in your old one. Creativity is about growth. The definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over and expecting different results.

5. Writing what’s popular, not what you have to say. Uuuuugh. I hate this one. I hate it hate it hate it. This leads me to encountering cookie-cutter Hollywood-model books that are the same thing over and over, and drives me to write scathing reviews on Amazon and Goodreads. I cannot believe how unoriginal so much YA literature is, or how spineless so much of it is. Between the books that copy the latest bestseller, and the books that copy waning bestsellers, the books that are retellings of fairy tales and myths, and the demand of publishers to publish what’s marketable and not necessarily aesthetically valuable: there’s not much room for originality. Granted, the ebook market has created an outlet for this, but it doesn’t soothe my pain. More than this, I hate meeting writers I want to punch in the face because they think they’re being clever by writing Twilight-but-seriously-not-Twilight-nudge-nudge-wink-wink. I swear to god, the worst of them are people who read one book and decide they can be a writer. And odds are it’s not even a good book, it’s just what’s popular at the moment. I’m not saying populist literature is bad (Dickens and King qualify), but a lot of it can be. I loathe writers who have so much timidity they feel the only way they’re ever going to say something meaningful is by treading the path of someone bolder or luckier. That their own experiences, however humble and true, aren’t as important as something flashy and hollow. And don’t give me that crap about “all stories have been done before”, because there is a distinct line between stories inspired by inherent structure, and stories that rip off every cliché’ known to the genre without even attempting originality. You’re writing to express a truth. Be brave. Step out somewhere new and show us the way.

How to construct a story (Text by David Farland)

Mon, 11 Feb 2013 17:10:00 +0000

How to construct a story (Text by David Farland):

fiasko0:

when I used to write for competitions, I would make lists of ways that judges might look at my work in order to grade it. For example, some judges might look for an ending that brought them to tears, while another might be more interested in an intellectual feast. A couple of you asked what my list might look like.

So here is a list of things that I might consider in creating a piece.

First, a word of warning. When I was very young, perhaps four, I remember seeing a little robot in a store, with flashing lights and wheels that made it move. To me it seemed magical, nearly alive. My parents bought it for me for at Christmas, and a few weeks later it malfunctioned, so I took a hammer to it and pulled out the pieces to see what made it work—a battery, a tiny motor, some small colored lights, cheap paint and stickers.

Your story should be more than the sum of its parts. It should feel magical, alive.

But when we go through a checklist like this, we’re looking at the parts and not the whole. When you’re composing your story and editing it, you must be constantly aware of the whole story, keeping it in mind, even as you examine it in detail, making sure that one part doesn’t overbalance another.

Setting

My goal with my settings is to transport the reader into my world—not just through the senses, but also emotionally and intellectually. I want to make them feel, keep them thinking. This can often be done by using settings that fascinate the reader, that call to them.

1) Do I have unique settings that the reader will find intriguing? In short, is there something that makes my setting different from anything the reader has seen before?

2) If my setting is in our world, is it “sexy” or mundane. (People are drawn to sexy settings. Even if we place a story in a McDonald’s, we need to bring it to life, make it enjoyable.)

3) Do I have any scenes that might be more interesting if the setting were moved elsewhere? (For example, let’s say that I want to show that a king is warlike. Do I open with him speaking to his counselors at a feast, or on the battlefield?)

4) Do I suffer by having repetitive settings? For example, if I set two scenes in the same living room, would one of them be more interesting if I moved it elsewhere?

5) Do my descriptions of settings have enough detail to transport the reader?

6) Did I bring my setting to life using all of the senses—sight, sound, taste, feel, smell?

7) Do my character’s feelings about the setting get across?

8) Do I want to show a setting in the past, present, and suggest a future? (For example, I might talk about a college’s historical growth and importance, etc.)

9) Can a setting be strengthened by describing what it is not?

10) Does my setting resonate with others within its genre?

11) Do my settings have duality—a sometimes ambiguous nature? (For example, my character might love the church where she was married, have fond memories of it, and yet feel a sense of betrayal because her marriage eventually turned ugly. So the setting becomes bittersweet.)

