Inspiration

I will let the world inspire my soul as it pours out of my body, through my fingertips, and onto paper. I will write every action, every feeling, every line. I will fill hundreds and thousands of notebooks and my soul will still ache to release itself.

The New "Hello"

I was at work today and a fellow employee walked by me. One of his hands was in his pants, (no, that's not a typo - it really was in his pants, not his pocket, but his pants.) the other slowly rose from his side. He held out two fingers in a peace sign and bobbed his head once. I believe this was some form of greeting, but one cannot be sure. I offered a polite smile and he seemed pleased.

bon voyage again

I've restarted my bon voyage story. I still don't know how I feel about it.

Life is a journey—a journey with choices. You wonder about the choices you don’t make, you think about what could have been. Sometimes you’re faced with choices that you make without thinking: I drink my coffee with sugar. Sometimes you approach choices you have to think a lot about, it may take days: buying a car. Sometimes it’s just hard, but simple: deciding whether to order the cheeseburger, or chicken. I was faced with a decision that had two choices to it. I could choose one, or I could choose the other. The two outcomes had an endless amount of possibilities for my life. I knew after only two seconds of thinking which choice I would make; I know I made the right decision, but not a day goes by that I don’t think about what my life would have been like if I chose differently. My choice has marked a new chapter in my journey, and I’d say it’s been a bon voyage.

Multi-Genre anyone?

The Multi - Genre paper is very interesting -- you combine many genre's of writing, use one theme, concept, idea, etc (you use the same subject throughout), and create a unique paper.

I would really like to use this in my classroom, but first I need to try it myself and since I have plenty of time now, and won't by the time I start teaching, I think now is as good of a time as any to try it out. Who knows, maybe after writing one myself, my views will have changed and I won't think it's such a  good idea after all.

I've never written one myself, but I've done a lot of reading about multi-genre papers and examples of multi-genre papers. Tom Romano wrote a book called "Blending Genre, Altering Style" where he explains the ups and downs of writing such a paper and gives plenty of examples- an interesting read for an English teacher-to be (or an English teacher for that matter).

Why am I so into this?
As a student who has written plenty of papers, I find it boring to write paper after paper in the same format. Block prose, paragraphs, 10 pages of the same genre, it gets monotonous.  Completing one paper but with different genres sounds fun, edgy. Sure it'll take more work - you have to figure out which genres to use, how many, what section should be what genre, how to connect everything, so on and so forth, but challenges are fun.

Why would it be helpful to use this in a classroom?
Some people are better at writing poetry than block paragraphs. Some are better at journal style writing. Students can experiment with different types of writing and the student and the teacher can figure out what the student likes to write best. It includes some of the genres that students hate most without having to focus solely on it. (You could include a mini poetry unit, without having to fail a bunch of kids who just don't understand it.) You can include genres that students should be exposed to but aren't important enough to focus on; like advertisements, news articles, memos, business letters, etc. It'll keep the students interested. It's different, it's versatile, each student can cater it to what they enjoy best within writing. Of course, there are rules, and as a teacher, you can set certain parameters, but it is really flexible.

I have a few projects that I'm working on right now, but hopefully I'll be able to write a multi-genre paper before I graduate college, and hopefully I'll enjoy writing it as much as I enjoy the idea of it.

Movie Review

*if you plan on watching this movie, do not read any further. This review gives away the storyline and the ending*

The movie Diary of a Nymphomaniac isn’t at all what I expected it to be. I expected something more documentary –like, more definitions, more labels. What I saw was a story about a woman who, at the age of 29, found herself. Valerie is an average French woman, trying to live her life to its fullest. She battles herself and by the end of the movie, learns to accept herself.

Her grandmother sees that Valerie is upset about something; she just doesn’t know everything. She suggests that Valerie “jot down [her] thoughts, ideas, problems, on a sheet of paper, but interrogatively so [she] can see them from outside and understand them.” Excellent advice to anyone – writing is definitely a good way to vent and work through problems; but what Valerie’s grandma is suggesting is more psychological.

When Valerie opens up to her grandmother and tells her that she is a nymphomaniac, her grandma responds with: “Nymphomania, a man’s invention to make women feel guilty if they break the rules.” Valerie’s grandmother accepts Valerie for who she is, but Valerie must learn to accept herself before she can fully enjoy her life.

