Mercy! Mercy! That Dang Nabed PERCY!

The Antagonist

The Antagonist

I hit a low on my weight yesterday. That was encouraging. My overweight condition while not excessive came upon me slowly and it will no doubt come off me in the same manner. Today I was back up a bit and so it goes.

My students who have been with me awhile, those who have taken my courses in the past are sounding more and more like writers. I am seeing that blend of exposition and dialog in their work and that is encouraging.

Every novel needs a bad guy. Many, myself included, didn’t or don’t really appreciate the importance of a vile antagonist. It is my belief that everyone has good and bad and characterizing a character as bad to the bone is not something I do well. However, readers like to hate the antagonist and writers need to keep this in mind. I don’t give this the emphasis I should in the Exploratory Writing Workshop and I need to do a better job with it.

This upcoming weekend the RC Flying Club I belong to is holding an event. My job is to provide the bottled water. I bought four cases yesterday and Linda and I will be delivering it today. I checked out the airplane I bought and everything works. The battery is charged. Maybe this weekend I can get some lessons in with the club’s flight instructor.

George Martin has an annoying habit of killing off a character, or appearing to kill them off and then bringing them back to life. In other words you would think they are dead but low and behold, they turn out to be not really dead but risen again. I suppose it is OK to do this once in a novel but to keep doing it over and over again is to my thinking not such a good idea. I finished his last book so far (Book Five) and he is still nowhere close to closure. I have to admit that I am curious and will no doubt buy his next book when it comes out and continue watching the episodes on HBO. The last show of the season is this week and having read the books have a fairly good idea of how it will turn out.

Teaching the One Act Play and now the EWW has taught me a lot and made me a better writer. Teaching takes me away from writing but that is a good thing. It helps fill up the pitcher of creativity just like reading does. Seeing others make the same mistakes that I have in the past, reinforces in mind those things I need to fix when I start writing again. Templating a favorite author has proven particularly useful as has reading for understanding as a second read after a first one for pleasure. Martin is a bit tedious at times but he also hits his stride with some of the characters he creates and writes in a most captivating manner.