12) Do my settings create potential conflicts in and of themselves that aren’t explored in the text? (If I have a prairie with tall grass and wildfires are a threat, should I have a wildfire in the tale?)

13) Do my characters and my societies grow out of my setting? (If I’ve got a historical setting, do my characters have occupations and attitudes consistent with the milieu? Beyond that, with every society there is almost always a counter-movement. Do I deal with those?)

14) Is my setting, my world, in danger? Do I want it to be?

15) Does my world have a life of its own? For example, if I create a fantasy village, does it have a history, a character of its own? Do I need to create a cast for the village—a mayor, teacher, etc.?

16) Is my setting logically consistent? (For example, let’s say that I have a merchant town. Where would a merchant town most likely be? On a trade route or port—quite possibly at the junction of the two. So I need to consider how fully I’ve developed the world.)

17) Is my setting fully realized? (Let’s say I have a forest. What kinds of trees and plants would be in that forest? What kind of animals? What’s the history of that forest? When did it last have rain or snow? What’s unique about that forest? Etc.)

18) Does my setting intrude into every scene, so that my reader is always grounded? (If I were to set my story in a field, for example, and I have men preparing for battle, I might want to have a lord look up and notice that buzzards are flapping up out of the oaks in the distance, already gathering for the feast. I might want to mention the sun warming my protagonist’s armor, the flies buzzing about his horse’s ears, and so on—all while he is holding an important conversation.

19) Are there any settings that have symbolic import, whose meanings need to be brought to the forefront?

Characters

I want my characters to feel like real people, fully developed. Many stories suffer because the characters are bland or cliché or are just underdeveloped. We want to move beyond stereotypes, create characters that our readers will feel for. At the same time, we don’t want to get stuck in the weeds. We don’t want so much detail that the character feels overburdened and the writing gets sluggish.

So here are some of the checkpoints I might use for characters.

1) Do I have all of the characters that I need to tell the story, or is someone missing? (For example, would the story be stronger if I had a guide, a sidekick, a love interest, a contagonist, hecklers, etc.?)

2) Do I have any characters that can be deleted to good effect?

3) Do I have characters who can perhaps be combined with others? For example, let’s say I have two cops on the beat. Would it work just as well with only one cop?

4) Do my characters have real personalities, depth?

5) Do my characters come off as stock characters, or as real people?

6) Do I know my characters’ history, attitudes, and dress?

7) Does each character have his or her interesting way of seeing the world?

8) Does each character have his or her own voice, his own way of expressing himself?

9) Are my characters different enough from each other so that they’re easily distinguished? Do their differences generate conflict? Remember that even good friends can have different personalities.

10) Have I properly created my characters’ bodies—described such things as hands, feet, faces, hair, ears, and so on?

11) Do each of my characters have their own idiosyncrasies?

12) Do I need to “tag” any characters so that readers will remember them easily—for example, by giving a character a limp, or red hair, or having one who hums a great deal?

13) How do my characters relate to the societies from which they sprang? In short, are they consistent with their own culture in some ways? And in what ways do they oppose their culture?

14) What does each of my characters want?

15) What does each one fear?

16) What things might my character be trying to hide?

17) What is each character’s history? (Where were they born? Schooled, etc.?)

18) What is my characters’ stance on religion, politics, etc.?

19) How do my characters relate to one another? How do they perceive one another? Are their perceptions accurate, or jaded?

20) Does each character have a growth arc? If they don’t, should they?

21) How honest are my characters—with themselves and with others? Should my readers trust them?

22) What would my characters like to change about themselves? Do they try to change?

23) Do my characters have their own family histories, their own social problems, their own medical histories, their own attitudes? Do we need a flashback anywhere to establish such things?

Conflicts

One of the surest ways to engage our audience is through our conflicts. When a conflict is unresolved, and when the audience is waiting breathlessly for its outcome, the reader’s interest will become keen. They’ll look forward to the resolution unconsciously, and may even be thinking, “Oh, this is going to be good!” That state of arousal is called “suspense,” and it’s perhaps the most potent element of a tale.

1) What is the major conflict in my story?

