Why I Hate Paolini

I didn’t really have chance to be comprehensive about why I loathe this man so much last time, so I firmly believe now is the time. I’m off to Italy on August 1st so don’t expect any posts from me for a couple of weeks after that. Anyway, back to Paolini. Firstly, there’s the plagiarism which, sadly, is not enough to convict the little bugger:

• A young handsome farm boy named Luke who doesn’t know who is parents are lives with his uncle and while talking to a strange man of the village named Obi-Wan his uncle is murdered by soldiers serving the empire, formed by a Jedi traitor with his apprentice, and burns. Kenobi gives him a lightsabre and teaches him the ways of the force. While on their way to a rebel base they come across a hologram telling them to rescue a princess. They turn off course and fly to save her, but it is a trick and Obi-Wan dies but the princess survives. They reach the rebel base and there is a battle which he wins by flying a ship.And…
• A young handsome farm boy named Eragon who doesn’t know who is parents are lives with his uncle and while talking to a strange man of the village named Brom his uncle is murdered by soldiers serving the empire, formed by a Dragonrider traitor with his apprentice, and burns. Brom gives him a sword and teaches him the ways of magic. While on their way to a rebel base Eragon has a dream telling them to rescue a princess. They turn off course and fly to save her, but it is a trick and Brom dies but the princess survives. They reach the rebel base and there is a battle which he wins by flying a dragon.
• His characters are not only clichéd, but they revolve around an immature status quo. The woman cleans in the kitchen,  young farm boy is able to save the world, but, had it not been for the sudden strike of fortune (coming across an egg) it would have been destroyed by a creepy (and overly camp) old man with a name, Galbatorix, resembling that of a tacky year 300 meets Mars spin-off. Aplogies for the ridiculously long sentence.
• He completely abuses not only his position, but his fans. So many writers and in fact young people dream of his wealth, people queuing up outside shops in the early hours, waiting for the next book to be released. Let’s compare Paolini to, let’s say, JK Rowling. She is worth over £500,000,000 which in US money, makes her a billionaire. She tastes success–she achieved that in just 10 years from when Harry Potter first hit the stores. Then Paolini. Oh gaw. Worth around US $63,000,000, roughly £30,000,000. Sure that’s a lot, but he has reached the wrong end. I have always seen literature in two areas–the very bottom and the very top. The very top fans would be JK Rowling, the majority of her readers loving what she writes. Paolini however, has reached his optimum. He doesn’t have many fans surprisingly but why so then do we here about them all? Because he insists on having mile long blogs, huge websites and fans, releasing spoilers to boost his ego. Have you seen the latest of his ’spoilers’? He claims that what of the people in book gets pregnant. Wow. Like it’s so original! He’s now resorted into bringing random crap into his books to try and bypass the cliched, plagiarised devices (which remain many) with this junk. I would love to just go up to him and give him a huge slap.
• To continue with fan abuse. He says exactly the wrong things. Never have I seen Paolini say ‘I hope you are enjoying the books’ or ‘I hope you will enjoy Brisingr just as much, and it’s great for all of your support.” But nothing. Just releasing these spoilers to boost his ego.
• He compares himself to that of ‘Tolkien at his best’ and the ‘lyrical beauty’ of Seamus Heaney’s translation of Beowulf. It’s like comparing a lantern to a torch–you can’t just slot in.
• Paolini’s obsessions for archaism drives my head in. It’s as though throwing in some Victorian words will save him and make him seem uber good. Erm… don’t do that. His writing also odours a strange immaturity. Let’s take some examples… “Sorry,” Brom apologised… No! Just no! Then… “Galbatorix kicked Eragon in the fork of the franchise”. I mean, what the hell? Soon after Paolini writes “Galbatorix removed his head.” As if it were a day to day occasion thing. You don’t remove someone’s head. You lop it off.

Conclusion?

Paolini is a no-talent brat, and the film was such a *snort* pile of crap since the book was just el-Crapo and only published thanks to Mommy and Daddy, whose publishing firm open the paths to the easy market. I could go on, but unlike Paolini I know when to stop.

Websites for Writers

Just recently, thanks to the holy Stumbleupon I’ve come across some great websites for us writers. Some weren’t intended so specifically but anyway.

