Elgan speaks
...and her words thunder across the land

Wherein your intrepid diarist jumps on the bandwagon.

Tuesday, May. 1, 2007
10:42 p.m.
May Day! M’aidez! We had a fantastic writing group tonight, if only because I started something that I feel a burning need to finish, not something that usually happens on Tuesday nights. Normally I write practically complete pieces in the 20 or 30 minutes we are given for each exercise, but this time the instructions were to write a sequel or a continuation of a fairy tale or folk story. So I started surmising about what happened after the little mermaid of Anderson fame leapt to her death over the bow of the wedding ship, having thrown the gift of the knife that would have given her back her fishtail and immortality with the prince’s death overboard, bought so dearly from the witch of the sea with her sisters’ beautiful hair. Of course, Hans Christian told us what happened to his heroine, how she would spend 100 years as a spirit of the air before being allowed to enter the gates of heaven, but we are left to wonder what happened to the prince.

In my story, which is unfinished, he finds himself missing the girl, his constant companion, the mute who walked as though the soles of her feet were on fire; he tires of his new wife’s incessant chatter and starts to yearn for the beautiful girl who was nothing more to him than a pet of sorts. I find it to be an intriguing premise, that she squandered her immortality for love, and he is haunted by the memory of one whom he can now never have, ever, but who would have been his had he but asked. We shall see where I go with this.

And now, because everyone else has been doing it, I’m going to answer tiaris’ questionnaire:

1. What makes an on-line journal good? When you click on one, what makes you stay? The quality of the writing is the biggest drawing card. If an ordinary person living an ordinary life can make it sound like great art, I’m in. If the writer has an extraordinary life, I will stay for the story, but if the writing is really bad, I usually lose interest.

2. What makes an on-line journal bad? What makes you run away from one? Religious prosletyzing. Anyone who tries to convert me is to be avoided. Bloggers who cannot type out words in full earn my contempt. What can I say, I’m a grammar bitch, I even belong to the diary-ring.

3. Where are most of the journals, diaries, or blogs that you read? Most of them are here at Diaryland, although I read several at Xanga where I also have a blog. There are a few at Elftown and Writersco which I keep tabs on, too, and a couple at Blogger.

4. Is there a difference in the quality of writing among the different services? If yes, how so? Not that I’ve noticed. I’ve read from others that Xanga attracts a younger crowd. This is not necessarily true. I have become part of a rather middle-aged community over there. I would say that blogging/diary sites tend to attract youngsters in general. It just depends on if you are lucky enough to find your own level or not.

5. Judging from the comments you see in other journals, diaries, and blogs, is there a difference in audiences among the different services? If yes, how so? I don’t know if the audiences are different, but the trend towards giving comments certainly is. I have more readers at Diaryland than I do at Xanga, yet I receive many more comments there than here. I may get a couple a week, especially if I write something controversial or deserving of sympathy. Over there I get five or six per entry, sometimes more.

6. How did you find most of the journals, diaries, and blogs that you read? I followed comments back to their source, or I randomly went through different letters of the alphabet here, or at Blogger I pressed the “Next blog’ button. Sometimes a blog was recommended to me, or I would check out and see what my friends were reading.

7. Does template matter? Why or why not? Yes. I don’t mind an elegant, spare, or austere design because it’s the content that matters. Anything with a jumpy or busy background, text in colours that would test for colour blindness, and those cute butterflies that follow your cursor around are all distractions from the reason why I came there.

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