2) Do I have proper try/fail cycles for it?

3) Is the major conflict resolved?

4) Is it universal enough so that the readers will find it interesting? (Note that a conflict becomes far more interesting to a reader if it is something that he must deal with in his own life.)

5) Have I brought it to life through the incidents that I relate? In other words, are their ways to deepen or broaden the main conflict.

6) Do I have secondary conflicts? Most stories require more than one conflict. For example, a protagonist will often have an internal conflict as well as an external conflict. He may also have a love interest. He might have conflicts with nature, with god, and with his companions. So as an author, I must create a host of conflicts and decide how each one grows and is resolved.

7) How do my characters grow and change in order to overcome the conflicts?

8) Do my characters perhaps decide to adapt to a conflict, struggle to live with it rather than beat it?

9) How ingenious are my character attempts to solve their problems? Ingenuity often adds interest.

10) How driven are my characters to resolve their conflicts? Character who will go to extremes are needed.

11) Do I have any namby-pamby attempts that I should delete? For example, if I have a protagonist whose main problem is that she doesn’t have the nerve to talk to her boss about a problem at work, should I strike that entire try/fail cycle? (The answer is “almost always you should strike out the scenes and replace it with something better.)

12) Is my hero equal to or greater than his task at the start of a tale? If so, then my hero needs to be weakened so that we have a better balance.

13) Does my protagonist ever get betrayed?

14) Does my protagonist have an identity conflict? At the heart of every great story is a character who sees himself as being one thing—charming, heroic, wise—while others around him perceive him as being something else—socially wanting, inept, fool.

15) Do I have enough conflicts to keep the story interesting?

16) Should some of the minor conflicts be deleted, or resolved? (Remember that not all conflicts need to have try/fail cycles.

Themes

Themes in the story might be called the underlying philosophical arguments in your tale. A story doesn’t need to have a theme in order for it to be engaging. Likeable protagonists undergoing engaging conflicts is all that you need in order to hold a reader. But a tale that tackles a powerful theme will tend to linger with you much longer. Indeed, such tales can even change the way that a reader thinks, persuade him in important arguments. Shakespeare made every story an argument, and the “theme” was the central question to his tale.

Some people will suggest that dealing with themes is “didactic.” Don’t be fooled. Those same writers will put themes in their own works, and usually they’re taking stands that oppose yours. For example, if you argue that morality is innate and central to what a human is, they’ll argue that it’s situational and we’re all just animals. They don’t oppose the idea of stories having themes; they may just be opposed to your views. So make sure that your arguments are rigorous and persuasive.

1) Can I identify themes that I consciously handled?

2) Are there themes that came out inadvertently?

3) How universal are my themes? How important are they to the average reader?

4) Are there themes that need to be dealt with but aren’t? For example, if I have a policeman who is going to take a life, does he need to consider how he will feel about that?

5) Are there questions posed or problems manifested that bog the story down and need to be pulled?

6) Do my characters ever consciously consider or talk about the main themes? Should they?

7) Do my characters need to grapple with important questions? If not, perhaps they should.

8) Do my characters change at all due to the influence of new ideas or beliefs?

9) If my theme is going to “grow,” become more important as the story progresses, do I need to add or modify scenes in order to accommodate that growth? In other words, do I need to let the theme help shape the tale?

10) As your character grapples with a theme, does he find himself led down false roads? For example, let’s go back to our cop. Let’s say that he shoots a boy at night, and feels guilty when he discovers that the boy wasn’t really armed. What the cop thought was a gun turns out to have been a cell phone. Would other characters try to influence him? Perhaps a senior officer might take him out to get a drink—because alcohol has been his salvation for 20 years. Another officer might suggest that the kid was trying to commit suicide by cop, and our protagonist that he ‘did the kid a favor,’ and so on.

11) Does my character ever have to synthesize a thematic concept—come to grips with it intellectually and emotionally, so that it alters the character’s behavior?

Treatment

There are five elements that will come into nearly every scene in your story—setting, character, conflict, theme, and treatment. Your “treatment” is the way that you handle your story. The number of items that come into play in your treatment is so long, I can’t get into all of them. We get down to the real nitty-gritty of putting a sentence together.