One Word

The first I would like to introduce  would be ‘One Word’ found at www.oneword.com. It’s a simple little website, but a nice idea. Anyone can take part so long as they have the effort to press Go and endure 60 seconds of speedwriting, on a given word. It’s fantastic to break writer’s block because you are just writing about what they say, no prior research or thought. The word changes everyday–I think’s it’s Graffiti at the moment.

Wordle

This one’s pretty neat too. You post a whole body of text into a little box, hit submit and get a word cloud for your novel. The bigger the word, the more you use it. I noticed I use very few similes, but one hell of a lot of ‘Aedomir’s and ‘Seridon’s. It’s from my first draft, so there’s room to change. You can find it here.

I put it in alphaetical order and what I find interesting is I use a lot words upper and lower down, but not in the middle. Might have something to do with Aedomir and Seridon taking over the page. I hate that name ‘Seridon’ anyway, let’s hope draft two will see greater horizons!

Novelism

Finally, the site I created! After many long days getting the thing to work, I created a forum-based community for writers. People can post work, get feedback, review others’ and fit in with a community. They now all get their own blogs and I’m working on a photo gallery. The site is growing rapidly! Check it out Novelism.

Freedom Writers

You know, summer holidays? Bored and depressed? In my case I had been through a… rough patch, shall we say, following me almost throwing a brick at the computer when, once again, I failed with chapter one. Anyway, I was so close to giving in. Last night I was on the verge of tears thinking of a new plot–but, I haven’t been put off yet.

Anyhow, to prevent this becoming another of my boring, personal blog entries I will go in-depth with the film I was watching yesterday morning, Freedom Writers. I had heard about it but, I thought it was just about some sad, old people trying to stop some melodramatic contest again. Yes, say imagination. Anyway, I had come to believe that the 21st century Hollywood was incapable of making anything worthwhile, that perhaps all the half-decent actors were either dead or had retired to Canada. I was pleasantly surprised. Although I missed the start I came in on an inspiring part where a class of students were inside this… museum to remember those subjected to the horrors of the holocaust.

We can take away a fantastic message from this film, something that I have been trying to acheive for a long while. We are not always who we choose to be, and so we can change. I felt not only shocked by the empireonline verdict of two stars but a twinge of sadness that this film is not as recognised as I feel it ought to be.

Film conclusion? Remarkable story, but Hollywood’s adapation has failed to recognise the powerful truth and potential.

Poopstream – Da Wannabe Poet?

No, I’m not changing this blog title to: “Confessions of a teenage poet” because writer covers it, and you ain’t seen nothing ’til you’ve written Poopstream.  But what is Poopstream? Some believe it is a work of beauty, between the lyrical temptations of Tolkien and Seamus Heaney but I myself see as a gateway to a new dimension. I write Poopstream quite often, perhaps to fill my lunch hours or even to take the mick out of Miss W, my English teacher who insists on annotating stuff for no reason. But yes, Poopstream is a collection of random sentence structures (typos never changed) and I see what magnificence I have come up with after a minute or so. I forgot to save what I wrote today and I can’t find the hard-copy but here’s what I knocked up a while back, I call it ‘Biglet’:

There was this dalek right,
No left however right,
who was like omg I’m a horse faced machete.
However
One day a man named
EVIL
Decided to be best to stab
FLEMENGO s l o w l y
And died cus my machine is
A machination of the peanut kind tribe who ride to France at
07709355092-miles per hour in km.
Seventy two, Robert, seventy two, berty,
And a man who claimed he was a French pickle.

But it was three day
Upon the eve of night
That the colour was a figure—
Visit our HQ upon sunset—
The address is featured below in a fashion magazine—
Her.

Not my best, in fact one of my worst. My favourite was the first one I ever made, quite funny actually. Something to do with joining us for free at fattyland@gmail.com.

Meh. Perhaps I should annotate these, because according to my English teacher, all poetry has meaning:

There was this dalek right,
No left however right,

This symbolises the forever change between decisions–from the point of view of a man, a deluded being who cannot understand the concept of his livelihood. The mentioning of ‘Dalek’ implies a sentimental purpose behind it, and that it is not capitalised signifies the communist rebellion of ‘42.

Visit our HQ upon sunset—
The address is featured below in a fashion magazine—
Her.

This shows how the media influences childhoods across the globe, from war to to night (sunset indicating the faliure to progress).

That’s right, I Poopstream analysis.

