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Fantasy: October 18, 2023 Issue [#12227]




 This week: On the Surface
  Edited by: Robert Waltz Author IconMail Icon
                             More Newsletters By This Editor  Open in new Window.

Table of Contents

1. About this Newsletter
2. A Word from our Sponsor
3. Letter from the Editor
4. Editor's Picks
5. A Word from Writing.Com
6. Ask & Answer
7. Removal instructions

About This Newsletter

There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.
         —Ernest Hemingway

You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you.
         —Ray Bradbury

We write to taste life twice, in the moment and in retrospect.
         —Anais Nin


Word from our sponsor

ASIN: B004PICKDS
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Letter from the editor

Writing has been around for at least 3500 years.

That's a long time. Far longer than the axled wheel, but not as long as beer, which probably says something about our priorities.

The earliest known writing came from the same culture that invented beer: Sumer. (They didn't invent the axled wheel, though.) But what we know about written works from that long ago is necessarily biased in favor of media that can last, well, thousands of years: stone and clay. It's entirely possible, even likely, that writing developed earlier, and the true innovation of 3500 years ago was figuring out a way to make the writing survive the ravages of time.

When you take a moment to think about it, writing—and even the proto-writing such as the figures and symbols we've found painted on cave walls, some of which are as much as 10 times older than the Sumerian clay tablets—is a kind of magic.

You have a thought, so you express it. Before writing, that expression was spoken. It may impress itself upon the listener(s), but the original speech is lost in the void, forever. Writing changed all that. You make marks with some implement on some surface, and others who know the markings can know what it is you wanted to express, even over a stretch of space or time.

We take it for granted most of the time now, and we have other ways—recordings or video—to communicate, but the magic of writing endures... even if we're moving back toward proto-writing pictographs in the form of emoji.

One of the earliest known stories, the Epic of Gilgamesh (also Sumerian), deals, in part, with the titular hero/king questing for immortality. In this, he was denied.

Or was he?


Editor's Picks

Some fantasy writing for your reading pleasure:

 The Last Voyage of Havenlight Open in new Window. [18+]
IAM Impage Prompt - May 17, 2023 - The Dirigible - Revised
by Rodryn Author Icon


 I Live There Open in new Window. [E]
A few ghosts never hurt anyone.
by Paul Author Icon


 The Architects Open in new Window. [E]
Our creators
by Robert Hayes Author Icon


 The Waiting Open in new Window. [E]
Hanston receives his first magical longsword
by Fletch Author Icon


 Invalid Item Open in new Window. []

by A Guest Visitor


 Altered Reality Open in new Window. [E]
Flash Fiction 5-22-20 W/C 296
by QueenNormaJean It'sa WrapY'all Author Icon


 In the Heart of Melody Open in new Window. [13+]
An orchestra played it music rose above the trees and floated through the forest.
by Prosperous Snow celebrating Author Icon

 
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Word from Writing.Com

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Don't forget to support our sponsor!

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Ask & Answer

Last time, in "Drawing on RealityOpen in new Window., I discussed the core of reality in Fantasy.

The harsh reality is that no one had any comments.

So that's all for me for October! See you next month. Until then,

DREAM ON!!!



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