I Know How To Identify All Of The Barksies Now.

i know how to identify all of the barksies now.

people b saying things so definitively. like man i think it depends

writer problem: constantly generating WIPs to avoid your other WIPs that you wrote to avoid your other WIPs you wrote to avoid your problems.

It occurs to me that, while Oliver's final "Big Evil Villain" monologue is just him lying to himself to pretend that he won and he's happy, even though in reality he's a lonely, unhappy recluse with a coke addiction to fill his days, he's not the only one who lies to himself this way in the movie.

Both of Farleigh and Venetia's final monologues at Oliver are their own versions of, "I'm a winner, you're a loser, and I'm totally happy about this and for sure not desperately unhappy inside at all."

Even Oliver's final monologue is something he learns from others during the film, only to turn around and do his version, as usual, to The Most extreme.

Happy Tuesday internet, today I got rejected for a job 24 minutes after applying and now I am going to take a nap.

I love first-person because it’s about what the narrator chooses to tell. What do they focus on? What do they leave out? What can you learn from reading between the lines? Are they lying to you? Are they lying to themself? It’s great for unreliable narrators and for epistolary storytelling! It’s intimate but there’s still a distance because you aren’t really seeing the narrator’s thoughts–you’re just seeing the story that they’ve constructed.

I love second-person because it’s a conversation. Does “you” mean a broad, indefinite “you”? Does “you” really mean “I” but with plausible deniability? Does “you” mean one specific person? Can they hear the narrator? Do they know the narrator? What is the relationship here? Who’s talking? Who’s listening?

I love third-person limited because it’s focused and intimate. What does the world look like from inside this character’s head? What are they seeing? What are they feeling? It doesn’t grant them the privacy that first-person does; the narrative isn’t something they’ve chosen, it’s invisible and inescapable. As a reader you’re not watching so much as astral projecting.

(I love singular point of view because of how much it leans into that limitation. You’re not getting the whole story; you’re not seeing anything unless this character sees it. How do you embrace that? What do you do with the gaps around the edges? How does that define–or warp–the events that they’re experiencing?

I love multiple points of view because of how it broadens your understanding of the story and the world. If two point-of-view characters react in opposite ways to the same thing, what does that tell you about them? About the world? How does it feel to spend time inside a character’s head and then see them from someone’s else’s point of view? How do all of these viewpoints work together?) 

I love third-person omniscient because the narrative is a character. It’s great for stories that know they’re stories! It allows for a camaraderie between the narrator and the reader! It allows for wider and more cinematic descriptions because you’re not limited to what a specific person can see! It lets you look at the characters from outside while still giving you the option to delve into their heads because you have full control over what you’re focusing on!

And I love authors who can combine viewpoints in ways you wouldn’t think would work but manage to pull it off! Stories with multiple point-of-view characters where one is first-person and the others are third! Stories that combine first- and second-person! Stories where the omniscient narrator suddenly refers to themself in the first person! Stories where you realize halfway through that you were wrong about who was narrating it!

Isn’t it fantastic that there are so many different ways to tell stories!!!!