Percy Jackson: Book Review

What two reviews in one week why are you doing this I hear you cry? Well I am really running short on time this week so I am just going to make a really quick post about The Percy Jackson series written by Rick Riordan.

If you remember back to my first ever blog post. I basically ranted about why the movie adaptation of this book was so bad. But then I remembered just today I never actually talked about the book and why it was so good. So that is what I am going to be talking about, so strap in. SPOILER WARNING.

I really not going to touch on the plot because you can literally just look that up on Wikipedia. But today I am going to talk about why I thought this book series was amazing. There were three main things I found amazing with the books as a kid. The Action, the Lore, and the story.

First the Action. Man the fight scenes described in these books was amazing and still holds up to this day in my opinion. I draws you in and makes you feel like you are right there with the characters, fighting right by their sides in the heat of battle. It was such a cool thing to me as a kid.

Secondly the Lore. Greek mythology is now my favorite thing to talk to people about because of the Percy Jackson series. It taught me a lot about the Greek gods, and how powerful there were, their personalities, and even what they were able to do in a fun and exciting way.

Finally the thing that always kept me going was the story. A normal every day kid being able to become basically a god was always an insane idea to me. This even affected my childhood and what I and my friends played as kids.

A fourth and minor thing that I am just going to mention is the nostalgia of the books. They kind of take me back to when things were easier, and I didn’t have to worry about writing three blog posts every week.

Well now since that is done I can finally head off to what I need to do. I promise next week that my blogs will be up to the normal quality but this week was show week and I really never had time to write blogs.

The Pajama Game: Play review

Hey look here another review. Yay! And it’s something besides a book. Yay! So today I am going to be reviewing the Play: The Pajama Game. (Spoilers but the play was written in 1957 so I am pretty sure you don’t care).

The Pajama Game, takes place in a Pajama factory in Cedar Rapids, IA. It takes place during a 7 and ½ cent dispute between the workers and the company. The play goes on and the dispute get settled. The end. I could do an in depth analysis of the story but instead I am going to be talking about what cool things happen in the actual show.

So the music is amazing by the way but one song in particular stands out to me, it’s called Hey There. (Warning the original singer on Broadway sucks) the song itself is very well written but there is something special about this song. So whoever is singing the song basically sings into a Dictaphone, (an old school tape recorder) and after he finishes singing stops the track, rewinds it, hits play, and then starts harmonizing with himself. It is one of the coolest things I have seen in a show for a long time.

There is one gripe I do have with the show and that is the writing. Man the writing in this play is horrible. I am in it so I have actually read through the script, and we have actually had to re write at least like twelve of the lines. Don’t get me wrong there are some really funny moments in, but for the number of funny, laugh out loud moments, there is some that you just don’t want to hear about. Like women getting blanked in the forest. Not allowed to say the worded that I blanked out because it’s a high school blog. And even though the writing is horrible I understand why. The play was written in 1957 when women were treated more like objects than they were people.

So with that another play review done and gone just like wind and with it another amazing play back to the mysteries of the wild. So let’s hope that this gave you an inside into more plays.        

Making Fatnasy in Writing

Yay! Another blog where my true nerd self gets to poke through. So today we are going to be talking about the wonderful world of writing fantasy. So prepare to be whisked into a world of powerful wizards, fire breathing dragons, fair maidens in need of rescue, and the brave warrior who must stop whatever evil you throw in their way.

Now you see, when I write fantasy I find that there are three main stories to be told when it comes to fantasy.

·         

    First you have The Quest. The Quest entails that your hero or heroes must go off to an unknown land to find/gather something for someone. Usually has to deal with a prophecy  

·         

    Next you have The Adventure. The Adventure says that your hero or heroes must go and defeat an enemy or an army for some sort for some reason.  

·        

   The final type is The Mix. The Mix is basically just mixing the ideas of The Quest and The Adventure together.

Now with the type of story comes your characters. There is a certain set of characters that usually shows up in fantasy so I will go over the ones I know.

· The Hero. The most basic character you can have in fantasy can be either male of female and has something about them that sets them apart from the rest of the characters/world.

   The Band. A group of heroes that usually all have their own strengths and weaknesses. Can be a mix of genders and has become a lot more common in fantasy writing.

   The Unlikely Hero. This is the character that is a plain old Joe, nothing special about them. But somehow they get whisked into an adventure that they never thought could have been possible.

· The Unlikely Band. This is a group of people that you would never think could be heroes. Every single one of them is usually an outcast or just looked down upon by society.

· The Siblings. Almost the same as The Unlikely Band, the only difference between them is that The Siblings are obviously related.

Finally we get to the major point of the book. The reason why your hero or heroes are on this journey. The main conflict. The main conflict can really be anything, so I will give you a few examples.

· The Plague. Your hero/heroes must go on a quest to find the cure to an unknown disease.

·         \

   The Item. Your hero/heroes must go and find some long lost artifact to help do something.

·        

      The Enemy. Your hero/heroes must go and defeat an enemy for whatever reason.

So that is the basics in how to write fantasy. If you have any questions or your own pointers out them in the comments I would love to read them.

Rejection in General

Hey you probably thought you would never see this title again. Well I have had some interesting things happen in the last few weeks so I want to be able to talk to you guys about that.

So I have decided to turn in a few of my plays that I have written to my schools literary magazine. I will not know if my pieces have made the cut for a few days, which I really don’t mind. But I am prepping myself just in case they do not get selected which there is a decent chance of happening. So why am I telling all of you this, well because if you go into something prepared to fail then you kind of give everything you’ve got. Let me give you another example.

I have mentioned this earlier I am part of my school’s show choir tech, and we recently went to show choir nationals. Now I mean preforming at show choir nationals is a big honor in itself but our show choir hadn’t been having great year. We finishing pretty low in competitions so when we went to nationals none of us thought that we were going to make finals, so we gave everything we had because we thought there was no way in hell that we would make finals so we put our blood, sweat, and tears on that floor, and by some miracle when ended up making finals. I mean we placed last in finals, but we were facing schools all around the country, and we won best tech crew. So sometimes going into something prepared to fail and giving everything you have because you have nothing to lose is sometimes the best thing to do.

If you go into something thinking, oh I am sure that we will make it so we can save everything for later can and will most likely end up backfiring on you. So going in cocky and not giving everything is worse than going in ready to fail but giving everything you’ve got, because there is that small light at the end of tunnel that you might just barely reach.

I know this one didn’t really focus on literature to say the least but you can apply this to really anything. But if you want more about failure and actual literature go to my second post ever titled Writing and Rejection. You can find some more information there.    

Book Review: The Magic Tree House Series

Another book review, Yay!  And again it’s another one of my child hood favorites, Yay! This time we are going to be talking about The Magic Tree House Series. The Magic Tree House is written by Mary Pope Osborne and was and is still one of my favorite child hood book series of all time. The series follows two main characters Jack and Annie who are brother and sister. The story basically revolves around them and their magic tree house, which is basically a time machine. The book series is split into two sections that each follow an over arching theme. So now with that out of the way I 

can now explain why I love this series so much.

