YAY SO MANY THINGS IDEAS IDEAS LETS GO CREATIVITY ART AND ARTISTS DANCING THE WORLD NEW

Creation and Absorption Two

Welcome to the second bi-weekly review of the art and creativity I’ve experienced! I’m still going through my back-catalogue of works and resources from my mailing list days, but there’s also a fair number of new things! Especially movies. I watched a fair collection of cool movies recently :0.

So relax, take your time going through all the links that interest you, take your own notes on them, and have fun!

Reminder that this is also posted on my substack!

THE NEWSLETTER PROPER

Creation

  • Quotidian Writer - youtube writing advice can be very hit or miss, but this channel’s videos have helped me :). she uses book excerpts to support her points, which is always a good touch.
  • writing prompt generator - a fun program from itch.io where you can generate little prompts. the abstract option is especially fun.
  • rumblewrites - a great substack that posts writing resources (among other things), and the thing I like the most is the monthly list of writing opportunities
  • r/conlangs resources page - a grand list of resources for if you want to get into making your own fictional languages (conlangs) for worldbuilding or otherwise!
  • If you’ve been around the writing/worldbuilding scene long enough, you probably know about picrew, but I figured I’d link this picrew character maker in case you haven’t heard of it yet. Great for visualizing your characters!
    • I also recommend exploring other picrew character-makers, it’s very fun to try out a bunch to see what style really clicks with you.
  • Frantic Fanfic - a creative writing party game to either have dumb fun with or practice some writing on the fly with friends!
  • Cascade Dice - a wicked-cool framework for using a pair of dice to generate story ideas.
  • MY SUGGESTIONS
    • Poetry is a FANTASTIC way to improve one’s prose. Reading even a few good poems, and I mean closely reading them, can give you a better feel for how to say precisely what you mean to in as fews words, yet as much color and music, as possible. This isn’t to say that poetic prose is always better, though--just that a greater appreciation for poetry can give you more tools in the belt for your writing.
      • I recommend starting with poems by: Emily Dickinson, Ursula K. Le Guin, Virginia Woolf, and William Blake.
      • I also recommending trying to write a poem or two! Even if they’re only a couple lines and have no rhyme or meter. It’s real good practice.
      • And you may find you simply love the process of writing poetry. I know I have. One of my favorite parts of worldbuilding is getting a culture and a conlang to a point where I can write poems written by in-world characters.
    • I made a Substack note recently related to this, but write from weird perspectives! It’s a very fun exercise!
      • For instance, write a poem from the perspective of a tree. Or a piece of flash fiction the wind would want to tell. Or a star. Or an electron in the internet. Or a solar panel. Or the concept of love. Or your childhood home. Or a spoken word travelling through the air.
    • Building on something from last time, SUBMIT TO LITERARY MAGAZINES! It’s a good way to get discovered, and it’s fun to play the Rejections Game with your friend (see who can get the most rejections). There’s some new mags on Substack, specifically, that don’t have submission fees, such as:
      • Strange Pilgrims - Publishes weird short stories, essays, and flash pieces.
      • ONLY POEMS - Publishes, well, poems. This one isn’t new per se, but did recently start a Substack.
      • Fang & Flower - Dedicated to gothic literature!
      • The Alchemist's Cabin - Wants raw, experimental, personal works of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction.

Absorption

  • MOVIES!
    • The Wolf House (2018) - I put this at the top because it is the most creatively-presented moving picture anything I’ve ever seen. It’s ostensibly a stop-motion animation, but one done through paint and weird sculpture. And its themes are poignant: colonialism, generations of abuse, parenting, among others.
    • Yellow Submarine (1968) - another wild film, but one with very different vibes. ‘Tis a Beatles animated film where they visit a surreal world and sing a bunch of songs. It’s awesome! Reminded me a fair bit of Fantastic Planet (1973) at some points.
    • 9 (2009) - an animated movie from my childhood. It’s about a bunch of puppets trying to make it in a post-apocalyptic world, rife with symbolism, well-crafted all around. Also, it was released on 9/9/2009, which is fun.
    • Video Diary of a Lost Girl (2012) - a strange film about succubi who suck the souls out of the men they make love with. There are silent films, resurrection, and a fair bit of blood magic. Oh, and it’s very low-budget, which is always fun!
  • The Internet Speculative Fiction Database - a FANTASTIC wiki cataloguing authors and writings of sci-fi, fantasy, horror, and more! It is just a catalogue, though--it doesn’t have the works themselves on there, so you’ll have to open new tabs if you wanna search for whatever you discover. Still, amazing resource if you’re looking for new speculative fiction to read and learn from!
  • The Diaries of Virginia Woolf! - A fascinating look into a wonderful writer whose books, I’ve heard, are some of the best of the 20th century (you can bet I’ll be listing them here when I’ve gotten around to reading them).
  • All the books in the epic fantasy world of Osten Ard by Tad Williams (including the two series Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn and The Last King of Osten Ard).
    • There are seven books total, and both series are finished, and the sequel series doesn’t require you to have read the first! I like the prose, the worldbuilding is deep, and, oh, have I mentioned that the original series partially inspired A Song of Ice and Fire by George R. R. Martin? Because it did. Lots of political intrigue and shocking plot beats, highly recommend.
  • Alien Anthropology: Doing without Agriculture by Biblaridion - a fascinating look into alternative forms of civilization for a very non-human alien species.
  • Also, uh, shoutout to real-world history. I mean it. And no, I don’t just mean to take a historical event/period and use it as inspiration, I mean really do some passionate research on the event/period, figure out why it happened, how it ticked, the social/economic/political/cultural forces present, and use those revelations to help guide your worldbuilding.
    • Well, don’t let me stop you from taking cool aesthetics or specific moments. I definitely still do that. But it feels more whole when there’s more flesh under the flash.
  • On that note, why not read The Dawn of Everything by David Wengrow and David Graeber?
    • It’s a passionate argument for a different look into the lives of prehistoric peoples and the rise of agriculture, states, and systems of hierarchy. Good especially if you’re looking to make art inspired by very ancient cultures!
  • UNCOMMON STANDARDS - a wicked cool and poetic collection of symbols and their meanings.
  • unlws - this one’s wild. it’s a nonlinear conlang that bends and experiments with what written language can do. very inspiring if you’re interested in strange or alien conlangs.
  • Vivian Maier's Photography - a wonderful photography collection from the 1950s and beyond. were taken by a woman just being happy dabbling in photography, with no visions of releasing her work ever. they were discovered after her death.
  • My partner's Camp Boneyard 4 set! - a yearly internet concert thing hosted by underscores’ underscord. and my partner played in it this year!

OTHER

The End

Comment any suggestions you have, and I may put them in the next newsletter! Also lemme know what you found most interesting/helpful and I’ll try to find more stuff like it!

Happy creating and absorbing, and I'll see y’all in two weeks!!