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<blockquote data-quote="mythago" data-source="post: 1306909" data-attributes="member: 3019"><p><strong>Round 2 judgment (arwink)</strong></p><p></p><p><span style="color: yellow">arwink</span></p><p> </p><p> Alsih20 vs Guedo79</p><p> </p><p> Alsih2o – Gone Fishin’</p><p> </p><p> I’m going to be blunt from the introduction here – Clay’s story shows some</p><p> strong characterization and a wealth of great ideas, but in some ways it seems</p><p> to suffer a great deal from the time constraints of the competition. When</p><p> reading it, I get a strong sense of early drafting and a story that is still</p><p> finding its direction, and while I can see the direction it’s going I don’t</p><p> necessarily think it’s reached it yet. The elements are there, but the stories</p><p> pacing and tension is uneven and the setting doesn’t quite come alive for me as</p><p> a reader.</p><p> </p><p> Clay’s introduction is all about playing on the contrasts, delving into the</p><p> dream of earth before being drawn into a world that is extra-terrestrial and</p><p> mechanical. This is a classic juxtaposition in Sci-Fi stories, but the contrast</p><p> isn’t really working to its full effects here. The dream world that Clay’s</p><p> character inhabits as he emerges from cryo is to sparsely set up, to</p><p> under-developed to really give the contrast enough weight. In part, this comes</p><p> down to being told to much about the experiences – we know the character runs</p><p> his hand through the soil, that he remains in awe of the ship he awakens in, but</p><p> as readers there aren’t enough details there to let us share in the experience. </p><p> For those of us who have never been awed by the inside of a star freighter (or</p><p> experienced running our fingers through rich dirt and breathing in the earthy</p><p> smells – some of us haven’t <img src="http://images/smilies/wink.gif" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" />), more description and ambiance is needed to</p><p> really set the tone of the piece to come and get full effect from the idea being</p><p> developed here. In a lot of ways, this opening contrast would work more</p><p> effectively if it truly did disorient the reader, giving us some empathy for the</p><p> character and a real sense of why he blames his mother for his current state.</p><p> </p><p> The idea of clashing contrasts comes up again as Clay’s story progresses, with</p><p> the description of the freighter re-decorated to resemble an ancient sailing</p><p> vessel. Clay is playing with his strengths here, creating a more concrete</p><p> visual than we’re given in the introduction and letting his narrator really gain</p><p> some strength as an irate son trying to cope with his mothers interference. </p><p> There is a great moment where some world-building is done by expressing this</p><p> irritation, with the imperfections of the cryo process giving us a glimpse of a</p><p> sci-fi setting that isn’t necessarily perfect in its development. In some ways,</p><p> this is one of the stronger parts of the story for me as a reader, but it also</p><p> serves to draw attention away from the openings sparseness and disrupt the</p><p> rhythm of the peace – we slow down for the detail, but it doesn’t advance the</p><p> plot/conflict set up in the opening paragraphs. I would like to see more</p><p> interplay between the narrator and his computer, as in some ways I think the</p><p> contrast between the human irritation and the machines confusion serves to</p><p> heighten our sympathy for the lone traveler in his oddball freighter.</p><p> </p><p> The scene in the ship is followed by a short aside, one that disrupts the flow</p><p> of the narrative and forces the reader the change gears – suddenly the conflict</p><p> ceases to be about the infuriating peculiarities of the narrators mother and</p><p> becomes his problems with locating the customer. In some respects, I think this</p><p> information could be introduced earlier in the piece – making an early</p><p> connection between the difficulties of the job and the conflict between narrator</p><p> and mother. I’m left caught off-guard by this change in direction, and in some</p><p> ways the idea of “Damn my mother for brokering these shady deals” is the driving</p><p> force of the story – it’s the thought that’s going to tie everything together</p><p> (Anger at his mother, bad job in progress, the weirdness of the ship. All the</p><p> things pushing this forward in one handy phrase). Bring it in earlier instead</p><p> of leaving it until the middle of the piece.</p><p> </p><p> Like the scene with the redecorated ship, the confrontation between the narrator</p><p> and his client livens up the piece a great deal. It has detail, we get a chance</p><p> to see the two characters develop by comparing their impressions of one another,</p><p> and the narrator’s irritation starts to really shine through. Unfortunately,</p><p> especially given the zinger at the end of the story, the irritation is directed</p><p> more towards the client’s situation and the job rather than the narrator’s</p><p> mother – the epilogue seems to be heading for a moment of ironic resignation but</p><p> isn’t quite getting there.