First off this is one of the largest book children book series to date. With a total of 54 books in the series so far (I believe the author is writing more but I am not one hundred percent sure yet) and a guess of about 120 pages per book (that stat is a very rough estimate) totals to be about 6,480 pages in the entire series so far. And I can see why since the first book was published back on July 28^th, 1992.yes this series is 24 years old, and I love it.

Mary Pope Osborne is an amazing author. From what I remember reading her books as a kid my mind was blown with how much detail and just how immersive the story was. And I am personally just impressed that an author has been able to keep a series going for 24 years and has still kept a pretty solid fan base with it. Another thing I praise Osborne on is how well she is actually able to teach kids things in a fun new exciting way. I mean don’t get me wrong kids love learning things but it does get boring doing the same thing over and over again. So when Osborne is able to teach kids things from history to science to literature is really cool. Don’t believe that she is able to teach history in a fiction story just listen to some of these titles. Dinosaurs before Dark, Mummies in the Morning, Pirates Past Noon, Afternoon on the Amazon, and the list just keeps going.

So if you are looking for a series to get you kids into I would totally recommend The Magic Tree House Series.

Hamilton the Musical: Play Review

Yes this is another review but I truly feel that this musical needs to be talked about. So just as a warning this will contain spoilers for the musical Hamilton or basically any American history class you will take.

Finally a musical that is actually really interesting.  Hamilton the musical does something completely different. Instead of taking place in the present day or a couple of decades ago it takes place from 1776 until the death of Hamilton. It is a historical musical; it talks about how our history happened, in a very interesting way. The musical is extremely historically accurate and talks about the one founding father that is very rarely talked about Alexander Hamilton.

The Play starts in 1776 when Hamilton arrives in America and how he becomes a writer and his struggle to become a solider. The first act ends with America winning the war and us trying to figure out how to run our country. The second act starts with the creation of the two party system and this is really where the true drama starts. It talks about how Hamilton has an affair with his wife, gets fired from his position in office, having his son die. And the play ends with the death of Hamilton in duel where he basically surrendered. This plot is insane because of how much information it is able to get a crossed in about 2 hours. Just the detail and how accurate the play is amazing. But now we move on to the piece of resistance. The music.

Lin-Manuel Miranda who is the composer, the lyricist, and the man who plays Hamilton. This man is a genius when it comes to writing music. You would think that the music in Hamilton would be the same as that time period, so basically opera, but you would be dead wrong. The music is a mix between now a day pop music and rap. Yes there is rapping in at least there songs and is really well written too.

Hamilton the musical is a true work of genius. The music and actual story is perfectly blended together to make a very entertaining story that keeps you intertwined throughout the entire show. The historical accuracy is almost dead on, and I am personal fan of the type of music. So if you are looking for a new musical to be listening to I would totally recommend Hamilton the Musical.            

Book Review: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay

Hey look at that another book review. (Hooray!) This one is a little overdue since I read the book about a few months ago but I am sure it will be fine. So now for the back story. (WARING THIS BLOG WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS). With that out of the way let's begin. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay takes place during the golden years of comic books, and basically talks about two friends who start up their own comic book series and basically make the big time in the world of comic books.   

So let me just start off by saying, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay is an amazing book. It really changed how I saw the creation of comic books. For a comic book lover like me, the book makes you really think about what it was like to make comic books back in the golden age of comic.

Another thing that I found truly interesting was the author’s idea to make Sammy homosexual, it was truly a shock, but I feel he did it, because without that extra point, Sammy was personally a very bland character and extremely 1 dimensional to me.

The next thing that The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay does amazing is how it used its fiction aspect.  In some parts of the book it would tell you a story from the Escapists point of view, bending the line between what was real and what was fantasy in the book. I found this to be really neat but kind of confusing at times. I felt the author could have done maybe a little better job with it.

My one struggle with the book is that it was a little hard to follow at some points, it was hard to tell whose point of view the story was being told from, and what exactly was happening.

The final The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay does well is its structure. I personally like the idea that you get to see the world from both the points of Sammy and Joe. I know a lot of books do this, but I feel that it works extremely well in this book.

But besides that one small problem The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay was an outstanding book and I wish more authors did books back in the golden days of comics.  

Evolution of Literature

This is another blog that I am completely shocked that I have touched earlier. Writing has been used since the beginning of man, but the use of it has drastically changed over our time span. Don’t believe me, let’s take a trip back in time and see where writing really started.

I am going to start all the way back with cave man. Yes cave art isn’t considered a form of writing but I consider it literature for one main reason. It tells a story. Cave art tells us the story of our ancestors before us and how the communicated.

The first form of writing is dated back to about 3200 BC in Mesopotamia. Back then writing was mainly used for trading and writing down events, but mainly trading.

A few thousand years later (I don’t have an exact date but you can probably google it) writing finally evolved into something new. Writing now was mainly used for treaties, keeping track of history, organization, and yes writing music. Yes writing was a thing back then, they didn’t have electronics to make the music for them.

Finally we get today where writing is used for everything from proving that you were the one to buy something, for writing treaties, keeping track of our history, organization, and still writing music. But then we got something new the computer. The computer has really gotten rid of the necessity of actually writing things down.

So there is the very basic evolution of writing and how it has changed over the years. And as you have seen writing really hasn’t changed a lot over the years. The only things that have changed are what we have written down and where we keep track of our writings.

I do apologize that this is a very short blog, but about half way through writing it I realized that I didn’t really know a lot about the subject that I was writing about, so hopefully I can try to make up for it in the next blog, and liked I had promised you in the last blog I stop my series track. Let’s just hope that doesn’t star back up, (that may or may not be a use foreshadowing) (hint hint). So I will see you guys in the next blog.    

Making Lore

Ah, it is finally time for my true nerd to show through. Today I am going to be talking about lore in literature. This blog is mainly going to be a Q and A about what is and how to use lore.

Q. First off since I know a lot of my readers aren’t nerds I will have to explain what exactly lore is?

A. So in layman’s terms lore is basically the back story to what you are writing.

Q. Secondly, what exactly can you use lore in?

A. Lore is mainly used Video Games, but I have also personally seen it in books, movies and comic books.

Q. Now what do you actually use lore for?

A. Well lore is mainly used for things that don’t fit into the main story, or other ideas you have.

Q. What is considered lore?

A.  Lore can really be anything, extra characters you could put in your story, backgrounds that you couldn’t fit into the main story, or even whole universes that just couldn’t fit in to a single story. So lore can really be anything that didn’t fit in to the main story.

Q. How do I write lore in to my story?

A. This is kind of a multiple step answer and it really depends on how much lore you have for your story. If it is just a very small amount I have seen a few authors just put in the back of their books, or with video games I have seen them put them in random papers around your map. Now if you have a lot of lore and I mean a lot you can do a few things. You could write a completely different story based on the back story that you created, or the other thing I have seen authors and video game creators both do is create like a book of lore for their stories. These are usually written like survival guides written by your main characters. The main thing with lore is that you want to make sure your lore is easily accessible, but not directly written in your game.