You’ll want to create your own list of items to look for in your treatment. If you notice for example that you’re creating a lot of long, compound sentences in a row, you might make it a goal to vary your sentence length. If you find that you’re using weak verbs, you may want to go through your tale and search for instances of “was” and “were.” If you find yourself using the word “then,” you might want to go through in your edits and make sure that incidents in your tale are related in sequential order, so that you don’t need the word “then.” If you find yourself stacking modifiers in front of nouns and verbs, you might want to watch for that in your editing. If you tend to over-describe things, you might want to watch your descriptions.

In short, whatever your own personal weaknesses are in writing, you’ll want to create a list so that you can think about them when you write.
But here are a few elements to consider in your treatment.

1) Is your tone appropriate to the tale? For example, let’s say that you want to invest a bit of humor into your story. You start it with a joke. Do you maintain the tone throughout the rest of the tale, perhaps layering the humor in, scene after scene?

2) Do each of your characters speak with their own unique voices? You’ll need to do a dialog check for each character before you’re done.

3) Do you as a narrator establish a voice for the piece, one that you maintain throughout?

4) Is every description succinct and evocative?

5) Do your descriptions echo the emotional tone of the point-of-view (POV) character?

6) Do you get deep enough penetration into your protagonist’s POV so that the reader can track their thoughts and emotions? If not, is there a good reason why you neglected to do so?

7) Is there music in your language? Do you want there to be? Ernest Hemingway once said that “All great novels are really just poetry?” With that in mind, listen to the sounds of your words. Consider changing them as needed to fit the meter and emphasis that you need.

8) Do you use enough hooks to keep your reader interested?

9) Could you strengthen the piece by using foreshadowing?

10) Do you use powerful metaphors or similes to add beauty and resonance to your work? (If not, you’re in trouble. Your competition will.)

Story Parts

Sometimes when you’re looking at a story, you need to think about it in “chunks.” Here are a few things that I think about when creating a tale.

1) Is the basic idea of your story original and powerful? (In a contest, entering a story with a mundane concept probably won’t get you far. For example, if you enter a story about a young man fighting space pirates, it probably won’t do well—unless you come up with some new technology or angle that sets it above all other space-pirate tales.

2) Do you establish your characters swiftly? We should probably know whom the story is about within a scene or two, and we should probably be introduced in a way that tells us something important about the characters.

3) We also need to establish the setting in every single scene.

4) Do you get to the inciting incident quickly and cleanly? (The inciting incident is the place where the protagonist discovers what his main conflict is going to be.)

5) Are there any storytelling tools that I could use to make this tale better. (For a discussion of storytelling tools, see my book “Million Dollar Outlines,” which is available at www.davidfarland.com/shop.)

6) Does my story escalate through the following scenes, with conflicts that broaden and deepen?

7) Does my story resolve well? Do I have a climax that really is exciting? Is the outcome different from what the audience expects?

8) Do I tackle all of the resolutions in a way that leaves the reader satisfied?

Writing a story can be an exhausting exercise—intellectually challenging and emotionally draining. When you’re in the throes of it, it may seem daunting. But you’re never really done until the outcome feels magical, and if you take care of all the little things that you should, the outcome will indeed seem wondrous.

Happy writing!

Writing References

Mon, 11 Feb 2013 16:05:00 +0000

krisnoel-lionhead:

I decided to make a reference post on most of the writing topics I’ve covered so far. If you’re looking for something specific, this might make it easier. Hope this helps!

