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Saturday Spotlight for December 10th, 2011

Daily Literature Deviations is proud to feature this special recognition article!
You can show your support by ing this News Article. We hope this gives you some insight into
the person behind the art.
Please comment and the features and congratulate the artist!


 Artists will be featured in a special news article every Saturday. Major points to SilverInkblot
for doing the hard work and research that goes into these articles!  

Today's featured deviant is:
 justlittlemusings


 

Questions

 

1.    Tell us a bit about your writing.

My writing is all over the place really! I'm at a stage where I'm experimenting and trying to develop my own voice; deciding what I like to write and what I'm best at. I have a mixture of poetry and prose in my gallery, but I'm drawn to prose-poetry or 'prosetry' because it allows me to mix poetic techniques with narrative techniques.

I draw my inspiration from my own experiences, or from a word I like the sound of, something someone says to me, or even just a tiny little detail of an event. I sometimes worry that one day someone is going to read a piece of my work and recognise in part of a line something they said, or something that relates to them. I'm always conscious of distancing myself from the content of my writing though, trying not to make things too personal. Anything in storage either falls into that category or is embarrassingly awful.  

2. How do you feel about dA as a literature community?

The first thing to say is that they're all completely and utterly crazy! In a good way. I've been on dA for about 18 months now, and I'll admit that the community seemed intimidating at first - in some respects it still does. Everyone seems to know each other and I found it hard to gather the confidence to jump in. I don't think I ever did jump, but slowly I'm getting more involved which is nice.

I agree with what other people have said about it being a close-knit community, but whilst that does make it difficult for a shy person like me to get involved, it also means that the community is very strong; people really seem to care about each other and about improving their work and showcasing literature. Critique is one of the things I like best about the community; there's a constant desire to improve, and critiques are both given and received well. (:

3. You have a pretty impressive collection of six word stories in your gallery. Could you tell us a little about that? What's it like to write in a form that values such brevity?

Well, I started writing six word stories back in January when the 52 Week Challenge started for SixWordStories. My original intention was to complete all 52 challenges, but life decided to take over, as it always does. I guess I decided to give it a try because it was something I hadn't done before, and I like to try new things. The most challenging thing about the form is the story-telling aspect; it's important that you actually tell a story and imply something more than what is written, rather than just making a statement which, whilst it might sound good, tells the reader very little. (My first attempt was pretty poor, to be completely honest). Six words are really not very many at all, and that means that each one counts and you can't afford to waste words. Of course, just using the longest and most complex-sounding words you can think of doesn't work either; it might look good, but the story has to make sense as well.

4. Are there any authors you feel have been an influence on your work?

This is always a question I'm not sure how to answer because, whilst I'm certain that a lot of authors have influenced my work, none really stand out as having had any particular influence. I definitely feel like it's a lot of little things from different places, both in works I have read outside of dA and by dA authors. Kind of a cop-out answer, I know.  

5. What would you consider your highest literary accomplishment to be?

A year ago I probably would have said that just posting my work online and titling it 'literature' was a huge accomplishment for me, even though it doesn't sound like much at all. Since then I've received two DLDs which at the moment is what I'm most proud of; having my work recognised by other writers is a nice feeling. It also reminded me that this is worth the effort, that all the working to improve is actually having an effect. The first DLD I received was a on a piece that I spent a long time trying to improve, to the point where I still don't really like the piece anymore, but it was worth it for the reminder that I'm not completely wasting my time here, that if I work hard enough and determinedly enough then I can write something that someone else considers worth reading, and more than that, worth sharing.

Poetry

triptych - can't live...i.  they're searching for fingerprints in my solace -- now shattered -- and your blood-stains on the carpet are a bullet to my own throbbing head. your presence lingers, your stained shadow licking up the walls by candlelight.
ii. on the sidewalk we met, and the cold brick of the buildings amplified your silent greeting into the blue night. light from an upstairs window cast a pale glow over your sweet chocolate skin, and i gave you my old green baseball cap so you wouldn't –- couldn't --  forget me.
          don't forget me now, my love
iii. the room that was ours is empty now and the silence suffocates me in my dream-filled sleep. i take the steps down to the cellar two by two in my haste to follow your call, and they lead me on into the indigo night where no ghosts can haunt me, and I shall find you once more.
"triptych –can’t live" by justlittlemusings


Tessstrawberry between
parted lips: lost purity-
smearing lipstick stains
"Tess" by justlittlemusings

Prose

The Elephant in the RoomHave you ever heard the saying, "There's an elephant in the room"? Well, that's my Uncle John.  I asked Mummy what she meant and she said he's not a real elephant. She said he's an invisible elephant. I'm not sure if that's true. I've never met my Uncle John so I don't know. I asked Auntie Patricia if we could visit him once and she started crying. Mummy came in and sent me to bed, but nobody told me where he was.
Sometimes I lie awake when I'm supposed to be asleep, and Mummy and Daddy and Auntie Patricia have all gone to bed and it's just me. I count the glow-in-the-dark stars on my bedroom ceiling. One, two, three… forty-nine, fifty. Uncle John sent them from America when I was little. They came with the postman in a big, brown envelope with that see-through plastic stuff that pops when you stamp on it. Daddy glued them up for me and I held on to the bottom of the ladder so he wouldn't fall. (He said that was a very important job.)
I lie there and count the sta
"The Elephant in the Room" by justlittlemusings


Week 12: Car Crashfatal: loving daughter became mother's carer
"Week 12 – Car Crash" by justlittlemusings




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~ The DailyLitDeviations Team ~


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