A Tale of Two Qs

One of my biggest pet peeves in writing is the idea of a word count. "In order for us to even read what you've written, your piece needs to be a certain length." For some reason, that doesn't seem to cut it. One of the marks of a good writer is being able to balance out quality vs. quantity.

According to Merriam-Webster.com, quantity is defined as the "total amount or number" and originally comes from the Latin quantus, meaning "how much" or "how many". This is a measure of amount and can easily be counted. Quantity talks about word count, page count... how much a person has written. On the other hand, quality is the measurement of how good something is. It is defined as the "degree of excellence" or "superiority of kind" and comes from the Latin qualis, meaning "of what kind".

Imagine these as graphs. Along the y-axis, you have quantity. Along the x-axis, quality is plotted. Find the area under the curve (hoorah for calculus!) and you'll have some measure of how good the piece is, right? Think of that scene in Dead Poet's Society where the teacher is talking about poetry if you don't get what I'm talking about.

Now, some writers have a very high quantity score, but a low quality score. For example, the guy who wrote Moby Dick. A high number multiplied by a low number usually gives a medium number (ie on a 1-10 scale, 2x10=20). For the sake of our purposes, let's make a rule that the factors can't add to more than 12. An author with a higher quality score and a lower quantity score would have a similar result (10x2=20). The best result with the restrictions we've applied is to even out the numbers and make the factors as close to equal as possible, or have 6x6=36. This would seem to imply that a balance between quality and quantity is the most useful.

But is this really the case? To some extent, yes. Both quality and quantity are important, but rather than having them work against each other, it's best to have good quality. Having good quality will undoubtedly lead to some increase in quantity. The point I'm trying to make? That quality >> quantity.

The verdict? Don't worry about how much you write. Instead, pay attention to the details and little gems that make the quality of the writing higher. Usually length will follow, but don't force yourself to write with lots of words unless you have to.

Write more?

I have discovered that I really need to write more, specifically from Snapshots, chapter six. I really need to figure out exactly what happens to Priya Shasthri and how that affects Sharpe and Michael and the conversation they have. I need to figure out if Priya would take Michael home... that is how he would get back home that night because Sharpe doesn't really drive (he doesn't have a car) and it's too late for Michael to walk home (silly thing called curfew that they have).

But it'll have to wait until the end of the chapter to decide because Priya's explanation is going to take awhile. I think I shall go take some time to write now, especially now that I do not have to worry about classes and all of that this week!

Shiny New Character!

Introducing brand-new, shiny character! I got an idea for a story when I was sitting in CORE lecture and this character won't leave, so I figured I should write a little bit down about him.

Tarachand doesn't exactly live in our world. Instead, he lives in Almedrim (Seleweno, Sininen, to be mroe exact) and he's a member of a monastic community. He's about seventeen years of age and has been living there for about a dozen years.

Their culture is very different from ours. They count the years by solstices and the way the twin moons align in the sky. The monastery is dedicated to a monotheistic religion, worshipping Anilfirin (Elven name). The Tamesians are the ethnic people from which the Winged Raiders com.


Character Name: Tarachand Paras (“Tarachand” is Sanskrit for “star”, “Paras” is Sanskrit for “touchstone”.) I do really enjoy using Sanskrit names.

Birth Date: Morning after Winter Solstice. Lunn and Carn were aligned (during Solstice, they are only aligned every third Solstice). He is currently about seventeen.

Place of Birth: Sobotaj, Sininen. This is one of the southeastern most communities and it is under the constant threat of war from the Dark Elves and raids by the Winged Raiders.

Residence: Monastery of Anilfirin in Seleweno, about twenty miles north of Cynelic

Race: Human, possibly tainted by Tamesian blood somewhere up the line.

Height: Five foot, ten inches.

Weight: ~150 pounds

Clothing Sizes / Styles: He tends to wear loose clothing and mostly long robes, which is what everyone wears at the monastery. When he has his choice, he will remove his outer robes, preferring a simple tunic and pants instead. His clothing is well-worn and patched in many places and with all sorts of colours of cloth.

Hair Color: Almost black. He is from the south eastern region of Sininen and they tend to be darker.

Hair Length: Straight and long enough to pull back into a ponytail. He tends to braid it at night so that it will not tangle.

Eye Color: Dark with golden flecks around the rim, signifying that he has Tamesian blood in him and is an outcast because of that.

Handedness: Right-handed. Everyone in their monastery has been forced to be right-handed, at least to write and eat.

Jewelry: None. No jewelry is allowed at the monastery.

General Appearance: Tarachand is of approximately average height, weight and build for a young human male. His dark hair reaches down well past his shoulders and is fairly fine. He often keeps this tied back. His skin is pale compared to his family, but naturally darker than the others at the monastery and it has a slightly jaundiced tint, due to the small bit of Tamesian heritage he has.
The clothing he wears is worn and tattered around the edges. His hands are perpetually covered in ink stains and often, he will walk around the monastery without shoes on, especially during the summer.

Relationship with Family: Tarachand doesn’t really know his real family because he was dropped off at the monastery when he was a small child to be placed under the care of Ahbahs Nirav (the Abbot). He considers Nirav to be a father to him and their relationship is very close.