I know there is many more things I could write about creating lore, but I can save that for a rainy day. But I promise this will not become a direct series, if I were to da another one it won’t be for a while.      

Copyright Pt 3

So just so you guys know I just got back from a Show Choir vacation/competition in Nashville, Tennessee, and I am basically dead so do not except a lot of quality from this one. But speaking of show choir I am now going to talk about forms of copyright that you may not have thought of. (If you do not know what show choir is I am going to most likely covering the subject in a future blog).

So with show choir we have to pick all of our own music to preform, only problem is to preform that music we have to pay a thing called ROALTIES. For those of you who don’t know what those are they are basically a form of copy right which makes sure that you are giving money to the creator of that song., which is a good thing. So why did I mention show choir? Well I just got back from a thing called show choir nationals, which is where the best show choirs around the country come together and compete. So what the big deal?

Well we placed 6^th out of 22 team, which is amazing, but there is a small problem. The team that beat us for fifth place didn’t pay royalties for the music they used, and they got caught, but after it was only after the awards they got caught. So what happens now? I here you all asking behind your computer screens. Well they will most likely be sued and have to pay the royalties and a fine, that’s it. That is all they have to do. (If this wasn’t a high school blog this and the next few sentences would have a lot more color to them). Seriously, there trophies don’t get taken away, they don’t get banned from competing, they just have to pay money, and that is it.

I personally feel that there should be more done, if a school is caught breaking copyright, then just paying money that trying to get out of. But what do I know I am just a teenage boy sitting behind a computer screen. So I am going to ask you. What do you think should happen to the school? Should they just pay the money and be done, or should there be more? Go ahead and answer down in the comments. I would love to discuss it with you guys. 

Copyright Pt 2

Welcome to part 2 everybody, and just to warn you now there will be a part three to this but it will actually not be related to other 2 in anyway except for the subject matter of copyright. Now with that out of the way let’s get back to me ranting about copyright.

If you are just now joining us I would recommend going back to part 1 and reading that first. With that out of the way let me answer the questions I left you with from the last part. No I don’t believe that YouTube should get rid of their copyright system.

Now don’t get me wrong YouTube’s copyright system is one of the worst things in the world, but it is necessary, let me explain. Even though YouTube’s copyright system is worse than getting stung by a thousand hornets there is a reason for it. Copyright is used to help protect its user from those people who are breaking copyright law, so yes it can actually stop people from making money off of someone else’s work that they didn’t have permission to use. So yes copyright is a good thing, it helps people make sure that they get the credit (and money) they deserve, and it doesn’t need to go away, but YouTube’s copyright system does still need a little help.

And when I say little help, I mean a lot of help, and when I say a lot of help, I truly mean that the old system needs to be completely thrown out the window and completely re-worked. Instead of having a completely automated system who has to guess if people are breaking copyright, maybe YouTube could get a certified team that actually looks for people who are breaking copyright laws. Or even better keep the automated system but get a team together to help out those small time YouTuber’s, who get falsely claimed of breaking copyright and get there videos back. Or help brand new YouTuber’s who may not understand copyright yet, and didn’t know that they were breaking copyright law and just help them fix it.

See YouTube there is a way to fix your copyright problem. I respect that you at least have a copyright system in place, but come on YouTube, you should know by now that your copyright system needs work. So now we finally move on the part 3 of copyright. 

Copyright Pt 1

Hey guys, so today we get to talk best and worst thing in literature, copyright. Copyright, a two sided coin, both evil and good, dark and light, peace and hate, it can be force that helps people and a force for to destroy people. Today specifically I am going to talk about the place where copyright is most debated, the internet. And where in the internet is copyright most debated, YouTube. (I am going to get so much hate for this one).

So personally I have started up a YouTube channel to get my musical talent out there, (No there is no link to my channel, I will not stoop that low, if you would like the name ask in the comments) but I have run into a small problem, copyright. See I do drum covers, so I am required to use music, but whenever I put out a video I get flagged for using copyright. Which doesn’t really make sense to me. You see drum covers are considered parody, which is protected under fair use of copyright. (This has been a huge thing on YouTube recently so if you want to learn more about the situation going on over there I would recommend just doing a search on YouTube for it, a lot of people have covered the subject a lot better than I can). So why am I getting flagged when I am not breaking copyright?

Before we even get into that I should probably explain what copyright is. For those of you who don’t know, copyright in layman’s terms is basically a system used to protect people who create things from other people are trying to steal their ideas. But there is a minor problem when it comes to YouTube and the copyright system, it’s completely automated, so there is no human interaction. So the problem going on at YouTube is basically, people are placing false copyright claims on other people’s work (which I have had happen) to steal their ad revenue (the way YouTuber's make money). Which is very harmful to those content creators. And since the system is automated, it is almost impossible to refute that claim.

So is copyright one of the worst things in the world? Should we just out right get rid of copyright? You will find out in the next part of this not at all dramatic blog post. See you then. 

Depression in Literature

So I know I said that part 3 would come today but this is something that completely trumps part 3.

Depression is one of the hardest subjects to talk about when it comes to writing so this blog is going to be a lot different than my normal ones. My high school have suffered a severe tragedy with one of our freshman committing suicide. So I am deciding to dedicate this blog to her.

Like I said depression in literature is one of the hardest subjects to tackle, so it very rarely used in most forms of writing unless it is a biography. So why is depression such a hard subject to talk about? Well because it effects a lot of us. I personally went through a phase of my life where I was basically extremely depressed. And I know a lot of other people have gone through that same phase. But if it is such a common emotion, then why don’t authors use in writing more? Well that is because depression effects everyone differently, so if an author wants to try to make their character more relatable by giving them depression, it is really hard for people to relate because yes they may be going through the same thing but most likely in a different way. That and not a lot of writers know how to write a book where one of the main characters is depressed.

So that is why I believe that authors don’t really use depression in writing. But before I end this blog I actually want to talk seriously about depression and suicide. Look if you guys out there are suffering with depression, don’t just stand by and do nothing about it keeping all of your emotions bottled up. Go and talk to someone please, I know from experience that keeping your emotions locked up like that is not healthy for you at all. Secondly let’s talk suicide, look in no matter what the situation, suicide is not the answer. I don’t care what you may be feeling, it is not the answer. There is so much more to live for and there are people out there who care for you. So before even thinking about trying, think about what will happen to the people who actually care for you.

Video Games and the 4th Wall

Again this is not a book review on some made up prequel to the amazing book the 5^th wave, (you should really read it though) this is us talking about the 4^th wall. If you haven’t read the last blog, or are just joining us I would really recommend going back and reading the last blog because I am not really going to be doing any explaining of what the 4^th wall is. This blog is mainly going to be about how video games are able to use the idea of breaking the 4^th wall.