Music & Politics

Anyhow, when I’m listening to music I also find some ease in writing–oh, and I seem to live chewing Trident chewing gum too. Don’t know why. Back the music, depending on what mood I’m in I will play a song to match it, so I go the extreme and being writing in that tone. Listening to Annie Lennox’s ‘Into the West’ gives me reason for sad endings and the Rohirrim Fanfair let’s me imagine heroic battles–desperation?

Moving on…

Has anyone seen the I’m Voting Republican video? I think it’s hilarious, and what makes it all the better is that I live in the UK and hence don’t care much for the presidential race, ’cause they really are a race. If you haven’t seen it, then try it now:

The sad thing is, it almost reflects the mess that the US is in at the moment, and has been for quite some time. I can’t be bothered to go into poliicts, considering it’s 23:15 and I’m tired… Anyway, watch it now!

I Write Essays in my Freetime

No, not really… not as such anyway. Last night when I was lying in bed, I realised why I was not writing–the thing is, I had no idea what I wanted to happen in the book. My view was too vague and even my plans were just bullet points–so I started my outline. I call it an essay because it’s around a paragraph a chapter, and it based completely on my book–except no one will be grading it and I can relax. There’s no rush. At this point I’m still writing for myself, for as of yet my deadlines extend to around the 12th of forever. Of course, it will do me no good thinking about that.

But also I tend to spend more time procrastinating than enything else. I mean, I have set up a writing community but it takes so long to advertise and manage–it’s like a 24-hour job that I have to pay to do. Anyway, it’s a nightmare. You can find links to it here, at Novelism.

Confession #2: I Hate Paolini

Christopher Paolini? What a twat. I mean, no joke–who does this guy think he is? I first heard about Eragon in 2006, whilst in the cinema waiting impatiently for a film to start (taking considerably longer this time, might I add) when the word ‘Eragon’ appeared in the screen. My first thought? ‘Aragorn’. I thought, alright, let’s give this thing a chance. As I sat on my seat, watching this so-called ‘Eragon’ trailer I slowly sank down, almost screaming out Tolkien, Tolkien! as loud as I could. All I gathered was that it was something to do with a farm boy who conveniently-magically becomes some clichéd ‘dragon rider’ (that bit made me cringe) and save the day.

Oh.

Well, my friends wanted to see so I thought, don’t judge a book by its cover. Two hours later, I realised that phrase only worked for books. It made me feel physically sick, feeling the need to run off home and turn on Star Wars, then note down the endless list of similarities. But, if anything, I am a merciful man and braved the horrors of the ‘Eragon’ book, after discovering its connection with the film. After twenty pages I had learnt something about an elf, who had been chased by a shade. Oh ye, she conveniently sent a magical egg over to handsome farm boy named ‘Eragon’. I mean, any book named after the fantastical main character? It works brilliantly for Harry Potter because it’s no fantasy name, it’s a down-to-earth fantasy (if there ever was one) but Eragon on the other hand? No.

Just no.

I eventually managed to read 100 pages. I threw the book down, almost grabbing my pair of compasses and stabbing it, before throwing it out of the window into a bonfire. ‘Twas merely an evil take on Star Wars, set in Middle-Earth and no more. I saw the name–Christopher Paolini? I thought. First impressions?

Something like this:

You know, depraved old man feeding the ducks? Guy going through mid-life crisis, thinking writing some crappy novel will save him? But then, without typing him in on Google Images I thought young, immature wannabe Tolkien. Again, I was so very very wrong:

25 year-old immature kid? Umm… ye. Like he spent all day everyday writing into some tacky bound book in a load of dead weeds. I have got nothing against young writers–not only am I one, but I have been part of a young writing community for several months and my dog is misguided. No… that doesn’t even cover it. His work stinks of plagiarism and immaturity.

When I told one of my friends at school I was writing a novel, I can imagine the first thing to come into their mind would be magical deus ex machina dragon high fantasy world parallel to Middle-Earth. He made a  rather stupid comment that I can’t hate Paolini, since I would be a hypocrite! I don’t hate Paolini because of his age! I admire him for that–I just hate what he writes and generally, how he manipulates his fans into thinking he is the writer of original fantasy. See, I don’t focus my world around the fantasy, I focus the fantasy around the story, meaning, it could quite easily be set in a modern day, but I chose not to–the freedom of fantasy is just too great. However, I, like Tolkien and unlike Paolini will not abuse it.

