View Single Post
Old 07-25-2019, 03:23 PM   #9
Diablo
Badgerdick
 
Diablo's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jul 2015
Location: Showdown City
Posts: 2,604
Battle Record: 11-2


Champed
- Art of Writing League

Rep Power: 22685548
Diablo has a brilliant futureDiablo has a brilliant futureDiablo has a brilliant futureDiablo has a brilliant futureDiablo has a brilliant futureDiablo has a brilliant futureDiablo has a brilliant futureDiablo has a brilliant futureDiablo has a brilliant futureDiablo has a brilliant futureDiablo has a brilliant future
Default

Am I the only one that thought the NSFW tag in the thread title was a bit excessive? I mean, it’s hardly pornographic in the slightest, you could find worse in most red-top newspapers. It’s just funny to me. Lol. This topic is an oddity, I’m not really sure how I would have approached it in truth without much thought. I’d have possibly gone for something along a Wyclef “Told my mama I’m in love with a stripper, yo,” type thing. I’d have probably made it more periodic and Victorian in writers voice and setting though to tie it in more with the image. There’s quite a few possibilities that could be played with around the guy reading a book/story. I find the fact both of the birds (odd additions IMO) looking away in opposite directions quite interesting and could have been delved into with regards to prudishness. There’s a more obvious take that could have been simply around the males admiration of the female form. I think if someone like a CopyPat or Pinot had gone along that route with a more comedic take, this could have been a lot of fun. Anyway, those are my initial thoughts on what could be done to this. Let’s see what you guys had for it...

Candy: There are times where you have this similarity to almost how Inno chooses to write verses, linking a few different associative words of themes poetically and it comes off well. I enjoyed the simplicity of “Up a pond and down a stream,” off bat. It doesn’t sound difficult to do, but the beauty of it almost lies in its simplicity (to me). It reads like something you would find in a children’s book, but I mean that in the best possible way; it’s very easy to understand the language of it and also uses the opposites of up/down along with the synonyms (?) pond and stream. The subtly to it stood out to me, and in a lot of the battles in this tournament I’d imagine it’s the minute details were going to have to pick at to decide winners as the competition grows stronger so deft touches like that aren’t lost on me. “Ruby red blush from tickle pink moments,” was another example of the associative wording at work - helping tie the line into more than just what’s at face value. Some people use their technical skill to do this via rhyme schemes and multi strings at work, others in this tournament use these associative words and imagery to good effect. It’s interesting to me as a reader to see who does what and how. Another point of note for me is that you also went for a more topical piece over a story, something I’ve seen a few different people try in round one when there was a good amount of time where everyone would do a story and not falter from it. It was tried and tested. The topical verse still seems alive and well! I did feel there were other elements from inside the image that could have worked in, the streetlight / candelabra looking thing could have been interpreted as some sort of net or cage that the guy in the chair unknowingly was being lured into by his captor - slowly but surely - and I think that idea would have worked well within the context of your piece with its title. The Book With No Spine was clever too. Kudos!

Scar: You were the stronger here from a technical standpoint, I see how you toyed with the rhyme through the opening couplet and it’s done relatively subtly but the shellfish and yoghurt is out syllabically and sounded rather unnatural wording wise. It was made more noticeable, perhaps, because it was right at the very beginning where you wanted to hook the reader in (ideally) so it almost started off on the wrong foot and left you with work to do to put that right. I think you choosing to go with the story (stories?) he was reading route served you well here because it opened things up for you creatively and you could use all of these varying characters and scenarios as you wanted - it gave you a flexibility to do what you wanted and you got progressively better around that section. The writers voice became a lot more conversational in its tone and it made it read more naturally fluid. Particularly in this section:

Quote:
In which he escapes often. He’d engage problems..
..resembling ape monsters and battle beasts.
Oh yeah there were casualties. Bill payments stack in heaps.
The follow up line following that needed a little tightening around “space worms” for the internal multi maybe, and/or some cleaning up on the wording of “they’ve attacked the streets,” as it isn’t ideal the way you left it. It just needs some polish and a proofread, it’s a relatively easy fix so I’m not going to go overboard on that. I liked the idea of the ‘alien outlaws’ and felt you could have built on that even more strongly imagery wise to develop the characters more and add some depth to them, describe them, maybe reference their home planet or something distinctive about their look/colour/odd shape/hair/tentacles/teeth/whatever. Maybe they look like your opponent in a wig. Something comedic, you know? The references to all these “alien outlaws” “space gods” and the “King” only really served as something surface layer here. Even if you had assigned some kind of made up species/name/title I feel it would have added an element to them, you k ow? It would have given the reader a little more to contemplate imaginatively and help lift them off the page - bringing them more to life - and the story format was an open goal for you to shoot for in terms of the imagery/character development/creativity if you had been able to capitalise on it. Again, there’s stuff I enjoyed which show your potential like the

Quote:
“flickering in moments of grief,”
and I want to see more of that, even if it means restricting your rhyme scheme some what for now and concentrating more on that aspect of your writing over the flair elements. I feel it would serve you better to do so at this point. I did enjoy the narrative this had, especially the closing lines with the fading darkness due to him neglecting his responsibilities while in awe of these stories - I think we can all relate to that in some way via this medium, so that made it more universally appealing right at the end also. I do think you keeping it relatively brief made this more of a contest, with you having the more technical merit in terms of mechanics and rhyme scheme but maybe lesser in the way of visual imagery compared to Candy here. I don’t think you have similar styles, though I do see some similarities, especially around the stuff I quoted from you and him. They were the highlights in both (to me). It really comes down to a preference between them both, and since I am a fan of the more technically proficient elements I am leaning slightly more toward Scar in this one after breaking down both as to my reasons why.

Vote - Scar

Keep those pens moving!
Diablo is offline