old things. and styles.

once again with style. i'm sorry! ):

istyle.

now, even after i've written my story, i'm not entirely sure what my style is.

wdyl:two boys.

so since i just want to return lorrie moore's like life to the library soon, i will be posting my notes of the stories online.

moore on style. pun intended.

more on style (pun intended, i SWEAR.):

moore likes to give us stereotypes and cliche sayings, and just destroy them in an instant with some witty quip or observation. it's just lots of great. moore also likes to capitalize on The Exception. as shown by the quote from page 22. additionally, she likes to give beautiful details along with just absolutely hilarious comparisons to help us visualize what the character is seeing all the more (once again, no pun intended). see the quote from page 24. oh, the exception is back again! the main character uses a vibrator to stir her chocolate milk. this is a problem, because vibrators usually go into -body part- and said body part is not usually sanitary enough to drink chocolate milk. ...nor does any body part aside from the mouth drink chocolate milk. ever. lorrie the author (we're on the first name basis now. just kidding.) also likes to capitalize on ignorance. shown by ze vibrator incident and also the quote on page 30. and then moore likes to bring in previous details to make some slew of utter nonsense. like saying that the most expensive dish in a restaurant is $45, which costs as much as an oil-and-water bra! and then there are some rather riveting and interesting details like how sarah brink says the character's father's name (the quote on 35). 

a gate at the stairs.

so i went to the librario today to get a lorrie moore book. she's written novels. so i got one of those instead of her short stories (oops?). and i can just instantly hear her voice in here--it's the same sort of thing as the ones that we've read in class. moore just goes in and says something, but doesn't really mean it. for example, from page 12 of a gate at the stairs:
i liked children--i did!--or rather, i liked them ok. they were sometimes interesting.

moore just has this great way of just not really being serious but then making us take her seriously (kinda like me? question mark? i don't even know.) with just everything else that happens. also, she just has great lines. like this one. page 13.
twice a week a young professor named thad, dressed in jeans and a tie, stood before a lecture hall of stunned farm kids like me and spoke thrillingly of henry james's masturbation of the comma.

see what i mean here? masturbation of the comma, oh my goodness. this is why lorrie moore is my favoritest author ever (besides sherman alexie) because she's just so wacky, zany, and just slightly insane and i wish to meet her in real life some day.

kuh-kuh-kuh-crazy. (pov practice)

side 1:

a crashing echoes through the house. i can instantly feel adrenaline rush from the tips of my kidneys to my head and to the nails on my toes.

'nobody's home, nobody's home with me, what in the bejeezus was that?!' i think, as my fingers start to tremble.

time slows down, seconds seem like an eternity, and the clock hands seem to have cast some sort of spell as i'm glued to my chair. the rest of my cluttered room seems to go dark--the only thing i can see is the little island of light created by my small, blue desk lamp. i glance around madly, trying to find some way of defending myself. nothing.

footsteps start up the stairs, ringing as loudly in my ears as my thunderous beating heart. who knew that a stranger walking up the stairs could sound like the end of the world?

my chair continues to hold me captive, as i start breathing rapidly. as i hear the safety click into the "off" position, my racing mind finally decides to let me know that the intruder has a gun. and then my brain switches into overdrive and i can't seem to think clearly anymore. everything has a foggy haze to it.

thunder crashes outside, and i finally realize that there's a humongous storm outside. 'maybe it's not someone,' i think, slowing down a bit. 'maybe i'm still safe.'

the report of feet in the all-too-empty hallway prove me wrong. my vision snaps to different places in my room, the hairs on my arm are standing on end, my heart decides that it's going too slow and the speedometer reads a thousand miles per hour. so much for fight-or-flight, i'm about as ready to move as a brick.

a knocking on my door. my eyes jerk towards the source, and i swear they start to bug out as the knob turns. a few, wispy, long and stringy white hairs blow in from the gradually opening doorway. my heart is still keeping way over race pace, and the door continues to inch its way open. a black trenchcoat, knee high leather boots, pale hands, ghost-white hair...