Now, assuming there won’t be a rebellion when the world finds out, there will, yes will be a film for Eldest. This remains a rumour, but this type of crap never stays away from the box office. In my shock I managed to find this ‘teaser’ for it on YouTube:

Now, that was only a teaser and was made by a fan, but if you like at 0:18 you will see Lothlorien. Just shows how even the most deluded of fans can see the Lord of the Rings content in Eragon!

Not only is Paolini a self-loving, smug freak but he has convinced himself that he has written a book worthy of future literature for the next millennium. Sure if it survives the decade he might be put on ‘neighbour’s from hell’ but for now? Let’s get him rehab. Not only that either, but his parents published his books for him, since he knew neither an agent nor a publisher would think twice about binning his manuscript. Ever writer has been where he has–in terms of muse, anyway. We all go through that epic-rewrite phase, it’s just that few us have the guts to feed it to other people in exchange for poorly-built muse money.

People say to one another if it is at all right that one writer criticises another. Yes, otherwise we never learn. But is it right to attack another one? I say no because there is no attack in that–it is truth, and he is no writer.

Confession #1 – Words Saved Me

Writers have ever sought to teach us their many fabulous ways of the pen, through yes, you’ve guessed it: quotes. I hope to take a look at what some of the most inspirational figures of writing have told us, and how we can relate with them. Never have our stories only needed one, two or even a thousand things. A story is like homework, it never ends.

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Determination:

“And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise.  The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt.” ~Sylvia Plath

Sylvia Plath offers us something very clear: determination. If you have no self-confidence, I am sorry, but you may as well not bother. Think of it like a plant:

Flower = Writing Style, they can be wonderful and provide interest, making something boring, beautiful.

Stem = Plot, it holds the structure together, without it there would be no plant, no story.

Leaves = Characters, they feed the story, but too many can ruin and overcrowd it.

Roots = Determination, it is all very well having hundreds of wonderful plants, colourful and majestic, but if the roots are dead, it will never flourish. The water flows through it, the flower thriving because of it, namely determination.

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Don’t think, just write:

“I’m not a very good writer, but I’m an excellent rewriter.”  ~James Michener

It may be the case, that some people can write symphonies without thinking, but more so the fact that we can beat them by using a brain. There is no point worrying about how bad you’re writing is, first time you stick it down on paper. I mean, think about it. Your first draft is always appalling, or rather, never as good as the second draft. It takes far more focus and determination to finish the first draft, than to rewrite it. It is like a house; get the bricks into place before you paint it.

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Show, don’t tell:

“Don’t tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.”  ~Anton Chekhov

How many times have you been told to show us what is going on? This is where it gets controversial. Think of two writers; let’s say William Wordsworth and J.R.R Tolkien. Wordsworth’s main character will roar with cries in his poems, struggling with the grief-storms of modern day horrors, whereas Frodo, weeps. Yet they are both fantastic, because they get across their meaning so fantastically with pen and paper. What works for you? I wish I could help you more than that, but from there, it is up to you.

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Imagine:

“Write down the thoughts of the moment.  Those that come unsought for are commonly the most valuable.”  ~Francis Bacon

Just think about that. Your duty is to tell your heart, not your brain. If you want to have a go at that, try speedwriting, or just mumbling to yourself at the window. Sit on your bed, and recite the entire lot of your story to yourself. What sounds stupid, what’s irrelevant, and most importantly, what is missing? Through your reclusive ramblings you will find that you will be writing some things that actual surprise you. This twines in nicely with the Don’t think, just write quote. Some of the best stories written come from NaNoWriMo, where if you think, you lose!

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Ignore:

“Do not put statements in the negative form.
And don’t start sentences with a conjunction.
If you reread your work, you will find on rereading that a
great deal of repetition can be avoided by rereading and editing.
Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do.
Unqualified superlatives are the worst of all.
De-accession euphemisms.
If any word is improper at the end of a sentence, a linking verb is.
Avoid trendy locutions that sound flaky.
Last, but not least, avoid clichés like the plague.”
~William Safire, “Great Rules of Writing”

Don’t you just love this one? The irony is so powerful here, and yet you read it, yes? I am a strong believer in this, and the fact that if you listen to all the people who have a go at you, saying Don’t do this it never works. Why? Because this is your story, and your flowers are individual to you. Otherwise, we might as well be numbers.

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To conclude:

There are so many people who seek to change what, when and how you write, but there is only one thing to it – only one thing to mix all those ingredients: you.