Lovely Lotus

Art images copyright© of artist or assignee

BROWN-EYED GIRL IN AUTUMN LANDSCAPE, 1920S

reasons for this:

basically TvTropes breaks down stories mechanically, using a perspective that’s not…ABOUT mechanics. Another way I like to put it, is that it’s an inductive, instead of deductive, approach to analyzing storytelling.

like in a literature or writing class you’re learning the elements that are part of the basic functioning of a story, so, character, plot, setting, et cetera. You’re learning the things that make a story a story, and why. Like, you learn what setting is, what defines it, and work from there to what makes it effective, and the range of ways it can be effective.

here’s the thing, though: everyone has some intuitive understanding of how stories work. if we didn’t, we couldn’t…understand stories.

TvTropes’s approach is bottom-up instead of top-down: instead of trying to exhaustively explore the broad, general elements of story, it identifies very small, specific elements, and explores the absolute shit out of how they fit, what they do, where they go, how they work.

Every TvTropes article is basically, “Here is a piece of a story that is part of many different stories. You have probably seen it before, but if not, here is a list of stories that use it, where it is, and what it’s doing in those stories. Here are some things it does. Here is why it is functionally different than other, similar story pieces. Here is some background on its origins and how audiences respond to it.”

all of this is BRILLIANT for a lot of reasons. one of the major ones is that the site has long lists of media that utilizes any given trope, ranging from classic literature to cartoons to video games to advertisements. the Iliad and Adventure Time ARE different things, but they are MADE OF the same stuff. And being able to study dozens of examples of a trope in action teaches you to see the common thread in what the trope does and why its specific characteristics let it do that

I love TvTropes because a great, renowned work of literature and a shitty, derivative YA novel will appear on the same list, because they’re Made Of The Same Stuff. And breaking down that mental barrier between them is good on its own for developing a mechanical understanding of storytelling.

But also? I think one of the biggest blessings of TvTropes’s commitment to cataloguing examples of tropes regardless of their “merit” or literary value or whatever…is that we get to see the full range of effectiveness or ineffectiveness of storytelling tools. Like, this is how you see what makes one book good and another book crappy. Tropes are Tools, and when you observe how a master craftsman uses a tool vs. a novice, you can break down not only what the tool is most effective for but how it is best used.

In fact? There are trope pages devoted to what happens when storytelling tools just unilaterally fail. e.g. Narm is when creators intend something to be frightening, but audiences find it hilarious instead.

On that note, TvTropes is also great in that its analysis of stories is very grounded in authors, audiences, and culture; it’s not solely focused on in-story elements. A lot of the trope pages are categories for audience responses to tropes, or for real-world occurrences that affected the storytelling, or just the human failings that creep into storytelling and affect it, like Early Installment Weirdness. There are categories for censorship-driven storytelling decisions. There are “lineages” of tropes that show how storytelling has changed over time, and how audience responses change as culture changes. Tropes like Draco in Leather Pants or Narm are catalogued because the audience reaction to a story is as much a part of that story—the story of that story?—as the “canon.”

please note that yes many of these are concepts that exist elsewhere and a few are even taught in fiction writing classes but TvTropes just does an amazing job at displaying the range of things that can be done with them

legitimately so much of the terminology I use to talk about storytelling, and even think about it in my own head, i learned about from TvTropes

Willing Suspension of Disbelief

Watsonian vs. Doylist

Trope Tropes, for all the ways tropes are used, deconstructed, subverted, and played with.

The Oldest Ones in the Book, which is basically my favorite thing on the entire Internet

Punk Punk, for -punk subgenres

Sliding Scale of Silliness vs. Seriousness, Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism

The Weird Al Effect is a fun one

Chekhov’s Gun, Chekhov’s Boomerang, Chekhov’s Skill, and further variations

Law of Conservation of Detail

Law of Conservation of Normality

Anthropic Principle

Word of God, Death of the Author

Sliding Scale of Fourth Wall Hardness

Mohs Scale of Science Fiction Hardness

Genre Savvy

Flashbacks and Chronology breaks down all the ways you can handle chronology in storytelling

Show, Don’t Tell is a very good breakdown of what is showing, what is telling, and how both can be used effectively.

Lampshade Hanging

Noodle Incident is just fun imo

Genre Title Grab Bag

Fridge Horror

Rule of Cool, and also Cool of Rule

The Smurfette Principle

The Hays Code - not a trope but a very good breakdown of how the Hays Code affected storytelling in film

If my soul touches you and it happens to burn you I'm not to blame... it was you who lit it on fire

I swear to you on cottage cheese and tobacco

If the people rule in poetry, so will they rule in politics and that's the goal of the century! To hell with the aristocracy!