Last time we talked exclusively about Deadpool, the mercenary with a mouth whose superpower is being able to break the 4^th wall, and use it to his advantage, which is why he is my favorite comic book hero, but so many other forms of literature do the same thing. Let’s start off with one of my other favorite forms of 4^th wall breaks video games.

Video games do this kind of stuff all of the time, whether it is giving you tutorials on how to play the game, to one or two side comment’s to the player about the game. But the granddaddy of 4^th wall breaks in video games has to come from Psycho Mantis from Metal Gear Solid on the PS1. This boss basically reads your memory card and tells you what games you have been playing recently and makes fun of you for playing them. If that isn’t crazy enough when the boss fight starts the game reads your button inputs then tells the boss to move out of the way from being hit. The only way to beat this boss was to get up off of your couch, walk over to you game console, unplug you control from control port one then plug it back into control port 2. I thankfully did not play this game as a kid but I do have a lot of friends who did, and this boss fight, was so creepy and mind shattering that a video game character was able to basically read everything you did.

So yes video games are kind of like the like the idea of Deadpool, which is the reason why a lot of people like it is because it does something completely different. The next and final blog of this series will actually talk about all of the other forms of literature that use the idea of breaking the 4^th wall.     

Comic Books, Deadpool, and the 4th Wall

First things first this is not a book review about a prequel to popular book the 5^th wave, but the 4^th wall does actually have to do a lot with literature. For those who don’t know the 4^th is the layer between you and the thing that you are viewing. This can be seen in many forms of literature from plays, to movies, to books, or my favorite comic books. Yes the 4^th wall is a very much needed thing because it separates the viewer from the actually story. But what happens when the 4^th wall breaks? What happens when the character in a story starts interacting with the reader? To answer this question I am going to have to go back into the world of comic books and dive right into my favorite character. Deadpool.

If you don’t know anything about comic book characters stop right now and go look up the character Deadpool. For those of you who are too lazy to actually go and look Deadpool also known as the mercenary with a mouth, is one of the most known comic book characters. Deadpool has extreme military training, a healing factor so strong that he can grow back all of his body parts from just having a head left. He can also keep talking while his head is decapitated. But Deadpool is also known for another reason, he is the only know character in comic history to be able to break the 4^th wall.

You see Deadpool actually knows that he is in a comic book, so he can do things that most other comic book characters can’t. Like being able to communicate with the audience of the comic book, know things before there are going to happen because he has read ahead, or my favorite kill literally every single character in the comic book universe, the jump out of the comic book and kill the creators of your comic. Yes this is an actual story that the creators of Deadpool wrote. But besides being one of the most powerful comic book characters, he mostly uses his powers to be a narcissistic, sarcastic, and not allowed to say the rest of this sentence because this is a blog for a high school class.

But Deadpool being able to break the 4^th wall is just a small, small percent of what breaking the 4^th wall is used for. There are a lot of other media that use this technique. And that is what the next blog is going to be about.        

What is Literature

I am shocked that I hadn’t thought to do this blog sooner. A question I should have answered in the first blog that I ever wrote. Now you must be wondering, what is that question? Well simply put, what is literature?  How do I define literature, what is literature to me? Well my friends that is not a simple question to answer. Because literature is many, many things to me.

Let me start out with the basics, what is literature? Dictionary.com states that literature as “writings in which expression and form, in connection with ideas ofpermanent and universal interest, are characteristic or essentialfeatures, as poetry, novels, history, biography, and essays.” Now to a lot of people including me that is an extreme definition of the word. So what is my definition of literature? Well literature is a form of art but in the written or spoken expression. So basically literature is any form of music or poetry or story that has to deal with any situation.

Now the second and harder question to answer how do I see literature, what do I consider literature? What is and isn’t literature to me? Well let’s start with what is literature. Literature is many things to me. Its movies, T.V. shows, video games, poetry, books, essays, etc. let’s just say there are a lot of things I consider literature. But before you even say “why would you even consider movies and T.V. shows, and even video games a form of literature?” I have made blogs tackling all three of those topics all you have to do is look. But for a brief summary, they all have to start from a script, and they all have writing and dialogue and lore, so I don’t get why people do think that they should be considered an art form of literature. Secondly that list is entirely my opinion so it is what I believe.

Now let’s answer a harder question what don’t I consider literature. Anything that can’t be written down and told as a story all on its own. Very simple definition that I am hoping that I don’t have to explain in a later blog post.

Well there you go my definition of what I believe literature is it only took me 55 post to finally figure to do this concept. Well this time I will leave you with a question. What do you believe literature is?

Play review: Urinetown

What is Urinetown? Is it a place, a lie, a tool, or even the end? Well really Urinetown is a musical. The basis of Urinetown is basically there has been a drought for many years now and the way they conserve water is by forcing people to pay to pee. And you can’t be caught peeing in public, since that is now against the law. And if you are caught you get sent to Urinetown. (Warning everything past this point has a risk of being a spoiler for Urinetown, you have been warned).

So before we begin Urinetown is not a happy musical. It takes place where all of the poor people have to pee, because it is the only place where they can afford it. The main character is fed up with having to watch people every day pay to pee so he starts a revolution. He then is sent to Urinetown in act two because he is captured. We learn in act one what Urinetown actually is (which is they take you to the top of a building a throw you to your death) by the narrator flat telling us what it is by saying it is a secret. In the end the good guys do defeat the evil corporation that is forcing everyone to pay to pee. Only problem is that the corporation was actually conserving the water supply very effectively, but when the “good” guys take over the water basically disappears all together killing off all of the cast except one.

I have always found Urinetown to be an interesting musical. Because even when the “good” guys win and the “bad” guys loose, it isn’t always for the betterment of everyone else even though a lot of people may think it will be. And the thing that I find extremely funny with the musical, all of the musical is very cheery and peppy, which doesn’t fit the tone of the musical at all.

So Urinetown is a great musical, and if you have a couple of hour to pass or just need something to listen to go on to YouTube and search up the soundtrack to Urinetown, the music is very well written and can help you focus a decent amount. Well that is it for this blog, and this time I will leave you with my favorite phrase from Urinetown, always remember it’s a privilege to pee.             

D&D

(Warning if you don’t understand anything about D&D you may want to skip this one). Today is the day my true nerd side shows through. Today is the day I finally get to talk about the literature side of D&D. For those of you who don’t know what D&D is, D&D is short for Dungeons and Dragons. Basically D&D is just a bunch of nerds sitting around a table rolling dice and constantly yelling at each other. But you are probably wondering, what does D&D have to do with literature? Well I will tell you. You see to even start D&D you have to create a story, lore, characters, it’s a lot more than just people being nerds. (Final warning if you don’t understand anything in nerd speak turn back now).