"holy shit!" i scream. "you're--"

the other side. the crazier one.

the house is empty, but he can still see the vibrating of a single soul through the closed window. thunder rolls through the heavens as rain continues to pour down in a relentless stream. the moon has vanished from the skies tonight, as has his sanity. his wild, unruly, long white hair billows behind him in an animalistic manner, even though it's sopping wet. he clenches his gun tightly. life's vibration needs to be stopped in that house.

raising his weapon, he brings it down hard against the door. it splinters all too easily, announcing his entrance with a cacophony of breaking wood. he can feel fear rush through the house like a tidal wave. perfect. he steps in, his tall, black leather boots echoing on the marble tile like heartbeats. too neat, too orderly. he releases the safety on his gun and continues his seven-step climb. his wet hand has sullied the elegant white of the railing and he smiles maniacally.

"truly," he whispers crazily to himself, "disorder and chaos are beautiful."

he clomps through the empty hallway, footsteps resonating and leaving even the walls trembling. a sliver of light from under a door. he knocks (for courtesy's sake, though she's been dead to him for some time) and opens the door. light spills onto his face. he raises his weapon and takes aim, but not before, "holy shit! you're--" breaks the silence. the gun screams, and once again, all is quiet.

a temporary matter (of life and death?)

wow.
that's all i have to say about this story. (in case you can't hear my tone of voice through the typed characters, i like this story.)
lahiri is so talented at crafting settings, it's a little ridiculous. now i couldn't picture the characters, but that's not the focus of the story. until baltimore was mentioned, i pictured shukumar and shoba living somewhere in new york city, in more of the suburb-ish areas in a house just like the one from the stuart little movie. i could picture it all, and it was thanks to all the tiny details and nuances of setting that lahiri chose to include. it was pretty freaking amazing.

also, lahiri did a really good job at describing her characters--the way shoba sleeps, the way that shukumar knows how his wife looks like even in the dark... it was done extremely well. i'm thinking that one of the reasons why i liked all these details so much is because that's what i want in a significant other (which makes perfect sense)--i want someone who can tell how i'm feeling not by what i say but by my eyes, i want someone who just knows me inside and out (don't go places with that comment).

the darkness in the story was used so well to just show secrecy... and even when the lights went back on, shukumar and shoba still felt the need to confide to each other their final secrets in the dark. and i guess sometimes we need that separation, whether it's over the internet, through the phone, or just sitting together in the dark.

abp#2: pulling myself from between the letters.

lemme say in short that i tend not to pay a large amount of attention to people.
i'm a big-picture guy, and the little details (unless hilariously creepy or just utterly funny) don't stand out to me. i know people's mannerisms, but only slightly. if someone were to do something, i could probably say, "i knew that they'd do that." and now you want me to answer this about my skills at recognizing styles? um.... it doesn't get any better. i can pick out diaz's style, only because it's so unique--he never really uses quotations, he italicizes, he has his own individual voice (which i like, i think) and... that's all i can really think of. to phrase it badly, "i know it when i see it." butler's style is harder--i don't think i know how to pick it out as well. i would feel safe saying that i probably don't even know how to pull it out from between the letters.

as for my writing... i myself cannot distinguish a certain pattern. ask more little-picture people about my writing, and maybe i'll say, "yeah, that sounds about right." i know that mostly in my muses, it's been a sad portraiture of my inner landscape, and maybe that's my style. i never seem to be able to write well when i'm happy--just in the midst of sadness or heartbreak, that's when the ink flows. well... that or when i'm feeling creative enough. when that is, i don't really have any idea. also, adding on to my big-picture-ness, if you've read any of my muses, you'll notice that there's no exact setting--i'm horrible at constructing a setting. make me an architect of a dream, and you'll just find yourself in a generic somewhere generated from a memory of mine (sorry, the connection had to be made). i miss small details of the setting, i give just barely enough to get by. why i do this, i don't really know. my signature, i guess, is... that's a good question, actually. what do you think?