The movie is ended with a statement from Valerie:

                “I’m a promiscuous woman, yes, because I want to use sex as a means to find what everyone is looking for. Recognition, pleasure, self-esteem, and, in short, love and affection. What’s pathological about that? If you want to give me a name, go on. I don’t mind. But you must know I’m really a mermaid, a dryad, simply a nymph.”

As an English major, I have to love how she used a play on words. I can't be completely sure, but I'm going to guess that the word Nymphomania comes from the Greek Nymph. Nymphs are mythological creatures known for their "amorous freedom." When Valerie says the words "mermaid" and "dryad" she is putting herself in the same group as those mythological creatures who enjoy their freedom and are happy with their lives. She says it proudly, where as in the beginning of the movie, when she first tells her grandmother that she is a nymphomaniac, she is embarrassed, she feels guilty, and she doesn’t want to accept it.

Since this movie isn't at all what I expected, and instead of learning about nymphomania as a psychology, I learned something completely different, I don't know where to go next with my research. I don't quite know either what I'm getting at with this whole research project. I wanted to incorporate the women of the victorian era into this because at the time there were so many taboo things. People had (and still do have) a hard time with identity. In Charles Dicken's Hard Times, the main characters undergo the same type of transformation. They realize that life needs to be celebrated, and sometimes logic needs to be thrown out the window, also the realiziation of understanding of identity comes into play. Emily Dickinson's Wuthering Heights portrays the same idea; very much more so with identity. Alot of Victorian paintings show women being in great distress, being locked away, so on and such forth. Women had no identity and there was a lot of effort to portray such problems.

My next step will be to explore Booth Library databases and see what I can find on Victorian Identity, and I bet I'll be able to tie it in with nymphomania rather quickly.

bon voyage

I haven't posted in several days now. I've been completely busy with work (besides that I don't have internet right now, I'm at the library), but I'll get a break soon and for about a week and a half  I'll be able to post. I'm pretending that people actually read my blog posts so that I'll keep up the practice of writing.

I've been having a bad case of writer's block lately too. I open word and can't think of anything. I'm trying to figure out where my fantasy story is leading me, as for now, I don't have any plans for it. I've been working on another story Bon Voyage, which I started  in my Creative Writing class. We were supposed to write a story where someone loses something and finds something. I thought it would be cool if someone lost their life and found another, then people from the past finds that person and he/she has to make a big decision: which life to keep.  I've got two pages down so far, but I don't like the tone and voice of it so far. I don't want to completely wipe out what I've got; but in order to make it sound the way I want it to, I've gotta do it. I would post a small section and hope for comments, but I don't have the story with me.

Hopefully my little writer's block will end soon and I can write some good stuff; I'm so anxious to finish another story.

Dreams

I have dreams that are just crazy and really vivid. Maybe it's just my imagination at work because sometimes I wake up and think "woah, that would make an excellent story." I tried it once, turned a dream into a story. I had to change a few things, and obviously add more since dreams like to just end in random places (don't you hate that? -- then you lay there trying to fall back asleep so you can figure out what happened.)

I had another really vivid and crazy dream last night that I hope to turn into a story. It's much different from my normal style of writing, so it'll be a nice challenge. Keep reading, I just may post some of it up here.

Here's an excerpt from one of my crazy dream stories:

(I don't have a warning on my blog page, so I had to censor some spots. I like the original much better, it's more spicy)

I woke up in a cold dark cell; it was dirty and gross. I could feel dried mud on my arms, legs, and face-- pretty much anything that wasn’t covered by clothes. I had a splitting headache and no idea why I was here.  “Ugh. I could really go for a hot cup of tea right now, and a warm bath,” I said, not even thinking that anyone was around except for the pacing guard who was currently on the other side of the hallway.

“Well you ain’t gettin’ any of that in here sweetheart,”

I could hardly see the man that was in the cell with me, but I could see that he was fat and had chains around his ankles. His voice was rough and cracked like he hadn’t had anything to drink in a while. I wished he would lick his lips or move his tongue around in his mouth to salivate before he had spoken.

“Why would they put a man and a woman in a cell together? I thought there was some kind of law or something about that?”

“Ain’t no laws here honey, they do as they please. Ain’t nothn you can do about it. Afraid I’m gonna hurt ya? Don’t be scared sweetheart. I’m chained down good and tight.”