To even start D&D you have to create a story. This can be anything, from something as basic as a princess is locked in a tower and the only way to save her is to slay the dragon. Or extremely complex like (and yes this is a story I have played through) an evil cult is trying to steal the world’s supply of gold to summon a five headed hydra which is also a god and that god wants to destroy the world. So in short (and if you didn’t understand a word of that) D&D stories can be extremely basic or extremely complex. But D&D stories allow people to bring their imaginations to the full. Lore is basically the same thing as story it can be as complex or as basic as you want it to be so I thought that I should at least mention it.

The other major thing that you can be extremely creative in is the characters in D&D. Your character can be anything. They could be a basic human warrior with a sword and a shield. Or you could pull something like me (and yes this was a character I played) and be a half dragon with scales and the ability to summon fire balls and shoot lighting by using playing cards.

So there I have finally gotten my true nerd out to the world. So I hope that this may have change some people’s minds that D&D isn’t just for nerds and is really simple. It’s actually a very complex story that you and some of your good friends make. And it is way more fun than sitting and staring at your cellphones for three hours just sitting next to people.

Comedy in writing

Oh you can’t tell that everyone doesn’t love a good old joke. Well I sure do, especially when it is in writing. Comedy in writing provides that relief from the serious. It can tone down the tension is a situation, boots your characters morale, heck you can even get a chuckle out of your audience.

Personally when it comes to comedy in writing I love it, but there are a few down sides to comedy.

1. Too much/ too little

See when it comes to comedy you have to be subtle when it comes to it. (Unless your book is focused on comedy). Too much comedy and everyone thinks your book is joke (literarily).  Too little comedy, and the book could become too boring for some readers.  So you have to find that right mix of comedy and seriousness for you book. And it is different for every book.

2. Not everyone gets a joke

See when it comes to using comedy you have to understand that not everyone well find your sense of humor funny and some people just don’t have a sense of humor at all. So you have to be willing to take some back lash on some of the jokes you make. But if a lot of people like your style of comedy, you can get a lot of praise for it.

3. Type of Comedy

See you can use comedy as much as you need in a book, but be careful in where you put it. You can NOT put a joke right in the middle of a serious scene where one of your characters is dying (unless it fits the tone of your book). Or you can NOT have your characters in the final battle defeating the main evil of your book, and have one of your characters in the back cracking pointless jokes the entire time (again unless it fits the tone of your book or fits the tone of the character) it just doesn’t make sense.

So I hope that this blog help some people crack a joke in some of their books. Or maybe even got them to think about adding some comedy to their books that they never thought they would add. And let me leave with a warning, watch how much comedy you use. Now if you will please excuse me I now need to leave the building.

Author Review: Bo Burnham

Before I start this blog there is three things that I need to mention. One Bo Burnham is technically a comedian but he has written a book so I can consider him an author. Second this blog will mainly be focusing on his comedian writing style and not his actual book. And three Bo Burnham is a VERY VULGAR comedian, so there may be some colorful language in this post. Now with that all of the way let’s move onto the blog.

Oh Bo Burnham, you are such a great and amazing comedian. Your writing style is perfect, your technique is perfect, and it’s just great. If you don’t know anything about Bo Burnham I will give a brief description but I would recommend actually looking him up. So Bo Burnham is a 25 year old musician comedian, which basically means he uses music to tell his jokes. And there are so well crafted.

Bo uses some of his life experiences to give off great and amazing performances. He does a perfect mix of his “music comedy” and his normal stand-up comedy. He creates these different personas of himself, and will be constantly changing his voice while he talks or when he sings to change the emotion of what he is singing. He also is able to take very deep topics and make them completely funny.

The other thing I enjoy about his music/ writing is that you are able to listen to it while you are doing other things. (I am even listening to one of his specials while I am writing this). But like I said in the beginning Bo Burnham is an extremely vulgar comedian. A lot of his songs include vulgar language, even some of my favorites do in their own titles. Some of these titles are (Beating off in A Minor, Eff, Theoretical Dick Jokes, and my personal favorite I F—K Sl—ts).

The final thing I like about Bo is that he is able to make fun of himself while he is on stage. There are songs that he has created just to make fun of himself. He understands that being a comedian is one of the stupidest jobs ever created.

So there is my review on Bo Burnham, before I go I do want to remind you if you do want to go look him up do be careful because he is an extremely vulgar comedian.      

Repo The Genetic Opera

Just so you know I have just heard about this so it is going to be the most un-informed blog I will hopefully ever write. So let’s dive right into this. While I was perusing the inter webs last night I found one of the most interesting things I have ever seen. An opera. Now usually things like this don’t catch my eye, but this one was extremely different.

First off the title, you know it something is different when your title is (and this is the exact title) Repo the Genetic Opera. When you have a title like that you are going to catch a lot of people’s eyes, or so I thought. Because digging a little deeper, I learned that this opera/ movie was basically a box office bomb.   

The second thing that really caught me off guard was that it was a gothic slash horror opera, which I have never heard of. So that immediately caught me off guard (because if you don’t know anything about opera’s, there are usually dramas or tragedies and not at all horror related) so this to me is a very interesting idea and I was shocked when I found out it was a box office bomb.  

Then I learned the plot of the story, truly all I did was search “Repo the Genetic Opera Plot” if you want to check me on it. So basically In the mid-21st century, an epidemic of organ failures leads to the rise of GeneCo., a company providing transplants at a great price. Those who miss their payments become targets of GeneCo. Mercenaries, who repossess the organs. In a world of drug addiction and legalized murder, a sheltered youth (Alexa Vega) seeks a cure for her rare disease as well as information about her family's mysterious history. Her questions are answered at "The Genetic Opera."

So when I learned of the plot I found it again really interesting that it bombed, then I listened to the music. And it is the worst music I have ever heard, and then understood why it bombed. So the idea of the entire opera itself is brilliant and I feel that someone else could do better with it. But I basically wrote this blog to explain that even a great idea can be totally ruined by just one aspect, when even the rest of it is still a really great. 

Music in T.V., Plays, and Movies

That beautiful, wonderful, amazing sound that is known as music. Music can be used in so many different ways especially in Plays, Movies and T.V shows. So what is music used for? Well many things, to create tension and emotion, to add some flavor to a scene, or even just some background noise. Music can truly help create emotion or tension in plays, Movies and T.V shows. You see music can make you feel happy or sad or mad and many other emotions. Now this helps in plays, Movies and T.V shows because helps portrays the emotion of each scene. Now is it absolutely necessary to have music in every scene? No, not at all. Sometimes the best music is pure silence. The next that music can do is create or add some flavor to a scene in a Play, in Movies and in T.V shows. See music is like that little hit of spice added to things to give them that little humph (if you catch my drift). An action scene is still really cool with fighting, explosions, and some kick ass quotes, but imagine that was just it, think of how bad that scene would be. Or imagine a very emotional scene that has no talking but a beautiful symphony orchestra playing in the background. Take out the music and then you just have your characters staring at each other for 3 minutes not saying anything. Just picture how awkward that would be. So without music you would have really boring action scenes, and really awkward emotional scenes. Finally music can be used just as background music or for plays transition music (this part will mainly be focusing on plays). So with every form of preformed literature it is just nice to have something else to listen besides the dialogue. Now for plays when you need to transition to another scene entirely it’s very helpful to have music there. For one it helps tell your audience you are moving to another place or scene, and two it helps keep your audience enticed while your techies need to get props in and out. So I hope that this blog post helps future play writes and movie directors, and T.V. show producers make sure that you keep the idea of music to make sure that us your audience doesn’t get bored.            