General writing posts—

http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwdYP2Q_ Ideas Worth Your Time
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwd5V0q_ Antagonists
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwd0hOSc How to Keep a Deadline
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwcxurso How Anthropology Relates to Writing
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwcYlgzm Incorporating Flashbacks
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwcU312R When to Use Bad Language
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwcKlfPR How to Write What You Know
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwb-5QhI Is Your Novel Working
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwbR-l_e Introduction to Screenwriting
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwaEye5Y Writing with Others
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwa5787P Working on Multiple Projects Simultaneously
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwZda2EW Picking Up an Old Story
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwZKhccU Developing a Well Paced Novel
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwZGOXVF When to Include a Prologue
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwZ9BbJX Dialogue Writing
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwYoUfV4 Embarrassing Writing Habits
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwX8UbNV Developing Good Writing Habits
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwV4tvlA World Building 101
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwUec1k5 The Opening Hook
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwUVi_6b Developing Your Style
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwUEgwn9 Types of Endings
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwUAwViF Plotting Failures
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwSNLfdI Forging Friendships

Editing posts—

http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwZZAloz Easy to Miss Writing Mistakes
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwYJ_9te Staying Motivated During the Editing Process
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwXj29Pz Is Your Story Too Telly?
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwWkryNz Editing: Who Should You Trust?
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwVqu20c When to Begin Editing
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwVPc-AE On Editing
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwUywwk- Easy Editing
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwTdeFrJ Content Editing

Character posts—

http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwc47pkY My Character is Drunk
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwbrNNwB Writing the Significant Other
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwbmRFbs Writing the Best Friend
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwayCHvs Writing the Best Antagonist
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwapw6q8 Introducing Your Characters
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwZ4EmcC Character Trait Cheat Sheet
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwZDnXfY Characters You Need to Stop Writing (Or Reinvent)
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwY6EZGz Making Your Characters Likeable
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwVyekGq Prewriting Characters
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwUum1I_ Writing a Young Character
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwUZNRyq The Importance of Characters
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwSqWlL1 Is Your Character a Mary Sue?
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwSiksAL Character Development Exercises
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwRpeCs1 Strong Characters
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwSFcnny Too Many Characters

Genre posts—

http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwYjYfUW The Space Opera
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwXnRf3R Historical Fiction
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwXGEFvS What is High Fantasy?
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwWotp6E Figuring Out Your Genre
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwVuW-i3 The New Adult Genre
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwVTZ2GA Different Types of Science Fiction
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwV0vLYy Writing Horror Novels
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwT7wDMn Teen Sick-Lit
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwS322fb Fantasy Clichés

Motivation—

http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwdANDbS Keep Being Weird
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwcxtAli Important Writing Lessons
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwdYSAlr My Favorite Writing Quotes
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwcOxfq3 You’re Not Perfect
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwbR_Iai Where to Write
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwbIPA2P Negative People to Avoid
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwZnIR5m Quick Motivation Tips
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwXKNDIT Using Rejection to Motivate
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwXCFZxT Finding the Courage to Share Your Writing
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwWfyjDB Staying Motivated
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwTN282h How to Stay Motivated Over the Weekend

Publishing—

http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwdPEPmR Writing a Blurb
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwbFANUN How to Make Sure Your Novel Won’t Get Published
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwXuOiTa Full Querying Guide
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwXdHlme What is a Crossover Novel?

Body Language—

http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwYgnd6W The Importance of Body Language
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwdTXfA2 Further Understanding Body Language

Random posts—

http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwdefLnd Why Everyone Should Continue Writing Love Stories
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwYbKQiz Why Writer’s Are Insane
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwYEVc-d Don’t Preach to Your YA Readers
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwY9hRSx Overused Situations in Fiction Writing
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwWsyNYx Male Readers and Female Protagonists
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwWCa4Xo The Power of Silence
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwVLdxHP Studying People
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwPxqNHH Trends I’m Sick of in YA Fiction
http://tmblr.co/Zq1MFwPU7LMl Virginity as an Identity

Sorry I couldn’t replace the link with the title of the post. CAN’T FIGURE OUT HOW TO DO THINKS ON TUMBLR NOW. Also, you can obviously follow my blog for more writing tips or suggest topics for me to cover. Thank you!

-Kris Noel

nannaia: Evolution of Chinese Clothing and Cheongsam the refs:...