“Where are we?”

“Mexico’s finest prison,”

“A prison? How did I get here? Man I’ve gotta get out,”

“You ain’t goin nowhere sweetheart; they keep you here on their terms. Ain’t no one broke outta here in a long time,”

“Well today’s your lucky day because I’m getting out of here, and so are you,”

“Ah, that’s sweet of you honey, but why d’ya  rekon’ I’m gettn outta here too?”
“Because, you are going to get the guard’s attention and when he comes to check on you, I’m going to knock him out,”

“Anything for you sweetheart,” he said, half annoyed, “what do I need to do?”

“First of all, don’t get any ideas. After we get out of here, we have to go in separate directions. I’ve got things to do. I was sent here on a mission,”

“They must have hit you hard when they captured you honey cause you don’t make a lick of sense. Sent here on a mission psh who do you think you are?”

“I’m a journalist for a newspaper, but that’s none of your business. Now be on your toes because when that guard comes back you are going to double over, hold your stomach and start groaning. Make as big of a scene as you can,” I took the rest of the water that was in a bowl set out for me to drink and threw it under him. I wasn’t going to drink it anyways, there was barely any there, and it looked gross, “there, it’s dark enough in here that he’ll think its blood. I’ll freak out and tell him something is wrong with you, when he comes in to check I’ll knock him out and we’ll be free.”

“I can’t be on my toes seeing as how I’m chained to the wall darlin’ but I’ll give it a shot.”

“Shh. Here he comes, go.”

“Marrrggggghh”

“Aaah!” I screamed as daintily as possible, “oh my god you’ve got to help him, he’s bleeding all over the place. Please hurry. Oh my god, what’s wrong with him?”

The guard ran to our cell, pulled out a ring of keys, and quickly opened the door. He came in and the fat man was still groaning like an idiot, I couldn’t believe this worked. When the guard took a close look at the fat man, I kicked him in the head. He fell over unconscious.

The rest of the story is action packed and has a bit of fantasy involved, if you'd like to read the rest shoot me an email at rphiller@eiu.edu

Writers Block

I sent a friend a text today, it said "writer's block." She replied with, "nymphomania." At first, I thought she was trying to tell me her secret, when I realized that she meant I should write about it I laughed out loud and thought to myself, why would I want to write about that. Then I got to thinking... Nymphomania is commonly associated with women of the early 19th Century. I did a quick search of the word Nymphomania at OED.com (English Major's gold) and the term originated in the late 18th Century.
I have access to a scholarly database that focuses on that era, and is overflowing with information regarding women and sexual desire, prostitution, brothels, etc.  We'll see where this leads me.

I have a weird interest in 19th Century literature, well anything that's old -- in college I took a class titled Victorian Literature, and another called Pre 1800 Literature (spl topics: Epistolary lit) along with many Medieval classes (I'm a medieval studies minor). I had a professor who is obsessed with the Victorian era, (Roughly 1832-1901) and in his class I learned a bit about the history. See there are many different classifications for studying literature; formalism, psychoanalitic criticism, historicism (old and new), just to name a few. The particular professor that I speak of, liked historicism and that is how he taught. We not only studied literature of the 19th Century, but we studied artwork, philosophy,  and more. We looked closely at people of the time and most particulary, gender matters.

Gender matters in the 19th century covers a lot of what the people of the time were going through. Many works of literature from that time period displays the problems. If I do take on this task, I'll research nymphomania, prostitution, and other issues related with women of the time. If I get real into it, I'll research the sames problems in today's society and compare and contrast.

A part of me sees myself starting this little project only to stick it in a box, throw it in the basement of my life and forget it even existed, on the other hand, I'm excited to have something to write about. It will definitely be interesting and time consuming.

Thanks friend who suggested it

Excerpt from "The Amulet"

Here is a piece from a short story that I've been working on. Right now it's at 21 pages and is kind of taking direction of its own. Enjoy

Any ceremony that the people of the Tree City held was beautiful and harmonious. Elves were the most gracious creatures in existence. They could sing, play music, and dance with the utmost grace and skill. The first part of the funeral would take place on the floor of the forest. Amithistella arrived with her two sisters. Every Elf attended with their family. Since Amithistella was highly regarded and fought on the battlefield, she would stand at the front of the crowd. The Bards, Priests, and Druids formed their circles, and the crowd encircled themselves around these casters who performed the ceremony.