Superpowers

I hope that everyone remembers the game that almost every one played as kids. The game always was asking each other “if you could have any super power what would it be?” The idea of super powers and super heroes has been around for such a long time almost every knows about them. The reason for this blog is because I am doing a piece all about super powers and I wanted to talk about why I feel that more stories should include the idea of people having superpowers.

I know that the idea of superpowers got there major debut in comic books but I have a feeling that the idea of superpowers has been around for so much longer. So I don’t get why the idea of superpowers have been stuck in mainly comic books. Now don’t get me wrong there are probably some books that use the idea of superpowers but not a lot. I mean a lot of books use the idea of “special abilities or powers” but they never really say anyone has actually superpowers.

Now you see I feel that the idea of super powers shouldn’t be only stuck in the idea of comic books. The reason I feel this is because everyone knows the idea of superpowers and I feel an actual book that talks about people with superpowers would do really well. If comic books about people with super powers or T.V shows about people with super powers or even movies that show people with super powers why couldn’t a book about people with actual super powers sell well?

Now the only problem with this entire idea is that getting the people picture of what the powers you create look like, or what the scenery looks like, or even what your characters look like. See the reason why comic books, T.V. shows, and movies do really well selling is because that they don’t have to worry about using a huge amount of imagery because they can use pictures and video. But the problem with books is that you don’t have all of that so you have to use a lot of imagery.

So I hope that this gives some new authors some idea on what to write a book about. I personally feel that if someone were to write a book about people with actual super powers it would sell extremely, extremely well.     

Star Wars: Bash

So just so you know I am a true die hard Star Wars fan so I have been holding this blog off for the longest time, but now is the time. It is time to finally bash on the new Star Wars movie. Before this starts one this is all of my own opinion and isn’t fact so if you don’t have the same opinion as me don’t get mad, and two SPOILERS FOR STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS. And three if any of my personal friends that are Star Wars fans please don’t kill me. And now that is all out of the way let us move on to the bash.

So Star Wars the force awakens is a great movie, don’t get me wrong most movies/ books that I bash usually have horrible special effects or an extremely bad story, but that isn’t the problem with Star Wars VII. The main problem with it is that it is basically a carbon copy of the original story from Star Wars 1-6. Now don’t get me wrong there was nothing wrong with the original story of Star Wars. I actually love the original story from Star Wars but I didn’t want to see an almost exact copy of the original six movies.

Now the movie does change some things up like adding new characters to the mix, and making a new villain for the series but that’s really it. The movie even has the same thing that the main protagonists have to destroy. The only thing they changed was the size and the name. Now while this movie was a basically a carbon copy of the originals I still have A New Hope for the next few Star Wars films. (I am so sorry for that horrible Star Wars pun). I feel that they will hopefully change up the story or we may have an Attack of the Clones. (Again I am so sorry for that horrible Star Wars pun).

So that is basically my very small rant for Star Wars: The Force Awakens. And remember this rant was mainly for me to get out the only thing that I found wrong with the movie. The only other thing I found wrong was that they killed off Han Solo. But that deserves its own blog.          

Choose Your Own Adventure

I am shocked that I haven’t thought about doing a blog on this sooner, but it wasn’t until a few days ago I started thinking about multiple ending narratives. I personally love the idea of one major story / plot that can have many different and unique endings. And you see this kind of story in many forms of media. From video games that have many different endings based on you performance and your actions in the game. To choose your own adventure books, that base your ending by what steps you take to get to that ending.  So why do I love choose your own adventure books so much? I love them for one major reason, the immersion.

When you get the choice to pick how the story ends is great. It makes the viewer really feel like their actions matter to the world you have put them in which is a great way to immerse your audience in the world that you have created. The idea of multiple choice endings also can make your viewer think about their own morals and can also create and attachment for the character in this world that you have created.

But there is a problem with multiple choice endings. The problem comes with having too many or too little. Having to little isn’t that big of a deal. Now in some stories you can get away with two or three endings and be fine, but it nice to have a few more options. Now the real problem is having too many. 

You see if you have too many ending it can be hurtful to both you and your viewer. For you it can suck to write and create all of that but for your viewer it may overload the viewer on how to get the ending they want.

So I personally love the idea of multiple choice endings because of how it can immerse your viewer. But do be careful about how many endings you put in.

Harry Potter Just Why?

Hey you probably didn’t think you would ever see a tittle like this again. Well neither did I until I heard that a new Harry Potter book was being released, and how could I not. Almost every book friend won’t shut up about it. And it pisses me off. WARING I HAVE NEVER READ ANY HARRY POTTER BOOKS, THIS IS JUST MY RANT ABOUT WHY I DON’T THINK THERE NEEDS TO BE ANOTHER BOOK. Now that that warning has passed I am hoping that most of the basic Harry Potter fans are gone and now all I have to deal with is the Mega Harry Potter fans. Oh and if you think that there needs to be another book leave a comment, I would to read people’s reactions.

Oh Harry Potter why do you need an eighth book. J.K. Rowling you are already a millionaire why do you think you need even more money. Look I am not a Harry Potter fan by any standard but I can at least deal with the books and the fans. But when I heard an eighth book was coming out I nearly lost it.

First off the book isn’t even written by J.K. Rowling, it’s by the guys who created a play based off of the Harry Potter franchise. Which isn’t that big of deal, I actually kind of like the idea of making a play based off of a book universe and story. But the problem comes in when you are just basically taking the script of that play, turning it into a book, and then trying to sell it as a new book. It’s just horrible.

That and the other thing is I don’t think the Harry Potter world needs another book. You already have an extremely popular 7 book series, and even more successful 8 movie franchise, an entire flipping theme park based on the world, and another set of movies that are supposed to be coming out some time soon. So I don’t feel that Harry Potter needs another adventure.

Look I may not be the biggest Harry Potter fan out there, but I mean I still enjoy the idea of the series. It was a part of a lot of people my age’s childhoods. So this rant to day was just leading to one point that I want to give to all of my Harry Potter fans. Just don’t get your hopes up. (That and there are a lot of books better than Harry Potter).      

The Wonderful World Of Comic Books

Oh now that I am of that huge series about play writing I can finally move on to something else, maybe comic books? See, with all of these new comic book movies and T.V shows coming out I feel so out of the loop, so I have finally started getting into comic books, and now I am hooked. The amazing colors and designs, the great story, I am just upset I never got into comic books sooner. So this blog is mainly just going to be talking about the wonderful world of comic books.