Mon, 11 Feb 2013 15:30:08 +0000

nannaia:

Evolution of Chinese Clothing and Cheongsam

the refs: http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y246/lilsuika/refs.jpg

Alt: Timeline as 1 cohesive file at http://lilsuika.deviantart.com/

Chinese clothing has approximately 5,000 years of history behind it, but regrettably I am only able to cover 2,500 years in this fashion timeline. I began with the Han dynasty as the term hanfu (meaning: historical dress of ethnic Chinese people) was coined in that period. Please bear in mind that this is only a generalized timeline of Chinese clothing primarily featuring aristocratic and upper-class ethnic Han Chinese women (the exceptions are Fig. 8 (dancer) and Fig. 11 (maid, due to the fact I couldn’t find many paintings in the Yuan period)).

My resources are mainly the books: 5,000 years of Chinese Costume, China Chic: East Meets West, Changing Clothes in China: Fashion, History, Nation, and Hong Kong Museum of History. 5,000 years of Chinese Costume is an invaluable resource in English (though sadly currently out of print), I would highly recommend this book if you can get your hands on it.

NOTES OF INTEREST:

Han Dynasty:

“In the Han Dynasty, as of old, the one-piece garment remained the formal dress for women. However, it was somewhat different from that of the Warring States Period, in that it had an increased number of curves in the front and broadened lower hems. Close-fitting at the waist, it was always tied with a silk girdle.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 32)

Wei and Jin dynasties:

“On the whole, the costumes of the Wei and Jin period still followed the patterns of Qin and Han.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 54)

“From the costumes worn by the benefactors in the Dunhuang murals and the costumes of the pottery figurines unearthed in Louyang, it can be seen that women’s costumes in the period of Wei and Jin were generally large and loose. The upper garment opened at the front and was tied at the waist. The sleeves were broad and fringed at the cuffs with decorative borders of a different colour. The skirt had spaced coloured stripes and was tied with a white silk band at the waist. There was also an apron between the upper garment and skirt for the purpose of fastening the waist. Apart from wearing a multi-coloured skirt, women also wore other kinds such as the crimson gauze-covered skirt, the red-blue striped gauze double skirt, and the barrel-shaped red gauze skirt. Many of these styles are mentioned in historical records.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 65)

Southern and Northern Dynasties:

“During the Wei, Jin and the Southern and Northern Dynasties, though men no longer wore the traditional one-piece garment, some women continued to do so. However, the style was quite different from that seen in the Han Dynasty. Typically the women’s dress was decorated with xian and shao. The latter refers to pieces of silk cloth sewn onto the lower hem of the dress, which were wide at the top and narrow at the bottom, so that triangles were formed overlapping each other. Xian refers to some relatively long ribbons which extended from the short-cut skirt. While the wearer was walking, these lengthy ribbons made the sharp corners n the lower hem wave like a flying swallow, hence the Chinese phrase ‘beautiful ribbons and flying swallowtail’.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 62)

“During the Southern and Northern Dynasties, costumes underwent further changes in style. The long flying ribbons were no longer seen and the swallowtailed corners became enlarged. As a result the flying ribbons and swallowtailed corners were combined into one.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 62)

Sui Dynasty:

“During the period of the Sui and early Tang, a short jacket with tight sleeves was worn in conjunction with a tight long skirt whose waist was fastened almost to the armpits with a silk ribbon. In the ensuing century, the style of this costume remained basically the same, except for some minor changes such as letting out the jacket and/or its sleeves.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 88)

Tang Dynasty:

“The Tang Dynasty was the most prosperous period in China’s feudal society. Changan (now Xian, Shananxi Province), the capital, was the political, economic and cultural centre of the nation. […] Residents in Changan included people of such nationalities as Huihe (Uygur,) Tubo (Tibetan), and Nanzhao (Yi), and even Japanese, Xinluo (Korean), Persian and Arabian. Meanwhile, people frequently travelled to and fro between countries like Vietnam, India and the East Roman Empire and Changan, thus spreading Chinese culture to other parts of the world.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 76)

“…all the national minorities and foreign envoys who thronged the streets of Changan also contributed something of their own culture to the Tang. Consequently, paintings, carvings, music and dances of the Tang absorbed something of foreign skills and styles. The Tang government adopted the policy of taking in every exotic form whether or hats or clothing, so that Tang costumes became increasingly picturesque and beautiful.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 88)

