Feedback Strategies

I really like the article: How to Give Feedback Without Sounding like a Jerk. I think that Grant does a good job of pointing out the problem with the normal way that people give praise and criticism. A lot of times, I find myself ignoring the compliments--as he points out, I don't feel like they are genuine. I always read past compliments and look for the criticism. I find myself dwelling on the negative commentary more than the positive, and the fact that it's often accompanying positivity makes it hard for me to see either in the correct light. The negative seems like a hidden barb, and the positive seems like superfluous fluff. 

But I find myself giving feedback like that, because the last thing I want is for someone else to lose confidence or feel self-conscious about their writing. I don't want to be the reason someone doubts themselves, but sometimes I know that if I said what I really felt, it might actually help someone improve. I know that the point for everyone is to get better, but I have never been good at tough love. 

I also read Be a Mirror. The most important part of this article for me was the fifth point about taking myself out of the feedback. I've never noticed it before, or maybe I've simply never acknowledged it, but saying "I think..." highlights the subjectivity of my commentary. It seems like a personal reaction that's relative to me and my opinions on their writing. It needs to be about the writer and what they have created and how they can improve their creations. 

Source: Flickr

Week 3 Story - Pygmalion's Statue

Source: Wikipedia

One day, she could simply see. 

She had known that she was, but had no idea what else was. There was darkness and pressure, choking her consciousness. She was, but she was immobile. Trapped with her own thoughts, and without new ideas. How could there be new thoughts without new information?

It happened slowly. The darkness began to shift and lighten, some of the pressure was removed and soon, she knew she had shape. Not a sophisticated shape, but now she was relative to everything around her. Now she knew of the cool of the shade and the warmth of the sunlight, the sensation of a breeze. She didn't know where, exactly, her shape was coming from. But she knew that, little by little, she was becoming something.

She could feel supports, holding her up, her weight distributed through out her being. She could feel parts of her extended beyond the rest, and parts of her kept closely to her core. She could feel herself becoming frustrated with the single sense of touch. Without knowing what else there was, she knew she wanted more.

He gave her ears before he gave her eyes. She could hear, now, how she was being formed. Chink, chink, chink, as he chiseled away at everything else which was weighing her down. He heard him grumbling to himself, thinking aloud. Calling her beautiful. What was "beautiful?" 

When he gave her eyes, she could not have been more elated. She could see him, finally. He was often right before her, chiseling away and forming "cheeks" and "lips;" a "nose" and a "chin." He worked so close to her, and she watched him closely. His brow furrowed in concentration, he bit his lip in thought. She longed for breath, so that she could chuckle at the faces he made while he considered her every angle. He was beautiful.

One day she was complete.

One day her maker stood back, and simply gazed at her. She gazed back, and though she knew he could not feel her attention, she felt his. And it made her feel "beautiful."

He came to her at night, and she was glad. She had often stood in the dark, staring at nothing and waiting for him to return in the morning. Now he came to her, and embraced her, and kissed her hands and her cheeks. He was solid, like she was, but he was warm--blood and breath made him something other than she, and when he whispered: "How I wish you were alive" she learned what it was that separated them. He was alive, and somehow, she was not.

He began to stay with her, all day and all night. She was happy for his company, but what she wanted more than anything was to live. 

He came to her one day, when the lights of the city shone brightly, blending with the lights in the sky that she had come to know were "stars." He tried his best to caress her face, and wished with all her might that she could lean into his touch, but she remained stiff--carved from ivory. "I have prayed to the goddess Venus, my love. I have left her gifts, and begged her that you may live and breathe and be my bride." She prayed to whoever Venus was, that her love would get his wish.

He took her hand, and she felt his warmth in a way she had not before. She felt her fingers curl around his, and with hesitation, took in a breath, as she had watch him do for months. The sensation filled her lungs, which had not been there before, and she felt her chest expand. The chill and the stiffness that had previously been her life--her experience of being--melted, and gave way to something else. She could "smell" and was delighted that somehow the things she saw could and felt had other signs of existence as well. She learned what was "wet" and what was "dry," for not she could feel a tongue form and move in her mouth and her eyes could blink.

She felt her heart beat in her chest, and new blood course through her every limb, animating her. She looked at her maker, her love, and--unsure of how to speak and bashful in the face of new elements of existence--she touched his face. 