See the first reason I love comics is because they call tell the same story and old book can but they can do it in such a different way. Now this isn’t me saying that books can’t tell good stories, it’s me saying that comics can just tell the same story in a way that I enjoy more. While books are mainly stuck to just words and maybe a few diagrams here and there, comic books have so much more to work with. They can have a story that doesn’t just rely on words. Comics can use pictures, and colors and all of that jazz to make their stories feel more lifelike.

Now books and comics still have many similarities. They both tell elegantly crafted stories, with beautiful dialogue but again comic books do something that I find more appealing. With books that have to tell you in long boring sentences who is talking and saying what, and also has to create this world that it is trying to tell you with only words. Now comics don’t have to tell you who is speaking because of their creation of speech bubbles. See I think the idea of speech bubbles is brilliant because then you don’t have to worry so much about telling your reader who is talking, and at what time.

Now please do not take this the wrong way there is still something that I don’t fully like about comic books and that is their length. See with most books you pay 20$ and you get 300 to upwards of 1000 pages to read. But with comic books you pay about 5-10$ and only get about 20-30 pages maybe.

So comic books aren’t the best type of literature in the world. But I love them because there different. They take the idea of the normal every day book, and change the way that we read them. 

How to Pick a Piece for Speech Contest

WARNING, IF YOU KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT IHSSA OR SPEECH YOU CAN SKIP THE FIRST PARAGRAPH.

So in my state we have a thing called IHSSA (Iowa High School Speech Association) which is basically a giant competition which includes everyone in the state of Iowa. So the way that speech works is that depending on if you are doing an individual category of if you are in a group event you will pick a piece to work on practice and then preform for competition (this also can change depending on what category you are in). When you start competing you start at districts which is where about 70 schools come and compete. At competition you preform you have one judge and are rated on how well your performance was (1=Excellent t 2=Good 3=Fair 4=Disqualification) the way you move on from districts is that you have to get a 1 in your performance. After districts you get about two weeks to relax and prepare for state which is the next level, (the reason why I bring this up now is because my high school is hosting state). State is obviously a lot harder than districts. Instead of competing against 70 schools your competing against about 130, instead of 1 judge you have three, and the only way you have a chance of moving on is getting a minimum of at least two 1’s. The reason I say chance is because you then have to get nominated by your judges to move on to the top of the top all-state. I am not going too to go into the process of how they decide who goes to all-state is so complicated to explain even I don’t really understand it. So if you do get picked for all-state there are two possible categories of all-state preforming and non-preforming. Non-preforming all-state is that you were good enough to go to all-state but there wasn’t enough room for you to compete. And finally all-state preforming, this is the best of the best come to compete, and it is also the hardest to win, because instead of you getting judged base off of scores, you get judged based on the judges preference. And if you get all the way to all-state and win, what do you get? A banner, that’s it (you also get bragging for the rest of the year but that’s about it).

So you’re probably wondering why I went through so much trouble to give you that huge explanation of what IHSSA is and what it is all about, well I am going to help you. I personally know that a lot of states around the country have something very similar to IHSSA, and I feel like helping out my fellow competitors. But how am I going to help? Well I am going to give you some advice on how to pick your piece to perform for speech. And we are going to go step by step both for large group and individual categories.

Individual categories

Step 1: Pick something you can relate to.

In almost every individual category you can pick what piece you want to preform so if you are pick something that is close to you. This can comedy, drama, anything really.

Step 2: Make sure it matches the category that you are in.

This is a very simple point make sure that it fits the category.

Step 3: Make sure it’s short or can be edited down.

There are time limits to every speech category so do make sure that the piece you do pick is within the time requirements of the piece.

Step 4: Make personal edits to the piece.

Now this isn’t saying that completely re-write the piece (which is something you can technically do), but to help make the piece more personal add something to it to make it your own.

And that’s it for individual categories now on to large group categories.

Large Group

Step 1: Find a piece that works to every one’s strengths.

When it comes to large group a lot of the times your director will pick the piece for your group but if for some reason they don’t find a piece that really works to a least one strength of every person in the group.

Step 2: Make sure it matches the category that you are in.

This again is a very simple point, make sure that it fits the category.

Step 3: Make sure it’s short or can be edited down.

Again there are time limits to every speech category so do make sure that the piece you do pick is within the time requirements of the piece.

And that is really all the advice I have for picking pieces in large group and individual Speech contest. I do know that this was a very long blog post but I felt that if I didn’t give an explanation of what exactly speech was, a lot of people would have been extremely confused. 

Play Writing in Depth (Part 7: Final)

Welcome back to Play Writing in Depth part 7. Yes this is finally the last part of this 7 part series, so your probably wondering, what is this last part about? So this part is going to be mainly talking about everything that has to deal with getting your script out there into the world. So you have finally created this masterpiece of a script so what do you do now. Well there are a few options for you.

1. (this is mainly for high school students only) ask your school to help you put it on.

If you personally have been with the blog for a long time you will remember me talking about my school’s student directed one acts way back in the blog writing and rejection. Even though my script wasn’t selected it is still a great way for you to get your play out there. It also serves a second purpose which is allowing students to try their hand at directing instead of acting.

2. Find a local acting troupe to put on your show.

Many, many small acting troupes are always looking for new shows to put on. So if you go to them and give them your script they would most likely be willing to think about it at least. Now with this tactic you do have to be willing to get rejected from time to time but if it does work out for you, it could end up being a very good thing.

3. Try entering a competition.

See this is a little difficult because finding the competitions. See I know of a few play writing competitions around the country so if you can find one throw yourself in there and see what happens, but do be careful about being denied again.

4. Put it on yourself.

See this is the hardest of the four methods but it still possible. Now the problem comes with finding everything, a stage, actors, tech, and etc. But if you can pull it off it is the most satisfying of the four ways.

So that is it. This is the conclusion of the series Play Writing in Depth. I do thank you guys for sticking through this 7 part series but I felt that was how many parts it needed and I truly could have done even more parts but I knew by then it would have gotten really old and really boring.    

Play Writing in Depth (Part 6: Props and Set)

Welcome back to Play Writing in Depth. So this part is kind of going to be an addition to part 5 but in much less of a rant format. This part is mainly going to be talking about how you should always be thinking of your sets and props during the entire writing process.

When focusing on your set and props there is a list in which you need to go through.

1. Does it work with my setting?

Imagine your play takes place in 1920’s England and all of your cast is sitting around a table having a nice brunch and a cup of tea. Then during the conversation one of your character I-phones goes off and it’s part of the script. Does that make any sense to you? Now the exception to a situation like that is if it is a completely comedic play and that what used for comedy, but still try to keep you props in the correct time period. The same thing goes for props. You would see the same cast of characters having tea at a sports bar in 1920’s England, again the same rule applies for comedy.

2. Make sure your sets and props are somewhat reasonable.

So you this amazing script with space battles, and fights on top of volcanoes while mid-explosion, with people flying all in the back ground. Yes that sound extremely amazing but two questions on how are you going to afford all of that and two how are your techies going to build all of that. Now maybe some of that is possible but like what I said in my last rant techies aren’t builder gods who can do everything that you desire and the snap of a finger. It take time, money, energy, man-hours, and a huge amount of experience to do all of that. And it most likely isn’t going to look exactly like what you think it will.