“Women of the Tang Dynasty paid particular attention to facial appearance, and the application of powder or even rouge was common practice. Some women’s foreheads were painted dark yellow and the dai (a kind of dark blue pigment) was used to paint their eyebrows into different shapes that were called dai mei (painted eyebrows) in general.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 89)

“In the years of Tianbao during Emperor Xuanzong’s reign, women used to wear men’s costumes. This was not only a fashion among commoners, but also for a time it spread to the imperial court and became customary for women of high birth.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 89)

Song Dynasty

“The hairstyle of the women of the Song Dynasty still followed the fashion of the later period of the Tang Dynasty, the high bun being the favoured style. Women’s buns were often more than a foot in height.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 107)

“Women’s upper garments consisted mainly of coat, blouse, loose-sleeved dress, over-dress, short-sleeved jacket and vest. The lower garment was mostly a skirt.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 107)

“Women in the Song Dynasty seldom wore boots, since binding the feet had become fashionable.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 107)

“Although historians do not know exactly how or why foot binding began, it was apparently initially associated with dancers at the imperial court and professional female entertainers in the capital. During the Song dynasty (960-1279) the practice spread from the palace and entertainment quarters into the homes of the elite. ‘By the thirteenth century, archeological evidence shows clearly that foot-binding was practiced among the daughters and wives of officials,’ reports Patricia Buckley Ebrey […] Over the course of the next few centuries foot binding became increasingly common among gentry families, and the practice eventually penetrated the mass of the Chinese people.” (Chinese Chic: East Meets West, pg. 37-38)

Yuan Dynasty:

“Han women continued to wear the jacket and skirt. However, the choice of darker shades and buttoning on the left showed Mongolian influence.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 131)

“After the Mongols settled down in the Central Plains, Mongolian customs and costumes also had their influence on those of the Han people. While remaining the main costume for Han women, the jacket and skirt had deviated greatly in style from those of the Tang and Song periods. Tight-fitting garments gave way to big, loose ones; and collar, sleeves and skirt became straight. In addition, lighter more serene colours gained preference.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 142)

Ming Dynasty:

“The clothing for women in the Ming Dynasty consisted mainly of gowns, coats, rosy capes, over-dresses with or without sleeves, and skirts. These styles were imitations of ones first seen in the Tang and Song Dynasties. However, the openings were on the right-hand side, according to the Han Dynasty convention.” ((5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 147)

“The formal dress for commoners could only be made of coarse purple cloth, and no gold embroidery was allowed. Gowns could only in such light colours as purple, green and pink; and in no case should crimson, reddish blue or yellow be used. These regulations were observed for over a decade, and it was not until the 14^th year of Hong Wu that minor changes were made.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 147)

Qing Dynasty

When China fell under Manchurian rule, Chinese men were forced to adopt Manchurian customs. As a sign of submission, the new government made a decree that men must shave their head and wear the Manchurian queue or lose their heads. Many choose the latter.

On the other hand, Chinese women were not pressured to adopt Manchurian clothing and fashions. “Women, in general, wore skirts as their lower garments, and red skirts were for women of position. At first, there were still the “phoenix-tail” skirt and the “moonlight” skirt and others from the Ming tradition. However the styles evolved with the passage of time: some skirts were adorned with ribbons that floated in the air when one walked; some had little bells fastened under them: others had their lower edge embroidered with wavy designs. As the dynasty drew to an end, the wearing of trousers became the fashion among commoner women. There were trousers with full crotches and over trousers, both made of silk embroidered with patters.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 173)

The Manchurians attempted several times to eradicate the practice of foot-binding, but were largely unsuccessful. Manchurian women admired the gait of bound women but were effectively banned from practicing food-binding. Hence, a “flower pot shoe” later came into creation and it allowed its wearer the same unsteady gait but without any need for foot-binding.

Republic Era

“Ever since the Tang Dynasty, the design of Chinese women’s costumes had kept to the same straight style: flat and straight lines for the chest, shoulders and hips, with few curves visible; and it was not until the 1920’s that Chinese women came to appreciate ‘the beauty of curves’, and to pay attention to figure when cutting and making up dresses, instead of adhering to the traditional style.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 214)

“The most popular item of a Chinese woman’s wardrobe in modern times was the qi pao. Originall the dress of the Manchus, it was adopted by Han women in the 1920s. Modifications and improvements were then made so that for a time, it became the most fashionable form of dress for women in China.

