Stoicism

I promised, as last year was drawing to a close, that I would begin to extol the virtues of Stoicism and, occasionally, Oriental philosophies such as Taoism and Buddhism, on this journal.

Strangely enough, it was a post from uncut_diamond which set the ball rolling. Recently, whilst posting on his blog, Uncut Diamond mentioned, in passing whilst discussing the fortunes of the Team Canada Hockey Team, that he'd been given a copy of Marcus Aurelius' book Meditations for Christmas. Since this book is considered a staple of modern Stoic literature, it seemed an appropriate response for me to reply with the comment below to his post.

Stoicism doesn't mean sitting like an impassive stone whilst all around you is going up in flames. :)

You can enjoy your life. In fact, you're required by the logos to enjoy your life, because the capacity for enjoyment is within you, as one of God's many gifts to the human form.

But all that's required of you, once in a while, when it all goes quiet, is to remember that the hurly burly, the fun, the excitement, like the silence and the stillness, is just a temporary condition. This year, the right team won. Congratulations. Next year, your first thought should not be "Will they keep the title next year?" but "Will we all still be here next year to watch that drama develop?"

In the meantime, laugh at adversity, don't you dare trust prosperity, give thanks, give credit to the (proven) best team in the world and do what else is in front of you.

This seems to me to be a good place to begin.

A First Major Revision

I wanted to write a really lovely setting in my Big Story, to describe in glowing terms what an island called Anfar looked like. This was going to be the first time you and I would be able to look at Anfar in the Big Story.

The Chapter introducing Anfar was the fourth one in my book. And, until yesterday, I did not realise how badly it sucked.

Until I read it cold.

If I'd presented that chapter as the exemplar for my book, I think my Big Story would never see the light of day.

So last night I sat down and thought of a new Chapter Four for my Big Story, to match the previous three, which rock.

In the original Chapter Four, a friend of the protagonist, a man called Tarhan, dies a violent and senseless death, seemingly as a result of what i call "Plotstorm," a deus ex machina death that, in the end, made no sense whatsoever.

Last night, I wrote a different origins story altogether. I put in dialogue, interaction with people, town names, physical descriptions, a sense of continuity and a link to events taking place elsewhere in the Big Story.

But in the end, Tarhan still dies. The decision to kill off such a kindly, enthusiastic character before he'd even begun to get into his stride was a necessity, as part of the ongoing plot that Caithwynn be given something to fight against, both internal - his grief at the loss of his best friend crushing all motivation to do anything to save his land - and external, namely his fight against the authorities of Anfar for what is, essentially, an act of treason he has planned in order to save Anfar.

The original chapter was four pages long.

This new Chapter, now the definitive one as well as one of the most potent and vivid introductions to my beloved Anfar I have ever written, is fourteen pages long, making it the second longest Chapter I have written to date.

And it's a good one. It's a taster of what you will be enjoying later in the book, when all the main protagonists come to Anfar to sort out the Big Story's major story arc, whose resolution takes place there.

I am pleased enough that, barring a few minor tweaks to Chapter Ten to update it to the new writing of Chapter Four, I can now close the book on Chapter Eleven and begin work on Twelve. I might even now be motivated to begin work on the White Wolf Fiction Contest entry, and work it in parallel with this one.

Consider me a very happy man tonight.