Friday, January 18, 2008

1) I found the personal essay very difficult to write, because I don't feel that anything especially significant and "deep" has happened in my life. Looking at the sample essays also didn't help, because it just made me try to write like them - which just made me not able to find a good topic to write about. Anyway, I think the genre has some strengths, especially when you are trying to convey a very abstract notion. The form tries to ground abstract in something tangible by telling it in the shell of a short story. However, I still prefer to write in fiction, as you are not constrained by factual matters. I also find it quite difficult to write about myself directly. With fiction, I can write about myself through the actions/persona of an imaginary character... I don't reallly know. Basically, I had trouble finding a topic to write my personal essay on, and I didn't experience this problem when writing fiction.

2) Reading is important to the writer because otherwise, you would have nowhere to take ideas from. Reading other people's work helps set a standard for you to aspire to and even surpass one day. It can also give you new writing ideas and copy... Reading improves your writing because you get used to good writing conventions, and it improves your mind to read critically and to write critically. Basically, reading helps you inprove your writing, because after studying the way another author achieves an effect, you will also learn how to achieve that effect - but not by duplicating. So...to sum it up. Reading is ingesting in, and writing is regurgitating all that you've breathed in.

3) And so ends the class of creative writing. There have been good....and bad times... but it's all good. My favourite piece I wrote in this class was my first short story. I am actually quite proud my idea...since at first I didn't think it would work. But, it did work out pretty well. So, since i liked writing the first short story most, that makes my favorite genre: FICTION!!! This is just because I found it the easiest to write due to the very wide style of writing it encompasses. I enjoyed the freedom to write about whatever. The hardest piece to write for me was the personal essay, since I had absolutely no inspiration or previous experience in writing anything like a personal essay. All the essays I have written in the past have been to analyze another piece of writing. I honestly can't analyze myself. The piece I wrote that I don't really care for was my play. I just kind of goofed around on it, and wrote about a communist revolution taking place in China, with pirates and a clone of Mao Zedong... good stuff! I will definatley used my acquired communist powers in other forms of writing, and try to convert as many people to its cause!

4) I don't really feel like doing the quiz - I'm too busy play flash flash revolution online.

5) I don't know the disney reference. I don't remember much from the disney movies I have seen.

Monday, January 7, 2008

the unexciting blog

1) I don't really think I have any guiding principles. I feel that I live my life in the present, and most of my actions are circumstancial. But, for the purpose of this exercise, I guess I could come up with a cliched statement. My guiding principle is "treat everyone with respect". I try to stick to this principle....mostly of the times. Sometimes, I feel it's just impossible to achieve. But, even if I do go against my own guiding principles, I never go against it before I get to know someone. I never disrespect anybody based on any first impressions, or at least I try my best not to. There probably has been some time that I have acted on a first impression, but I don't distinctly remember one. This is a guiding principle, because it is the basis for our civilization. It is the foundation for tolerence which should be a very important aspect of everyone's lives.

2) Ummmmm.....I don't really watch the news that much. I guess the Hollywood writers' strike had kind of an impact on me. I remember feeling really annoyed that they shorted the season of Heroes from 24 to only 11 episodes. That really made me angry. There were also several other shows that were shortened with really terrible season finales that bugged me. Some other "headline" news that affected me: Britney Spears getting arrested. This made me feel good about myself because I realized that I'm far more fortunate than her, even if she is rich. Looking at her "stoned" picture in the paper made me feel satisfied.

3) I haven't actually decided what I want to accomplish this year. I guess one of my goals would be to save up for a new laptop, hopefully a really good one. Either that, or I bug my parents enough so they buy me one. I probably won't be able to achieve this goal, because I'm not very good at saving up money and my parents are already pretty resistant to my begging. Other accomplishments include beating the battle tower on my Pokemon game. This has been eluding me for a few months now, and I feel that it is time to dominate. I can't think about anything. I guess I could try to be more serious about my homework...and not procrastinate, but that's probably never going to happen no matter how hard I try.