</p><p> </p><p> The point of all this (Apart from the fact that I’m a wordy bastard) is that</p><p> Clays story shows a lot of promise – the elements to bring this together as a</p><p> cohesive and well paces story are in place if Clay wants to later take the time</p><p> to play with them, rearranging them and fleshing out some of the less detailed</p><p> areas. Like many early drafts, it shows its strengths in concept, setting and</p><p> character, but needs to develop the pacing and mood. Clay has set up of motif</p><p> of contrasts in many of his scenes, which is another aspect that can easily be</p><p> played with to add more strength to the piece.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> Guedo79 – Gloomy the Bear</p><p> </p><p> Since the introduction to Clay’s piece was blunt about the direction the</p><p> judgment was going, I may as offer Guedo79 the same opportunity – this is the</p><p> first poem that I’ve seen in a Ceramic DM (at least in the few competitions I’ve</p><p> judged), so I’m impressed at the idea and the way he’s put thing together</p><p> conceptually. The bad news is that rhyming poetry without meter tends to grate</p><p> me the wrong way, and when I read this aloud to myself there were several</p><p> moments that had my cringing as the meter disappeared. </p><p> </p><p> In terms of its narrative, I quite like the way Guedo79 has approached the</p><p> images and put together the story – it’s a playful approach, one that has fun</p><p> with the subject, and uses the childish theme of a boy and his pet to grisly</p><p> effect at the close of the poem. It brings back childhood memories of Dahl</p><p> books, which is always a good thing, as well as satisfying that little part of</p><p> my adult self that takes a childish glee in the horrible misfortune of a truly</p><p> amusing unhappy ending. I’m a sucker for anything that ends with most of the</p><p> major characters dying <img src="http://images/smilies/smile.gif" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></p><p> </p><p> Similarly, I think the rhyming structure and the choice of poetic images you’ve</p><p> used to illustrate the characters works particularly well for the genre of</p><p> poetry you seem to striving for. While the rhyming structure is simplistic, it</p><p> works well for the parody of children’s narrative poetry and you make great use</p><p> of several of the descriptive elements and images common to that form without</p><p> necessarily dragging them to far into the ground. The evocative use of language</p><p> in Gloomy’s feasting scenes towards the close are particularly gruesome, but</p><p> evoke a sense of delicious playfulness in their approach.</p><p> </p><p> And yet, for all the things I find to like in this, I still can’t get past the</p><p> meter. For me, and most other people I know who enjoy poetry, the true joy of</p><p> the form really comes down to the musicality of the language – the attempt to</p><p> create rhythm through the inflection, ebb and flow of words rather than music. </p><p> There are some elements of that here – the use of rhyming line-ends certainly</p><p> creates a sense of rhythm, as does the choice of a repeating refrain. However,</p><p> neither is quite strong enough to carry the music of the poem on its own,</p><p> particularly as the poem progresses and the refrain is used more often as the</p><p> Stanza’s shorten. What I find myself craving for here is a greater sense of</p><p> rhythm within each line of the poem, slowly building together</p><p> </p><p> The opening line here is a perfect example of what I’m talking about – when its</p><p> read aloud the rhythmical emphasis on the D and M in Freddy and Gloomy, as well</p><p> as the D’s in both Day and Dell, creates a elegant 4-beat line that sings to the</p><p> ear. Something about it simply catches your attention when read aloud,</p><p> reminding us of kindergarten chants and nursery rhymes, but also the regular</p><p> drum-beat of the 4-beat music bar. Had the entire poem made use of this rhythm</p><p> – a common one in children’s narrative poetry – there would have been a nice</p><p> sense of music to the entire piece. Contrast this with the second line – Again</p><p> we have an emphasis on the M in Gloomy, but there’s also a moment where there</p><p> are two inflected words close together when we hit the A’s in all alone, then</p><p> another two beats to be found in Fred and tell. In short, we drop from four</p><p> regular beats to a line that has five irregular beats. (For non-poetry types,</p><p> try reading these two lines aloud and see if you feel slightly awkward when you</p><p> say All Alone). </p><p> </p><p> As we continue through the poem, this irregular sense of line rhythm continues</p><p> and there are numerous stumbling blocks, but there’s also an underlying sense</p><p> that it is heading towards having a unified (or, at least, a more controlled)</p><p> sense of rhythm. There is a feeling that the four-beat line is struggling to</p><p> stay on top of things, and the poem could easily be shaped into a strong regular</p><p> rhythm should Guedo feel the need to play with it at a later date. </p><p> </p><p> The Judgment</p><p> </p><p> I find it hard to pick a winner in this round, partially because both entries</p><p> show a lot of promise, but also because I can see a lot of directions I’d like</p><p> to see both pieces take as a reader. I have to give Guedo79 bonus points for</p><p> attempting something I hadn’t yet seen in the competition (Poetry), as well as</p><p> slipping him the benefit of the doubt given he didn’t know he was likely to have</p><p> an rhythm obsessed poetry nut like me on the judging panel. In the end,</p><p> however, I have to sneak Alsih2o by the barest of margins – the edge given</p><p> partially because I enjoyed his use of the bell imagery slightly more than</p><p> Guedo79’s bear collar, and partially because in the long run I think there’s a</p><p> touch more complexity to the narrative world Clay’s creating. Apologies to</p><p> those following who aren’t a fan of wordy explanations of judges comments, but I</p><p> felt strongly enough about both these entries that I wanted to explain my</p><p> comments rather than just say a few brief words and name a winner.