His eye's grew wet with tears, and she had seen him cry from loneliness and sorrow, but never from joy or from love. He kissed her lips and she tasted him. He embraced her, and she felt his heart beating against her own. She could see all of him now, where before, he had been out of focus and blurry; she could smell the salt in his sweat and the incense burning in the workshop; she heard his shuddered breath and his whispered prayers of thanks against her ears. 

She no longer was--she was alive. 

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Author's Note: She this story is based on the story of Pygmalion's Statue in Ovid's Metamorphosis, in the Mythology Anthology. I though it would interesting to write his story from the perspective of the statue. It's cool because you get to explore the different facets of existence, like the five senses and self-awareness. At first, I was going to make the statue not too into Pygmalion, because I'm sure he was an old guy who sculpted a young girl them wished for her to come alive so he could marry her--and that's creepy. But I think that a statue who'd never met anyone else would kind of have no choice but to fall in love with him. So In my mind, he's a young eccentric guy that the girls weren't that into, so he prayed that his creation would love him--which is still creepy but certainly less so. 

This story can now be found at: The Plot Thickens, my Portfolio site for the class Project. 

Brainstorming Project Topics

I've come up with a few ideas for the Storybook project, and a few really excite me. I have some of them fleshed out in my mind, but since I have to choose only one, I think I'll need some time to really consider the logistics of researching and writing through the topics. 

One of my ideas, the least expandable I think, is to write the origin story of Dionysus, Greek god of wine, madness, and ecstasy from his perspective. I think it makes for an interesting addition to the trope of the "troubled young man with a dead/absent mother and prolonged adolescence." But I think that some of my other ideas would be more interesting in a longer assignment. Maybe I'll still write this story one day, just for fun, or if it's relevant for this class later, but I want to focus on my other ideas for the Storybook project.

I believe I've already mentioned my next idea: a modern-day version of Callisto's story. I think it would just be interesting to explore it in this cultural context, what with modern-day feminism, a change in the perception of sexual assault, and the "Me Too" movement. I think it would be interesting to give the gods--Diana, Juno, and Jupiter--personalities that somewhat correspond with modern times. It's just interesting that the gods already sort-of have personalities that are familiar in modern times. It reminds me of the old adage: "there's nothing new under the sun."

The third idea that I came up with was actually inspired by a different class, my Native American Philosophy course. There was discussion of stories and their importance within Native American culture, especially tricksters. And in one our first assignments I read stories about Anansi, the trickster in West African literature. I started thinking of how tricksters are a commonality within the stories of cultures and societies all over the world, and I thought it'd be interesting to imagine them in a scenario where they are all tricking each other to see who comes out on top. I would have to read lots of stories involving Anansi, Loki, Hermes/Mercury, Eris, Coyote, Eleggua, Maui, and any other trickster stories I can think of. Then I would narrow it down to four or five and try to adapt their classic tricks and pranks to another trickster in the group. I'm pretty excited about this idea because there's lots of room for creativity, I know exactly what kind of research I'd have to do, and it will give me an opportunity to explore the stories from all around the world.

My final idea is also pretty exciting, but I think that it may only be exciting to me. I am convinced that everyone has a wild belief that is not really "widely accepted," but that they can't help believing nonetheless. For example, I have a friend that is 100% sure that dragons used to exist, but have died out. I have another friend that knows mermaids are real, just rare. My fourth story idea was inspired by my own wild-card belief that magic was totally real, and it just died out over the centuries. I love the Egyptian myth of Isis, the enchantress, and Osiris, the king of the dead. It is an epic story and it's got everything: love, royalty, inheritance, betrayal, death, revival, and magic. And I think that it would be cool to tell it against a futuristic-"rediscovery of magic"-post-apocalyptic-Mad-Max (just because of the sand) kind of backdrop. Even if doing all that wouldn't work, I think that it would be cool just to tell the story with more detail and with dialogue. I mean, if the story of Isis and Osiris was a movie, I would totally watch it. They are 100% more interesting that Romeo and Juliet, and there are about five different versions of that story.

I think my final two ideas are my favorites, but I honestly don't know which to choose. 

Source: highachievers.com

Reading Notes - Ovid's Metamorphosis (Reading B)

In the second pard of Ovid's Metamorphosis, stories are a little less thematic than in Reading A. There are stories of unfortunate nymphs and mortals, and of demigod heroes. For instance, Echo and Narcissus--the nymph who fell in love with the man who loved himself. I think that these stories have less intentional interference from the gods. Certainly some of the situations that arise come from distant celestial parentage, like a pagan Rube-Goldberg machine. 