Those who died in battle have already been buried, their bodies uncovered so that they may decompose and become one with earth again. Amithistella watched as the Bards played and Priests danced in circles around the burial plot. When the time came, every Elven voice, royal and common folk, joined in a praise offered to Tunare. After the singing and dancing came to an end, the Druids took their formations. They were going to pull together earthen supplies with magic and create a stone plaque to commemorate the brave soldiers and casters who surrendered their lives to protect the Tree City. Such a spell required over a dozen Druids with the highest casting and concentrating abilities and took a few hours to complete.

The Druids were not alone in this, Bards accompanied the Druid spell with spells of their own that aided in concentration and kept the Druid mana flow at its highest. Before the Druids begin their casting,  the Enchanters stepped  forward and casted spells that also help with the Druids’ concentration and mana flow. Bards and Enchanters are not the only ones who help the Druids cast their spell. Every Elf in the crowd must chant with the Druids, they do not actually cast the spell, for they do not have the powers to do so, but magic lies in every Elven creature. Each individual who chants with the Druids gives a little bit if their will to the spell that the Druids are casting. With magic, each person comes together as one and creates a magical plaque to remember those who died in the battle against Hate, as one the spell will be completed, and the people of the Tree City will go on living harmoniously.

The Enchanters completed their spells and stepped back. They stood in the circle outside the Bards, so they can re cast their spells if need be. The Bards began their chants and their music. Amithistella felt her own mana flow with more liquidity inside her since she was so close. Everyone in the crowd held hands with the Elf standing next to them. The Druids began their spell. They danced in a particular formation and chanted. They chanted the spell once first, and then the crowd began again with them. Amithistella joined in with the others and felt a small portion of the mana within her leave her body as she chanted. Within an hour, she felt fatigued. As a Paladin she used some spells, but her casting endurance was not as high as a caster’s. She wondered if they were beginning to feel the effects of their casting.

Finally, in the middle of the Druid ring, a formation appeared, rocks gathered to form the plaque, they were almost finished. The rocks moved around as the crowd and druids continued to chant and joined together. The plaque was finished, the Eldest Druid stepped forward and casted a spell that inscribed into the rock, it read:

“To save this city, the brave defenders died. Their valor and honor will have eternal remembrance. May their bodies give back to the soil, their souls be with the Gods, and their hearts forever remain with those who love and honor them.”

hrrrm.. what to write

I'm sitting in front of an open, empty posting box wondering what to write and realizing that it's getting me nowhere. The first thing that you have to realize about writing is that you can't just sit and wait for an inspiring moment or action to take place; you have to create your own.
So how do you do such a thing? Think of a prompt (google), or just write and see what happens.

Usually when I just sit and write, Amithistella (pronounced like the gem - amethyst- with stella at the end) is what comes to my mind and flows out onto paper. She is a character of my own, and kind of my alter-ego, although as I write more and more about her, she is becoming quite different from myself. Amithistella is a Fae (fairy, elf) Paladin who lives in a Norrathian Tree City with the other good Elves. She started as a character on a MMO that I used to play, so a lot of places and ideas that I use for my background comes from the game, but the adventures are all my own. So far I've created one complete short story with her and I'm working on another that doesn't seem like it'll end any time soon.

Ever since I was in late Jr. High/ early High School, I've written poetry, but as I've matured (yeah I've matured, but just a little)  I find that fantasy strikes me as most appealing. I thoroughly enjoy sitting down and reading a good fantasy novel. I absolutely love to write fantasy, but I'm trying out other genres as well. Like I said, my early writing was poetry, I tried one short story (about Amithistella) and decided to take a short fiction creative writing class in college. It was there that I found a love for writing short stories. I'm only a few months out of the class, but I've gotten a good start on a lot of stories in that class and can't wait to finish them.

As I write my stories I'll post them here. Mostly, I'll post sections that I'm unsure of - feedback and constructive criticism is most welcome. I'll take all the help I can get, I'm tough, but I'm a writer, and like all writers, I'm sensitive about my own creations. I'm not saying 'be nice' I'm just saying 'don't be mean.'