</p><p> </p><p> <strong>Judgment: alsih20</strong></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="mythago, post: 1306909, member: 3019"] [b]Round 2 judgment (arwink)[/b] [color=yellow]arwink[/color] Alsih20 vs Guedo79 Alsih2o – Gone Fishin’ I’m going to be blunt from the introduction here – Clay’s story shows some strong characterization and a wealth of great ideas, but in some ways it seems to suffer a great deal from the time constraints of the competition. When reading it, I get a strong sense of early drafting and a story that is still finding its direction, and while I can see the direction it’s going I don’t necessarily think it’s reached it yet. The elements are there, but the stories pacing and tension is uneven and the setting doesn’t quite come alive for me as a reader. Clay’s introduction is all about playing on the contrasts, delving into the dream of earth before being drawn into a world that is extra-terrestrial and mechanical. This is a classic juxtaposition in Sci-Fi stories, but the contrast isn’t really working to its full effects here. The dream world that Clay’s character inhabits as he emerges from cryo is to sparsely set up, to under-developed to really give the contrast enough weight. In part, this comes down to being told to much about the experiences – we know the character runs his hand through the soil, that he remains in awe of the ship he awakens in, but as readers there aren’t enough details there to let us share in the experience. For those of us who have never been awed by the inside of a star freighter (or experienced running our fingers through rich dirt and breathing in the earthy smells – some of us haven’t [img]images/smilies/wink.gif[/img]), more description and ambiance is needed to really set the tone of the piece to come and get full effect from the idea being developed here. In a lot of ways, this opening contrast would work more effectively if it truly did disorient the reader, giving us some empathy for the character and a real sense of why he blames his mother for his current state. The idea of clashing contrasts comes up again as Clay’s story progresses, with the description of the freighter re-decorated to resemble an ancient sailing vessel. Clay is playing with his strengths here, creating a more concrete visual than we’re given in the introduction and letting his narrator really gain some strength as an irate son trying to cope with his mothers interference. There is a great moment where some world-building is done by expressing this irritation, with the imperfections of the cryo process giving us a glimpse of a sci-fi setting that isn’t necessarily perfect in its development. In some ways, this is one of the stronger parts of the story for me as a reader, but it also serves to draw attention away from the openings sparseness and disrupt the rhythm of the peace – we slow down for the detail, but it doesn’t advance the plot/conflict set up in the opening paragraphs. I would like to see more interplay between the narrator and his computer, as in some ways I think the contrast between the human irritation and the machines confusion serves to heighten our sympathy for the lone traveler in his oddball freighter. The scene in the ship is followed by a short aside, one that disrupts the flow of the narrative and forces the reader the change gears – suddenly the conflict ceases to be about the infuriating peculiarities of the narrators mother and becomes his problems with locating the customer. In some respects, I think this information could be introduced earlier in the piece – making an early connection between the difficulties of the job and the conflict between narrator and mother. I’m left caught off-guard by this change in direction, and in some ways the idea of “Damn my mother for brokering these shady deals” is the driving force of the story – it’s the thought that’s going to tie everything together (Anger at his mother, bad job in progress, the weirdness of the ship. All the things pushing this forward in one handy phrase). Bring it in earlier instead of leaving it until the middle of the piece. Like the scene with the redecorated ship, the confrontation between the narrator and his client livens up the piece a great deal. It has detail, we get a chance to see the two characters develop by comparing their impressions of one another, and the narrator’s irritation starts to really shine through. Unfortunately, especially given the zinger at the end of the story, the irritation is directed more towards the client’s situation and the job rather than the narrator’s mother – the epilogue seems to be heading for a moment of ironic resignation but isn’t quite getting there. The point of all this (Apart from the fact that I’m a wordy bastard) is that Clays story shows a lot of promise – the elements to bring this together as a cohesive and well paces story