For instance, the story of Perseus is fraught with indirect action from the gods. Perseus, himself of course, is the son of Danae. She conceived him with Jupiter, who appeared as a golden shower to impregnate her despite her father's best efforts to prevent this very thing by sealing her in a room. He then kills Medusa, who has snakes for hair and the ability to turn living things to stone. She was given these traits by the goddess Minerva, who wanted to protect Medusa after Neptune raped her in Minerva's temple. Perseus then flies to Atlas's kingdom, turns him to stone using Medusa's severed head, then flies to Ethiopia. He proceeds to rescue Princess Andromeda, who only needs rescuing because her mother, Cassiopeia, insulted the gods and they demanded the sacrifice of her daughter as punishment. 

I think that this method of weaving stories together explains why so many are obsessed with Greek and Roman mythology. The pantheon and the stories that arise from the god's interactions with mortals are intriguing, and each thread leads back to another and another. I think that as a single writer, it may be difficult to create such a entangled world.

In the context of my Storybook project, or even just my Storytelling assignments, I think that it would be more simple to extend the threads left by Ovid, rather than trying to create a whole new web myself. 

"Medusa"
Source: Wikimedia

Reading Notes - Ovid's Metamorphosis (Reading A)

I chose to read Ovid's Metamorphosis for this week's reading. I have read the Metamorphosis before, for a CL C class, but I think that the translation used for this course was a little more casual (and honest about how creepy Jupiter is). 

The bulk of the reading was about Phaethon, the sun of Helios/Phoebus Apollo. He tries to drive Apollo's sun chariot across the sky in an attempt to prove his heritage and grandeur, and instead lays waste to both the earth and the heavens, then is killed by Jupiter to spare the rest of creation. I think the biggest take away for me was how descriptive the story was. The doors to the Sun Palace are described in great detail, as was the sun chariot itself and the fire-breathing horses. In my first Storytelling exercise, I tried to fit the mold of a lot of the myths that I had read, which only included as much detail as was needed to express the point of the myth. I'm glad that I chose Ovid for this exercise, because I think it will give me more confidence and inspiration to include more visual detail in my stories. 
Aside from the tragedy of Phaethon and the "creation story" of Deucalion and Pyrrha (which is essentially the story of Noah's Ark, but with less implied incest for the repopulation of the world), most of the stories in Ovid's Reading A are about the women who are raped by Jupiter and pay the price for beauty.

Two of these stories stood out to me, as potential Storytelling assignments and possibly the Storybook project. The first is Callisto, and the second is the story of Semele.

Callisto is a virginal companion of Diana who is raped and impregnated by Jupiter. When Diana discovers the pregnancy, Callisto is cast out of Diana's group of hunters. Then, Juno triples-down on her misfortune by turning her into a bear after Callisto "insults" her by giving birth to a son, Arcas. Jupiter was indifferent to the difficulties he'd instigated until, fifteen years later, Arcas nearly kills his own mother in a hunt. He "fixes" the damage by turning them into Ursa Major and Ursa Minor. 

This story kind of reminds me of the "Me Too" movement, and I think that a modern adaptation would really showcase the depth of what happens to the women Jupiter takes a liking to. When the stories are told in Greek/Roman mythology, the extent of Jupiter's creepiness and sexual aggression are glossed over; conversely, Juno's insane jealousy is always made a major point. In a modern version of events, I would portray Diana as a high school "purity warrior," Jupiter as her father, and Juno as her step-mother--true enough to their mythological genealogy and personas. Callisto would be one of Diana's clique, but would become an outsider after getting raped by Diana's father, then further ostracized and targeted after her pregnancy becomes public. I think if I told the story this way, the entitlement that powerful men feel they have over women and their bodies would be a major theme, as would the support--of lack thereof--of sexual assault victims (particularly regarding other women).

I think this would work better as a chaptered story, so I'm keeping it in mind for my Storybook project, though, of course it's still rather early in the semester. 

"Ursa Minor and Major"
Source: LisaAlisa via Vectorstock

The other story, Semele, is compelling as well, but I think that it would be more interesting as a part of an origin story for a mortal Dionysus. His mother, killed by his father's glory, goaded by a jealous Juno. He is then taken away and raised by his aunt, Ino and by the nymphs, until he becomes the god of the proverbial "wine, women, and song." I think that there is an interesting trope of "damaged souls" with tragic backgrounds growing up to become party gods, chasing that oblivion to snuff out the sadness. Even though it's a well-known trope, I still think it'd be fun to explore in this context.