Revision, Revision, Revision

                                  

Ahh, revision. So hard to get started, but so rewarding when you're done. 

I finally finished the short story I've been writing for the last few months and, in so doing,  ran out excuses to avoid revising the two stories that have been lying in the virtual drawer since August. So, after some grumbling and whining, I buckled down and got to work. 

Over the last year I've developed a system: at first I just go through the comments, correcting small stuff like typos or missing commas as I go. For the major stuff I'll write a note at the end of the story or into the text in ALL CAPS so I can find it. The real work starts when I have the manuscript at this stage. I'll read through the concerns, then try to address them one by one. Even though I'm focusing on a particular issue or scene, I find that if I have the comments in mind I'll sometimes fix a few more at the same time, or at least come up with a solution. 

Then I'll do a few read-throughs, keeping in mind the stuff I changed and trying to spot any rough edges or bumpy transitions. I'll also do one where I try to feel the flow of the text and change any poor or cliché word choices, work on the description, etc.

For me, getting started is the hard part; when I get going, the process is actually fun and rewarding. To combat this, I try to get started in the morning so I can do as much as possible when I'm in the zone, but the edits usually take me a few days, anyway. 

After I finish, I'll leave the story alone for a few weeks, but I'll do a final read-though before I send it on, unless a deadline prevents my doing this. 

 For the current piece, I'll need to do all of this again, because the revised version is going for another round in the Critters queue. The other story has been through Critters twice, so maybe I'll actually submit it somewhere. 

Oh, and I got a rather nice personal rejection for a piece I sent to a Lovecraft anthology. I'm not too bummed, because I got through the first cut and they complimented my voice (about the best compliment a writer can get), so I'm counting this as a positive. 

Another one for the to-be-revised pile... 

   

Independence Day

In honor of Finland's Independence Day, I though I'd attempt a translation of out national anthem, Maamme laulu by Johan Ludvig Runeberg. Mine isn't a literal translation, but you can find one here.  The part below is only the first and last verse.

Maamme Laulu

Oi Maamme Suomi Synnyinmaa

Soi Sana Kultainen

Ei Laaksoa Ei Kukkulaa

Ei Vettä Rantaa Rakkaampaa

Kuin Kotimaa Tää Pohjoinen

Maa Kallis Isien

Ei Laaksoa Ei Kukkulaa

Ei Vettä Rantaa Rakkaampaa

Kuin Kotimaa Tää Pohjoinen

Maa Kallis Isien

Sun Kukoistukses Kuorestaan

Kerrankin Puhkeaa

Viel' Lempemme Saa Nousemaan

Sun Toivos Riemus Loistossaan

Ja Kerran Laulus Synnyinmaa

Korkeemman Kaiun Saa

Viel' Lempemme Saa Nousemaan

Sun Toivos Riemus Loistossaan

Ja Kerran Laulus Synnyinmaa

Korkeemman Kaiun Saa

Our Land 

Our land, our land, O Fatherland

Ring proud, you golden words 

 No hill nor valley, 

Sea nor shore

Could we hold dearer evermore

Than this, our northern land 

This, our Fatherland

One day your splendour from its shell

Shall break forth and bloom

Still our love you shall ignite

Your hope, your joy,

 Their glory bright

And then your song, O Fatherland

Will echo, high and grand

You can listen to Maamme laulu here, if you want. 


And now it's time to start preparing for the evening's entertainment: watching the President's Independence Day reception on TV and seeing who has the best (and worst) dress. I kind of prefer the goofy ones myself. The broadcast is hours of people shaking hands and standing in line. Yes, I know it's weird, but it's a national pastime.   

A Christmas Carol at Tampere

                                  

Hubby and I took the train to Tampere yesterday to see Tampere Theater's production of A Christmas Carol. The weather was awful, but the Christmas lights still managed to look pretty. 

                                

Before the show we had a bowl of soup at Teatteriravintola Kivi, a pub/restaurant with a lot of character. I liked the mismatched chairs and the old dictionaries that decorated the windowsills. 

                                 

 We stayed at the Grand Hotel Tammer, a beautiful old hotel built in 1929, designed by architect Bertel Stömmer in the classical style.

The rooms had a small book about the history of the hotel. It was originally built by the Tampereen teknillinen seura (Tampere Technical Society, a society for engineers, I think), because they needed rooms to hold their meetings. In the end a clubhouse of one story turned into a seven floor hotel. There wasn't anything wrong with the hotel, but it was built at an unfortunate time. The Great Depression had the hotel in applying for bankruptcy soon after its opening, but the economy improved in the late 1930s. They were doing quite well until World War II broke out. But the hotel survived that too.

Some of the most interesting stories happened during the war. The shortages made it difficult to run a four star restaurant, and one thing they were short of were potatoes. Despite the shortages, they had a few potatoes stashed for the really important clients, but they couldn't serve them openly, or the other clients would get angry. So they smuggled the potatoes to the client inside a napkin, and then the client just had to eat them without drawing too much attention to himself. The hotel also used the black market. Sometimes an entire pig would be delivered to the hotel by one shady character or another, and if the police happened to be about, the employees would stash the pig inside an unused furnace for the search, and then they'd just pull the carcass out and dust off the soot after the police left.