Key Family / Relatives: Ahbahs Nirav

Relationship with Friends: Jahangir is one of the other members of the monastery. He is almost heretical for his beliefs and enjoys questioning the practices of the others. He is somewhat rash in his ways and stands up for what he thinks is right. One way that he dissents from the main group is that he believes that there is beauty in everything, not just in the culture of the monastery. Seeing truth and beauty in the pagan beliefs is more than enough to put him at odds with Tarachand, who has grown up believing everything that Nirav has told him to be true.
~Ellywn is a female wanderer who has settled down for a short time just outside of the monastery. Originally from Cynelic, she was taken in by Elven adoptive parents (their own children had long since left home) when she was a child after her parents died of the plague (similar to influenza). When she was sixteen, she left home and has been travelling since then. She is fairly caring, though she recognizes that life can be stripped away from people in an instant, so she tends not to form emotional bonds to people easily.
~Ahbahs Nirav, or simply Nirav, is the Abbot of the monastery. He is about eighty-five years of age as humans reckon time and he has cared for Tarachand since the boy was young. As the head of the monastery, he is in-charge of and responsible for everything that goes on there. He adheres strongly to the old traditions, even if they are considered out-of-date by some of the other members. To him, there is no excuse to deviate from the law and if you do, strict punishments are to follow. However, if one follows the law, Nirav is very kind and benevolent. He prefers to teach by example, rather than speaking. There are weeks where he will only speak while in prayer to Anilfirin.

Key Friends: Jahangir, Nirav, Ellwyn

Educational History: Tarachand was schooled at the monastery since he was a young boy. He learned to read and write and the basics of mathematics. When he was twelve, he began his training as a scribe. Because he is a scribe, he has learned how to read Common and Elven, the two main written languages of Almendrim.

Work History: Scribe training from the time he was twelve until he turned fifteen. He has been a scribe at the monastery since then.

Skills: Cooking, planting, harvesting, mending, transcribing the ancient manuscripts

Bad Habits / Vices: Vanity. Despite not being able to own very much (monastery rules), he really cares about how he looks... most of the time. He is very proud of his hair, but hates his eyes.

Quirks: He tends to bite his lips together when he’s focusing really hard on something or occasionally when he is working.

Best Qualities: Follows the rules, contemplative, emotionally and mentally stable, a good worker

Worst Qualities: People pleaser, vain

Key Childhood Experiences: Not remembering his family and being dropped off at the monastery when he was about five-years-old.

Key Teenage Experiences: Meeting Ellwyn, scribe training.

Sexual Background: Everyone entering the monastery has to take a vow of celibacy, which may only be broken if said person leaves the monastery.

Personal Goals: To be able to belong somewhere and be accepted by people. Because of this, he is a people-pleaser.

Morality / Ethics: Tarachand is legalistic about following the rules of the monastery, as he was raised there. When he meets Ellwyn and begins wondering if the solitary life is right for him, he feels bad for questioning what he’s been taught all his life. Tarachand is religious and worships Anilfirin.

Style of Speech: Not as formal as Nirav, but more formal than an average human of Almendrim would speak and quite a bit more formal than a human of the Shadowlands (ie, our world) would normally talk.

Other Important Details: Other than the fact he’s a brand-new fantasy character? Really nothing.

Update

Well, I'm awake and have nothing better to do, so I might as well blog. I haven't been able to knit, so I've been writing in my free time instead. Most of it is for a story that I'm working on with a friend over instant messenger. It's really starting to get interesting because there are a lot of potential issues that could come up and last night, we were talking about the issue of racism as it applies to a fantasy setting. Not usually the best path to take, but I do have a character who is racist, and perhaps almost for a justified reason. She takes it way too far and it is wrong, but considering the fact that her people have been at war and she hasn't had the most ideal life, she could be doing a lot worse than she is.

But that's really not what I intended to talk about. What I wanted to talk about was the idea of looking back on stuff that I've written over the past year or two and seeing how far I've come. One thing (in writing or in life) is that it's hard to make a judgement on that when you're in the middle of a situation. You really have to step back and make an observation.

I've even been looking back at Snapshots, which isn't necessarily the best embodiment of this. I was re-reading over some of what I have written and in the second chapter, only the very ending is strong. Chapter three, which was written in April of 2008, is mediocre. Really, only chapters one (because it was the first), four and what I've written so far of six are what I would consider really good. Chapter five is decent, especially towards the end. I've started to learn how to weave description in with dialogue, which is a most excellent thing.

I think I should work some on chapter six over spring break. But for now, I should probably go to bed and try to get at least couple more hours of sleep before morning really comes.

Slightly OT: Words and their Meanings

It just came to mind that so many of our English words come from other languages and if we took time to learn bits and pieces of these other languages, how much would our vocabulary (and grammar) increase and become improved?

Through studying Latin last year, I have come to know more about the English language, including the proper uses of who and whom. (The words that I still get confused are affect and effect...) My vocabulary has also increased, though I'm not sure if that's always so readily apparent. But one thing that I've realized about myself is that I learn words by their roots in other languages, most obviously Latin and Greek.

Recently, I've had at least two duh moments when I've come to realize definitions of words and how they're connected. Allow me to explain. Firstly was the word diagnosis. Pretty easy, right? Did you know that it's Greek origin and comes from the same root that the word agnostic comes from? The root gnosis means knowledge, making agnostic to mean without knowledge. This would make sense because agnostics believe that we cannot know for sure about whether or not God is out there. Second duh moment was being told that confidence comes from the Latin roots for con (with) and fidere (to trust). Having studied some Latin, I probably should've realized that.

But what does this have to do with writing? Nothing much in particular, other than noting the fact that some of my characters are bilingual and some of them would pick up on meanings of words like that. I know Sharpe definitely would and possibly characters like Donovan Isaacs or Aislynn Celeste, both of whom speak English and at least one other language fluently (Donovan's fluent in English, Spanish and knows a few words and phrases in French and Aislynn's more than fluent in French).

That is all for now, as I need to go eat breakfast before the day really gets started.