So there is my very, very basic list of what to keep in mind when writing scripts with set and props. So my next post will finally be the end of this series. And I can hear all of the cheers from anyone who actually read my blogs. But next post will mainly focus on all of the little things that I missed over this very long series, so see you then.  

Play Writing in Depth (Part 5: Techies)

Welcome to part 5 of Play writing in Depth. So finally we have gotten out of the actual writing portion of this series now the next few parts are mainly going to be focusing on the technical aspects of plays, and me being a trained in the technical arts, this will be hopefully very easy. So this part is mainly me going to be ranting about what you need in your scripts to make the lives of people like me a butt ton load easier.

First off write in your script what you want for you stupid props.

I cannot tell you how many times in my three years as a techie (technical person) I have had to ask “so what do you want for props?” and what is the usual response that I get. “Oh I don’t know I will just let you decide”. First things first you never let a techie decide what to do for props because you will either get one of two outcomes. One basically the most basic set of props that you need, or two the most elegant designed props. And what is usual response that most techies get after showing off the props they have created, “that’s not what I wanted”. That’s about it, and you don’t understand how much that angers us. Because you told us to pick it and now you don’t like it.

Secondly know what you need for music and mics.

Again I have learned that when it comes to sound and mics no one understands. What most of us have to do is watch the show at least three or four times to figure out what people need for mics and what sound goes where. So if you want to make your techies life a lot easier tell us how many mics you need not want need and write in where your music and sound effects go.

Finally do not mess with a techies stuff. (I know this doesn’t have to do with actual writing but it’s just something that needs to be said).  

Oh now if you really want to piss off techie do one of two things. Move a techies props/stuff, or two not tell us where it is. This is the one thing that so many actors do and don’t understand how much it pisses us off. It would be like a techie taking an actors costume and not telling them where we put it. You don’t understand I am pretty sure that some techies have hit lists of which actors touch our stuff without permission.

So if you want your show to run smoothly please treat your techies with some level of respect because if not we can very easily make your shows a living nightmare. Well there is that rant next we move onto more on stage and props. 

Play Writing in Depth (Part 4: Character Development)

Welcome to part 4 of Play Writing in Depth. After last week and us finishing up the beginnings, middles, and ends of plays, I believe it is time for me to get into the nitty gritty parts of writing plays. This part is going to be talking all about character development. Now I know I did touch on this a little in last three parts but I feel that this is such an important part of plays that it deserved its own part.

Character development is an extremely important part of plays in general, but is it the most important part of play writing, no, but it is still important. It may not be as important as plot, or setting but I mean you still need it. Imagine watching a play with an amazing story, with a beautiful setting, but there is truly no character to speak about, or there is character but they stay the same throughout the entire play. That would either be really boring or it would get very old very fast.

Now you also have to be very careful with character development and not over develop your characters because that it also a very big problem you can run into. See under developing your characters is bad but it is not the worst thing in the world and in some shorter plays you can get away with not really developing your characters. But if you are spending more time developing your characters then you are your plot, you have a very, very big problem. See if you develop your characters to much it again ca either can really boring or very old very fast.

So how do you make sure you that you aren’t over or under developing your characters? I really only have one answer to this one, ask others. But you have to make sure you ask the right people. You have to make sure that it is someone that will tell you the truth no matter how hard it is. And if some tells you that you don’t have enough or you have too much you now know what you need to fix. This also servers another purpose have people proof read your plays.

Thankfully in this series I will not be covering proof reading, but I might save that for another time. So next on our schedule is part 5: how to do stage directions.     

Play Writing in Depth (Part 3: Ending)

Welcome to part 3 of 7 on play writing in depth, and no just because the title says end does not mean it is the end of the series. So in this part of the series I mainly going to talk about how to get to the end of your play and how to fully wrap it up.

Now that you have just finished your climax you need to start wrapping up the entire book as a whole. Now you do have a few options on how you want to do this. You can start telling us what happens after the climax, either directly after the climax or you can even do a flash forward to a couple of years later to see what effects the climax had on the world you have created. Another option that you can do is build the end of your play into a cliff hanger, but I will get into more of that in a little bit. Finally you can just end the play. Once you get to the climax just find a way to wrap it up there. Now this is a very lazy way of making an ending, but for some plays it does work.

Now I am going to go back to cliff hanger endings for a little bit. See cliff hanger endings are good and are a very easy way for an author to make a sequel to the series, but it only really works in books. You can’t really make a sequel to a play. Now I know in some plays the author will decide to end the play during the climax or directly after the climax to allow the viewer to make the own assumption of what happens at the end, or after the climax. You make the audience think did the hero win, or what actually happens to character after the climax, kind of like those make your own adventure books. And when play writers do this correctly it can actually be really cool and really thought provoking. But do be careful with this idea, if done incorrectly it can make your play look unfinished, or just rushed, with no real ending to speak about.

So there is the major three beginning, middle, and end. Now you must be thinking, “wait this is a seven part series what is left to cover?” Well in the oncoming weeks I will be talking about, character development, stage direction, and how to set your stage and props. So I will see you then.     

Play Writing in Depth (Part 2: Middle)

If you haven’t been keeping up this a series of how to write plays in depth, this is of course part 2 and I forget to mention this is going to be a seven part series. So when you are starting the process of acutely writing the script there are a few things you need to think about. These are plagiarism, moving the plot along, and finally the climax.

First off you should probably think about this before writing but I do think that it matters here. Now I know everyone knows that plagiarism is a sin and you should never plagiarize other people’s work, ideas, characters, blah, and blah, and blah. Now don’t get me wrong, flat out stealing other people’s entire ideas or scripts is horribly wrong and I would never say to do that, but I do feel that a certain amount of plagiarism is ok. What I mean is that being inspired by someone’s work or having a similar plot to someone else’s is ok because it is really hard to come up with fully original idea  is extremely hard, even very famous plays do it from time to time. So inspired good, stealing bad.

Secondly what you want to focus on is moving the plot along. I have seen to many plays that are twenty minutes of story and the rest is just pointless filler dialogue. Now again some plays you do need a little filler dialogue here and there to help with transitions, and sometimes for comedy, but that is all it should be used for. Constant filler dialogue is boring and repetitive, and it gets way to over used. Something to ask yourself when writing your dialogue is how is this helping my story, how does it move the plot along in anyway. If doesn’t put it to the side for filler content, and don’t put it back in until you absolutely need it.

Finally the climax. When writing your play you need to make sure you are building to a goal. This also kind of ties in with moving the plot along. If you have so much filler content, and you don’t keep reminding us what your plot is, we will get to the end of the play we think, “Oh that’s it”. So just be careful to remind us your plot is.

So that’s it for your middle part of your play. So now we move onto part 3 your ending.