We had the prohibition here in Finland, too. It was bad for the hotel business, understandably. But people got around the restrictions. You could buy "lemonade" from the Tammer kitchens, and apparently some hustlers made a living writing prescriptions for "medicinal" cognac and selling them to hotels.

The first hotelier, Alexander Adlivankin, was also en interesting character. Russian by birth, he ran luxury hotels in France, from where some of his Finnish clients enticed him to come run the Tammer. Tampere was a centre of industry at the time, and there was a number of businessmen travelling there regularly, so it must have sounded like a good deal. That's how the Tammer got a good deal of its furnishings and silverware. There were swanky parties, elegant lunches, fashion shows, and concerts held at the Tammer during his reign.

Here are a few more pictures:
   

                                 

As you can see, Tammer has a lot of old world charm: crystal chandeliers, the monogram on the carpets, and the wrought iron and glass doors with an art deco feel. Staying here feels like being transported to another age. 

                                     

This isn't a very good picture, but you can see the glasswork a bit better in this one. 

                      

A lot of dignitaries have stayed at Tammer along the years. Our room had Sillanpää written on the door, and the one next to ours said Gagarin. Carl Gustav Mannerheim also visited the hotel many times. I wonder if we can get the room he stayed in next time?

                                    

                                                       These armchairs were gorgeous. 

                                     

                                                                    The dining room. 

                                      

                                      There was a gingerbread version of the hotel in the lobby!

                                       

                                    Then we headed to Tampereen Teatteri to see A Christmas Carol.

The show was very good, but we had an unfortunate mix-up with the tickets. It turned out ok, but I won't go into it now. it's one of those things that will make a great funny story for cocktail parties (the really embarrassing stuff always does), but I think it'll take a few weeks for it to seem more funny than embarrassing. 

                                 

     But all's well that ends with parmesan fries and truffle mayo, right? (And several gin and tonics...)

                                

                                               The cheese plate wasn't bad, either.

Iron Totoro Mittens

                                 

                           

Did you see that Iron Totoro cosplay last year? I loved it, and my friend made these for me for Christmas. Awesome, right? That's one good thing about the cold: I get to wear these again.

Writing Book: Ron Carlson Writes a Story

                                   

Ron Carlson Writes a Story is just that: a book about how Ron Carlson writing a short story. It's a short book, just 112 pages, and that's including the short story in question, "The Governor's Ball."

I picked up the book because a lecturer in the How Writers Write Fiction course recommended it. I'm always looking for pointers on short story writing, so I was exited to find a whole book devoted to the short story.  It's very interesting to see someone else's writing process so meticulously explained, and I think it had a nice bit of writing advice sprinkled in between the lines, like how to avoid cliches and surprise the reader, being specific with your description etc. Main point that stuck: Do not give in to distraction. Finish your story, whatever it takes. Just say no to the lure of coffee, the internet, and the outside world.

That said, this is very much a literary writer's book. The process is the pantser process, i.e. starting with an idea or a scene and then just going for it, sentence by sentence. There are snide comments about genre writers, but if you can cope with that, then by all means go for it and read the book.

I did recognise some of the stages Carlson went through, like the part where you really, really just want to quit because you don't know what's going to happen next and it's all too overwhelming and hard. That's why I like to do a bit of planning before I start. I need to have some rough idea of an ending, something to aim for. I think it helps take the pressure off. I don't necessarily have to end up where I planned, and if the story wants to take a detour, by all means, I'm game, but that doesn't change the fact that without a goal I'll just get lost in the story woods and eventually get tired of writing in circles and give up.

This is just one writer's process. We're all different; what works for him might not work for the rest of us.

An interesting read, all the same.

Etymology Expeditions: Dark December Words

                              

                                     

December is here again, which means it's getting darker and darker. The sun sets around four thirty, so it's already dark when I get back from work. And it's dark before I leave in the morning, so sunlight is a luxury reserved for the weekends. 

Boy, it's fun to live in Finland!

So, there's the theme for this week's Etymology Expeditions. Let's descend into the darkness and see what we find.

Darkness comes from Old English deorcnysse, from Old English deorc "dark, obscure, gloomy, sinister, wicked, sad, and cheerless." Yup, that's Finland in the winter.

Abyss is one of my favourite words in the English language. It comes from Old French abime, from Latin abyssus "bottomless pit," from Greek abyssos "bottomless (pool)." It might be related to the word bathos, "depth."

Dusk comes from Old English dox "dark-haired, absence of light." It's originally a colour word, and the twilight meaning is only from the 1600s. Twilight comes from twi+light, with the twi referring to half-light. In Sanskrit it's samdhya, "a holding together, junction." Another twilight word is gloaming, from Old English glomung "twilight," probably formed from glom "twilight," related to glowan "glow."

Shadow has its origins in Old English sceadwe, "shadow" from sceadu, "shade."The meaning of "anything unreal, a ghost" is from the 14th century. The verb shadow is interesting; it comes from Old English sceadwian  "to protect with covering wings."

So, let the shadows envelop you in their dark wings and surrender to the gloaming. 

The sun will return, one day. 

Sources:

http://www.etymonline.com/

The Advent Calendar

Here's this year's advent calendar for my godson. I made the calendar for him years ago, and I fill         it with surprises every year. Hopefully he likes this one!