Wednesday, August 13, 2008

the best writing on the internet

So says Mr. gingaTao

I don’t like creative writing, and I haven’t rated a poet since Samuel Taylor Coleridge, then again I haven’t read one since so what do I know. Add in the fact this guy is an Aussie who at times claims he has “the best writing on the internet” and we're off to a spanking start.

It’s not your average blog, in fact, it’s not a blog at all, but a collection of creative writings and poems.

Boring stuff first, the template is generally meh, at least it’s white. While I suspect you really couldn’t give a shit, I would suggest you sharpen it a little, dump that trash along the side, no one goes to your site to read the news, and fuck right off with your gingaTao store where I can buy a thong, or credibility, or some other such shit.

Tighten up those categories, structuralism etc, make it accessible for the reader to identify what you’re playing at. Give a newcomer a chance to figure out what you’re doing. That is, if it’s not too uncool for you.

I do find it hard to criticise anything you write because of it’s artistic and therefore subjective nature (although that seems to suggest that other blogs are of less artistic merit… who knows anymore).
Anyway, what you’re getting is my very personal opinion on what you do, while clearly it is something that runs through your veins, it’s not in the form of anything I would normally warm to.

The writing, you write your wee heart out, I love that. I found your best moments to be, surprisingly to me, a few of your short poems. A small boy holding flowers was delightful, to dust was a very good short piece on imagery that could have left you in cliché territory but didn’t, and some things are not ghosts is hushed and vivid.

I didn’t really enjoy your narrative pieces, personally I missed continuity, any real thread. Individually, they were quite good, but not substantial enough to leave me wanting more. Having said that, you did occasionally really hit heights.

Throughout, we read your observation of life around you, your opinion, your condemnation, your approval, but never your heart. You are always at a distance.

Where are your heartaches, your losses, your loves?

The closest you came was a post about your father, which for the life of me I couldn’t find when I returned to get the link.

You take a very clinical view of writing which left me a bit cold:
“my hatred of critics, of genre, of stuffy old grammar grannies, of all the postfacto analysis and name creating, postpostneoclassicism, knows no bounds, the only reason writing exists is to be read, being readable is the only rule”
Where does the emotion come into play?

Without it, you can write twice around the globe and remain dime a dozen.

As talented as you are technically, the only emotion you really stir is indifference.

45 comments:

  1. This, like the other blog, is just not my thing. It's very collegiate, that's the word that comes to mind when I think about it, as if this person doesn't really have his own voice, and is just riffing off of the voices of other people he/she (I can't even discern a gender, dang) read in college.

    If you want to be an artist, you need to find your own damn voice. Therein lies the art.

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  2. Isn't "best writing on the internet" kinda like saying that you "take the best shit in town"?

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  3. The pixelated banner gave me an headache. Why do people just not grasp the concept of resolution?

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  4. Nutjob, sort of like my "pundit" blogger from last week. People love to stroke themselves.

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  5. "I'm the biggest wanker in the UK."

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  6. "My teeth are the sharpest in the universe."

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  7. "The Best Tacos in Manitoba"

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  8. Ghost, you are the nastiest racoon anywhere and that's saying a lot cause raccoons are nasty from the get go.

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  9. I'm the worst rekoon speller in the comments.

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  10. "Best Maggot On a Dead Raccoon."

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  11. I'm sorry, we're saying what we are, right?

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  12. Irony, thy name art Rassles.

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  13. Anyone else feel like irony tastes strangely similar to an orange julius?

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  14. I have something stuck on my fingers.

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  15. FF, it is certainly not my syphilis. You ripped all that off with my hair and dignity!

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  16. Oh, please. That's not undignified. What's undignified is when he loses his erection inside of you because he can't catch his breath because you're exerting him too strenuously.

    Not that I know anything about that subject.

    Anyway, dignity is so overrated.

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  17. Yeah, that sounds about right.

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  18. Hey, fat guys are grateful.

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  19. They are grateful. And schweaty.

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  20. You know who else is grateful for sex? Lepers.

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  21. do you think he'd be interested? I'll take another one for the team.

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  22. I think you meant 'I'll take on another team', DPH.

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  23. Well, you are freshly waxed.

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  24. Like the Olympic swimming team, maybe? I would be okay with that. I did it in high school and it turned out pretty well.

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  25. Until they get DQ'd for filling the pool with your herpes.

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  26. well, yeah. But it would still be worth it for me.

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  27. I love when there are eight-billionty comments before the blog owner weighs in.

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  28. Please, gingatao ain't getting no sex. Which, I suppose, is why he'd be so grateful for it. Hey, DPH, take one for the team and help out gingatao. It might give him that extra little bit of umph in his writing.

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  29. Shit, sometimes they wait two months.

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  30. Well, he would get something extra for sure.

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  31. Herpes: That's just how DPH says thanks.

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  32. I think I would take on the woman's volleyball team for sure. Because they're tall and some of them are actually attractive.

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  33. Leave the soccer team for me. I fucked my way through half of the team in college, anyway. Might as well finish the job.

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  34. Thankyou. That is a very balanced and informative review. Your point about a lack of 'personal presence' or direct emotion is a debate that has continued through the blog's history. It is not me, you see, it is a performance. 'The newspaper' is a actually a feed from Amnesty International's calls to action and the 'the shop' earns enough to pay for my internet connection.
    Thankyou for your feedback and for taking the time to make such a close examination. I shall try to do something about the 'meh' factor but I can't imagine what. Have a fantabulous day full of tiny unexpected miracles like flowers blooming,

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  35. Tiny miracles? Um, let's cut back your dosage of well, whatever hormones you're on, mang. I feel like a bitch just reading that line.

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  36. Herpes: That's just how DPH says thanks.

    Bitch please, that's how I say I love you. Crabs is how I say thanks!

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  37. gingaTao - I suspected the performance or a projection element, and that the Thong store was Thong-in-cheek.

    I do think making your identity, projected or otherwise, a bit clearer would make a big difference.

    It would get you the readers you want reading you, instead of those looking for something else.

    I knew it wasn't entirely serious when you outed yourself as a Chelsea fan...

    Kudos for not being the arrogant Aussie prick I expected.

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  38. Rassles, you can have the rugby team. What they lack in teeth, they make up for with stamina and manliness.

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  39. Trust me, you do not want to shag a fella who has had his thumb up another man's arse for 80 minutes in the name of sport.

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  40. fatha- they have a sport for that? I knew I'd someday fulfill my olympic ambitions.

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  41. "tiny unexpected miracles like flowers blooming"

    Too bad he ruined that nearly perfect statement by using a comma instead of a period on the end.

    Oh well, I expected foot stomping and indignation after that review, I love it when people are decent about being dismembered. Although hissy fits do make for some really great opportunities to rag on just a bit more.

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  42. "nearly perfect", why thankyou. That is a very gracious compliment, especially from a grammar grannie,

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Grow a pair.