Myth-Folklore Blog

  ("Typewriter" by dr. shordzi via Flickr ) For my Week 14 Story Lab assignment, I read through some quotes on Jon Winokur’s Advice to Writers website. The first quote that really interested me was called “ The Golden Hours ” by Hilary Mantel. It basically says that even if you are busy with work, you can still put a few hours aside and if you are undistracted, you can accomplish a lot. I completely agree with this statement because if I honestly put my mind to writing, I can finish a lot quite fast. Even if I am busy with other schoolwork, I can always put aside an hour or two to do some writing for this class and if I am completely focused, which does not happen often, then I can accomplish a lot in that time period. The next quote that I related to was a quote by John McPhee called “ Writing is Selection ”. This quote is about how each part of writing is part of a selection process. As a writer, you choose the next paragraph, next word, next sentence, and more. I c...

("Writing a Book" by Laura via Flickr ) For my Story Lab assignment, I looked through the Writer’s Write website and found an interesting article while looking throughout the page. The article is called “ Don’t Commit These 9 Fiction-Writing Crimes ” by Alex J. Coyne. This title really jumped out at me because I wondered if I made any of these so called “crimes” throughout all the stories if I have written in the class and if I have, is there a way to fix that. The first two points of this article go together as the mistakes are to either over-describe or under-describe scenes and setting. I completely understand this because if you under-describe a scene or setting, then it could be difficult to immerse yourself in the story and if you over-describe, it may seem like too much detail that pulls away from the main story. The third point is simply grammatical mistakes, but this can definitely be avoided by some proofreading. The next two points also go together as Alex d...

  ("Royal KMM 'Magic Margin' Typewriter" by Seth Morabito via Flickr ) For my Story Lab assignment, I looked through Jon Winokur’s Advice to Writers site and found some interesting and relatable quotes. The first quote that kind of resonated with me is from Gabriel García Márquez and it talks about how the first paragraph is the hardest when writing to which I completely agree. The first paragraph for most of my stories, essays, etc. usually lays out the format or direction in which I want to go. After I finish that first paragraph, my writing usually gets a lot faster as the first paragraph lays out the framework that I follow when writing the rest of the paragraphs. However, I usually get stuck on the first paragraph because I find it difficult to provide a good introductory paragraph to kind of lead into my story or essay. Along with the first paragraph, I also find the final paragraph of a story or essay the most difficult because it’s hard for me to find a ...

("Heracles' Labors" by Egisto Sani via Flickr ) For my Story Lab assignment this week, I watched these three Crash Course videos about myths. Myths are quite interesting because it’s hard to tell where it originated, as many myths with known authors are just retelling of the stories. Therefore, I’m quite curious on how these myths started and how they were able to spread out throughout history, especially the older ones since literacy wasn’t giant back then. I also found it interesting how Crash Course explains how there isn’t just one way of interpreting a story. Stories can be interpreted in many different ways based on the person and their perspective and while these views on the story may differ, none of them are wrong. One major thing that I took away from the first video is that myths are not the same things as folktales or fairytales. I thought of them to be the same at first, but now I have a deeper understanding of what a myth actually is. As for the seco...

(Till Eulenspiegel via Wikimedia Commons ) Storybook Layout: For Anansi's stories, I will be combining a couple of stories into one bragging point (story) for this specific trickster as the stories are pretty short.     Anansi will start off talking about how they tricked the tiger so many times by combining these specific stories ( Story 1 , Story 2 , Story 3 ).  Then Anansi will later use these set of stories ( Story 4 , Story 5 ) as a larger bragging point. For Till Eulenspiegel's stories, I will use two stories with the first being "How Eulenspiegel Healed the Sick" and "How Eulenspiegel Danced on the High Wire" from this source . (If I could get maybe one more source or more stories for this trickster, it would be much appreciated) For Coyote's stories, I will be using two stories with the first being " Coyote and Grizzly " and " Coyote and the Dragon ". (If I could get a couple more reliable websites for stories on this trickste...