Put Down The Phoenix / Discussion

This is the discussion related to the wiki page Put Down The Phoenix.

Linkinbrick 25 Feb 2022 19:39

Thank you to destinysday and Piano_WL, for critique.

I would also like to officially denounce the county and city of Champaign Illinois, for maliciously harboring a typo.

Last edited on 25 Feb 2022 19:49 by Linkinbrick Show more

LAN 2D 25 Feb 2022 20:03

I really like this one. It's difficult to walk the line between serious and humorous, but you did it very well - especially considering the subject matter. Also, this feels different in tone from many of the other contest entries, so it was a refreshing read overall. Well done across the board!

Maxyfran73 08 Mar 2022 02:16

War… War never changes…

Ok, but for real, this is nice. I like the dichotomy between dialogue and prose, it's really interesting and I always appreciate when this type of writing is pulled off well, which this piece does. The ending is also gold, I love that tinge of humor in things when it's apt.

+1~

Rounderhouse 09 Mar 2022 04:10

It's pretty good! I feel like the

A: Dialogue

B: Dialogue

format was a bit of a misstep, felt weird blended in with the regular text. I know you did it to differentiate them but I'm of the opinion that in a piece like this, letting it remain ambiguous and implicit could've been tasteful. But other than that, yeah, good stuff. Pretty bleak, especially with recent events, but that's far from a point against it. It did feel very melancholy, very end-of-the-line, which I imagine you were trying to pull off. If so, well done.

Linkinbrick 09 Mar 2022 22:55

I'm glad you liked it.

One type of text being boxed and formatted in a more strict way is enough to differentiate between them I feel. The whole A: Dialogue B:Dialogue thing was actually more of a way to avoid the issue of balancing excessive verbosity and repetition in inquit formulas, which is to say: I wasn't sure how to not say "A said, B said" all of the time. I'm not sure if that is better or worse, but I feel that solution has a simple effectiveness to it. Not sure if that is actually true though, or just the way it feels to me. The points where it crosses from prose to drama notation are real weird though. I probably should have written a version where it's all just prose to see if it would be better.