My dear buddy,

My soul, my bastard,

My golden mouthed saintly friend,

My rowdy brother,

My lovable dummy,

If you want to see a dead Pegasus, look no further than me

I am trying to learn to smile nicely ( he did not succeed)

My dear friend, you better side of my soul

I will never forgive you for NOT writing the address on the envelope yourself. A woman's handwriting... and a black seal... dear god, the devil took him! he worked himself to death writing poems, he died! ... and then i opened your letter... Never do this again. Only use black seal vax on your death, and even then, still write the address yourself!

I'm reading (your work) for the sixth time. It's really a horrible thing. I'll need to read it again to understand just how awful it is!

Sincerely, your friend whose balls are itching

It's really good that your sore throat is gone, I can finally strangle you

Leave the dedication! Veselényi is a great man but he's still a Lord, and a poet should never dedicate ANYTHING to a Lord

Yeah.

So.. here some sketches from All the things yet to come are things that have passed/ Like the holding of hands, like the breaking of glass

1.Incredible deep and detailed narrative themes. The parallels that seem to hit just right, the narrative foils that they can be to each other, the intricate dynamic that's both extremely complex and easily understood. The juxtaposition between something that's harsh and undoubtedly toxic, with the softer undertones, the parts where you read in-between the lines and find a mutual feeling of loneliness from both parts, their intrinsic understanding of each other comes from the mere fact that they're each others mirrored reflections and shadows. In the end both sides will be together forever, and you as an audience can clearly see their tragedy laid out before in a path that blurs pure anguish and tender romance

a. She’s 5′ 11″ and can never find pants long enough for her legs or shirts long enough for her arms.

b. She hates synthetic fibers as much as I do and it’s difficult to find natural fiber clothes that aren’t made of cotton

c. She’s a biologist and would physically fistfight microplastics if given half a chance

So her gift from mom and dad for her birthday was a sewing machine. Not a super expensive one but a good solid serviceable one.

And recently she asked “So where do I GET wool or linen and thread that isn’t polyester” and mom was like ‘go ask your sister’

“Bets, u know I’m a 15th degree blackbelt of buying shit on the internet”

cotton and Silk thread; https://redrockthreads.com/

Linen thread and wool fabric; https://burnleyandtrowbridge.com/ (they’ve got wool stuffs and worsted wool fabric for $15 a yard! I just got three yards of navy worsted wool I’m making a constellation winter skirt from)

More linen thread and wool; https://wmboothdraper.com/ (just ordered wool broadcloth to make a coat)

Silk fabric (THE best place to get silk lining fabrics and raw silk fabric):https://www.dharmatrading.com/

A varying assortment of wool and silk and cotton and even some leather, use coupon code  spring2020 for 50% off your full order, worked yesterday when I bought some stuff there; https://metrotextilesnyc.com/

The Linen Lab has a variety of weaves, weights, and colors available

But my number two piece of advice is this: be deliberate.

Honestly this would fix so many pieces of bad writing advice. Don't forbid people from doing something, tell them to be conscious and deliberate about it. This could help stop people from falling into common mistakes without limiting their creativity. Black and white imperatives may stop a few annoying beginner habits, but ultimately they will restrict artistic expression.

Instead of "don't use epithets": "Know the effect epithets have and be deliberate about using them." Because yes, beginners often misuse them, but they can be useful when a character's name isn't known or when you want to reduce them to a particular trait they have.

Instead of "don't use 'said'" or "just use 'said'": "Be deliberate about your use of dialogue tags." Because sometimes you'll want "said" which fades into the background nicely, but sometimes you will need a more descriptive alternative to convey what a character is doing.

Instead of "don't use passive voice": "Be deliberate about when you use passive voice." Because using it when it's not needed can detract from your writing, but sometimes it can be useful to change the emphasis of a sentence or to portray a particular state of mind.

Instead of blindly following or ignorantly neglecting the rules of writing, familiarize yourself with them and their consequences so you can choose when and if breaking them would serve what you're trying to get across.

Your writing is yours. Take control of it.

I often see Harry depicted as a stuttering mess, a bad lier, an open book, timid, but that is not Harry James Potter.

Harry Potter brought the second Wizarding war to an end almost single handedly, he is a child soldier, a fighter. Harry lead the resistance against Voldemort, not Dumbledore, Harry.

This boy, since his first year was observant enough to figure out every mystery thrown at him, successfully surviving each danger he met. His gut was almost right every single time, and he had impeccable instincts.