are in place if Clay wants to later take the time to play with them, rearranging them and fleshing out some of the less detailed areas. Like many early drafts, it shows its strengths in concept, setting and character, but needs to develop the pacing and mood. Clay has set up of motif of contrasts in many of his scenes, which is another aspect that can easily be played with to add more strength to the piece. Guedo79 – Gloomy the Bear Since the introduction to Clay’s piece was blunt about the direction the judgment was going, I may as offer Guedo79 the same opportunity – this is the first poem that I’ve seen in a Ceramic DM (at least in the few competitions I’ve judged), so I’m impressed at the idea and the way he’s put thing together conceptually. The bad news is that rhyming poetry without meter tends to grate me the wrong way, and when I read this aloud to myself there were several moments that had my cringing as the meter disappeared. In terms of its narrative, I quite like the way Guedo79 has approached the images and put together the story – it’s a playful approach, one that has fun with the subject, and uses the childish theme of a boy and his pet to grisly effect at the close of the poem. It brings back childhood memories of Dahl books, which is always a good thing, as well as satisfying that little part of my adult self that takes a childish glee in the horrible misfortune of a truly amusing unhappy ending. I’m a sucker for anything that ends with most of the major characters dying [img]images/smilies/smile.gif[/img] Similarly, I think the rhyming structure and the choice of poetic images you’ve used to illustrate the characters works particularly well for the genre of poetry you seem to striving for. While the rhyming structure is simplistic, it works well for the parody of children’s narrative poetry and you make great use of several of the descriptive elements and images common to that form without necessarily dragging them to far into the ground. The evocative use of language in Gloomy’s feasting scenes towards the close are particularly gruesome, but evoke a sense of delicious playfulness in their approach. And yet, for all the things I find to like in this, I still can’t get past the meter. For me, and most other people I know who enjoy poetry, the true joy of the form really comes down to the musicality of the language – the attempt to create rhythm through the inflection, ebb and flow of words rather than music. There are some elements of that here – the use of rhyming line-ends certainly creates a sense of rhythm, as does the choice of a repeating refrain. However, neither is quite strong enough to carry the music of the poem on its own, particularly as the poem progresses and the refrain is used more often as the Stanza’s shorten. What I find myself craving for here is a greater sense of rhythm within each line of the poem, slowly building together The opening line here is a perfect example of what I’m talking about – when its read aloud the rhythmical emphasis on the D and M in Freddy and Gloomy, as well as the D’s in both Day and Dell, creates a elegant 4-beat line that sings to the ear. Something about it simply catches your attention when read aloud, reminding us of kindergarten chants and nursery rhymes, but also the regular drum-beat of the 4-beat music bar. Had the entire poem made use of this rhythm – a common one in children’s narrative poetry – there would have been a nice sense of music to the entire piece. Contrast this with the second line – Again we have an emphasis on the M in Gloomy, but there’s also a moment where there are two inflected words close together when we hit the A’s in all alone, then another two beats to be found in Fred and tell. In short, we drop from four regular beats to a line that has five irregular beats. (For non-poetry types, try reading these two lines aloud and see if you feel slightly awkward when you say All Alone). As we continue through the poem, this irregular sense of line rhythm continues and there are numerous stumbling blocks, but there’s also an underlying sense that it is heading towards having a unified (or, at least, a more controlled) sense of rhythm. There is a feeling that the four-beat line is struggling to stay on top of things, and the poem could easily be shaped into a strong regular rhythm should Guedo feel the need to play with it at a later date. The Judgment I find it hard to pick a winner in this round, partially because both entries show a lot of promise, but also because I can see a lot of directions I’d like to see both pieces take as a reader. I have to give Guedo79 bonus points for attempting something I hadn’t yet seen in the competition (Poetry), as well as slipping him the benefit of the doubt given he didn’t know he was likely to have an rhythm obsessed poetry nut like me on the judging panel. In the end, however, I have to sneak Alsih2o by the barest of margins – the edge given partially because I enjoyed his use of the bell imagery slightly more than Guedo79’s bear collar, and partially because in the long run I think there’s a touch more complexity to the narrative world Clay’s creating. Apologies to those following who aren’t a fan of wordy explanations of judges comments, but I felt strongly enough about both these entries that I wanted to explain my comments rather than just say a few brief words and name a winner. [b]Judgment: alsih20[/b] [/QUOTE]
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