Two main factors account for women’s general preference for the qi pao: first, it was economical and convenient to wear.” (5,000 years of Chinese Costume, pg. 214-215)

Women traditionally bound their breasts in the Ming and Qing dynasties with tight fitting vests and continued to do so in the early 20^th century.

“The vests were called xiaomajia ‘little vest’ or xiaoshan ‘little shirt” “used by Chinese women as underclothing for the upper part of the body.” (Changing Clothes in China: Fashion, History, Nation: Finnane pg 162) “Doudu [is] a sort of apron for the upper body […] in former times the doudu had been worn by everyone, old and young, male and female. The young wore red, the middle-aged wore white or grey-green, the elderly wore black. A little pocket sewn into the top was used by adults to secrete them money and by children their sweets. When a girl got engaged, she would show off her embroidery skills by sending an elaborately worked doudu to her fiancé, decorated with bats for good forturne and pomegranates, symbolizing many sons.” (Changing Clothes in China: Fashion, History, Nation: Finnane pg 162)

A ban on bound breasts began in 1927, in which the government started advocating for the “Natural Breast Movement”. Despite this, bound breasts still widely continued into the 1930s. The government also banned earrings as it fell under the criteria of deforming the natural body. The 1930s also saw the introduction of the western/French bra come to Shanghai.

“The little vest was designed to constrain the breasts and streamline the body. Such a garment was necessary to look comme il faut around 1908, when (as J. Dyer Ball observed): ‘fashion decreed that jackets should fit tight, though not yielding to the contours of the figure, except in the slightest degree, as such an exposure of the body would be considered immodest.’ It became necessary again in the mid-twenties, when the jacket-blouse—a garment cut on rounded lines – began to give way to the qipao. At this stage, darts were not used to tailor the bodice or upper part of the qipao, nor would they be till the mid-fifties. The most that could be done by way of further fitting the qipao to the bosom was to stretch the material at the right places through ironing. Under these circumstances, breast-binding must have made the tailor’s task easier.” (Finnane 163, Changing Clothes in China: Fashion, History, Nation)

Successful eradication of bound feet would not come until the 1949 when the People’s Republic of China came into power.

1950s-1960’s

Under the People’s Republic of China, very few mainland women wore the cheongsam, save for ceremonial attire. Clothing became de-sexualized for mainlanders.

It was the flip side in Hong Kong, as the cheongsam continued its function as everyday wear which lasted until the late 1960s. The cheongsam in the 1950s and 1960s became even tighter fitting to further accentuate feminine curves. Western clothing became the default after the late 1960s, though the cheongsam continued to survive as uniforms for students (who donned a looser and androgynous version), waitresses, brides, and beauty contestants.

21^st century

Designers today are creating new forms of the qipao/cheongsam. The mermaid tail appears to be a current popular trend.

Surnames Master Post.

Mon, 11 Feb 2013 15:19:08 +0000

phoeberpc:

Surnames are just as important as given names. So, I compiled a list of the websites I use to find my surnames.

English Surnames

Dutch Surnames

Spanish Surnames

Scottish Surnames

German Surnames

Italian Surnames

Irish Surnames

French Surnames

Scandinavian Surnames

Welsh Surnames

Jewish Surnames

Surnames By Ethnicity

Most Common Surnames in the USA

Most Common Surnames in Great Britan

Most Common Surnames in Asia

Renegade Chapter 14 Update

Sun, 03 Feb 2013 17:56:44 +0000

Name: Renegade
Chapters: 1-14
Story Synopsis: Fudou Akio in between Shin Teikoku and Inazuma Japan. Also featuring Takahashi Shinobu and Fudou’s former posse member, now friend Cap.
Chapter 14 Synopsis: Sliiiice of liiiiiiiiife A.K.A. reforming and maintaining relationships.

FFN / AO3