Harry Potter is not dumb, he is not clueless and he is not oblivious. Sure, Harry was not the top of his classes, but he passed almost all of his OWLs, only failing in the subject that I’m sure almost everyone did (History of Magic). He was the one who caught Draco was up to something immediately in HBP, already guessing he was a Death Eater. He was the one who filed away every small, minuscule observation, which helped him solve so many things thrown at him. He was the one who figured out the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets, who repeatedly took note of the random black dog wandering Hogwarts, who knew something was wrong when Dumbledore wouldn’t look at him, knew Draco was doing something under Voldemorts orders and who was able to figure out the whereabouts of the Diadem and thought to ask Ravenclaws ghost.

Yes, he had his moments of stupidity, but he was under tremendous stress and often was sleep deprived. He may have chased after Sirius like a brash Gryffindor, but he was extremely sleep deprived, nobody would tell him shit, and Sirius was his only family left.

No, Harry Potter was not an open book or a horrible lier. He survived an abusive household for ten years straight, that boy knew how to lie to survive. In the Philosophers Stone I know Quirrell wouldn’t have known Harry was lying about what he saw in the mirror had he not had the Dark Lord on the back of his head who can literally read minds. It was said in the books that Harry was seen as cold, unapproachable, it wasn’t known what he was thinking till he blew up. He was hard to get a read on because he knew how to hide his emotions after years of abuse.

Yes, Harry had his moments where he lost control over his emotions, like with Umbridge, Dumbledore, his friends, but only while he was under pressure and hit his breaking point. His whole life he had been called a lier, and suddenly a woman he doesn’t know accuses him of lying about how a student he watched die died. Dumbledore had been keeping secrets from Harry all year in OotP, fled the school and it ultimately led to Harry losing his last piece of family. His friends were constantly bickering while Harry was suffering, truthfully, I would’ve lost it on them too.

Harry Potter was not a stuttering, awkward mess. He was a leader, he was the one who called the shots, who took down Voldemort. When there needed to be someone in charge, Harry took the mantle even though he hated the attention because he knew he could handle it. He taught the DA with such ease because he could command a room, put on a confident front so others could rely on him. Never during the GoF did he stutter with fear when faced with challenges, he faced them head on. He wasn’t awkward when he met Ron or anyone else, truthfully, he just seemed to want most people to stay away.

There’s not even a single time I can remember him being awkward except with Cho crying and suddenly kissing him. Anyone would feel awkward as hell if that happened, but imagine being an abused orphan who wasn’t allowed to be upset? Exactly, Harry doesn’t understand emotions as well as others because he had to push them down. Also, she literally kissed him while crying about her dead boyfriend he witnessed die.

Harry Potter was not weak mentally or physically. He played Quidditch religiously, was forced to run from his cousin if he didn’t want to get hurt and fought tooth and nail in every fight to survive. There is no way in hell he didn’t have some muscle, and I will admit he may have lost it often during the summer or the year he was on the run, but for the majority of his school years he was athletic. Not burly, but definitely had lean muscle. Harry also survived through all that shit and never forget what he was fighting for, not once wavering on his path. He knew what he wanted, and was willing to do anything to achieve a means to an end, even if it meant dying by the hand of the one man he swore to defeat.

As stated above, I know he was often starved/malnourished, so there definitely were times he was physically weak. However, for the majority of the time he was not just thin. Also, it’s said he was the same height as his dad, who was described as being tall. Prolonged malnourishment can definitely stunt growth though, so I don’t really care for this point as much.

Harry James Potter and Tom Marvolo Riddle were prophesied enemies for a reason. Harry may have been a bit of a brash and reckless Gryffindor, but in the end he was a force to be reckoned with.

Both Tom and Harry were orphans who grew up in harsh environments, learning how to manipulate people to survive. (And don’t say Harry didn’t manipulate, he was able to get Vernon off his back for a summer by using Sirius)

They both were war survivors, Tom surviving a Muggle war and Harry surviving a Wizarding war.

Harry and Tom were both antisocial to an extent, the difference being Harry was able to gain a close knit group of friends.

They were magically powerful, but Tom was more controlled magic and Harry was wild magic that he willed to do as he said.

They were distrustful of adults, almost never turning to an adult unless they had to.

There’s so many more, but I can’t name them all.

Overall, it is an insult to Harry’s character (in my opinion) to water him down to someone so far away from who he truly is. He is Tom Riddles equal, he is not just a lucky boy who somehow survived. This boy was never dumb, awkward, loud or timid, and anyone who says he was has forgotten who canon Harry truly is.