stylee

FRIDAY (last one must have been thursday - quien sabe)

(had to do a rewrite, my tonals were strident, had to step back)

since this stylee week, lets talk orginality and plagiarism

martin de leon pulled my coat to my boy salvador taking incoming

seems this shane jones, author, i use the word advisedly, of the the light boxes snatched concepts, characters, passages, tonals, structure etc from people of paper and called it legit

sal cried foul

jones partisans jumped sal, wheres the harm they ask, sampling is a legit artistic tech nowdays

like i said in reality hunger post, everybody steal, what artist dont build on whats come before, but there is an ethic to stealing, you digest it, you make it yours, you dont just steal,

dont have to define artistic thievery, everybody know what we talking about, so now we
got jones partisans declaring that orginality in art is overrated -  o the shame of it all

for a longtime everything i wrote sound like bad marquez, but if you dont grow

past your influences you derivative, i dont care what you call it, and if you steal

folks ideas, words, concepts and characters you a thief, where is the art in that

recent interview by sal still crying foul - insult to injury is moviedeal, acclaim and dollars
sal didnt get, but such is the literary life, sal got the respect and i expect him to move on

he who steals from my youth steal trash

the real tragedy here is that im reminded just how profound, complex and moving
the people of paper is, downright depressing, i like to think my novel as a pathfinder

but compared to the people of paper im barely in the game, i need to read
it again, see what i can steal  -   once again best to keep in mind something

aishah rahman told me a long time ago -  once in my callow youth told her i wanted to be the
greatest writer ever lived, she said art, thats not what you want, you want to sing your song

the best you can sing it, that way you can appreciate other folk singing theirs

all my love

rdoc

FRIDAY

finally reach the stage where i enjoy working on this novel, every hour i work on it now makes it better - and to think i have a whole 4 month period of making it better, life is good

recent proclamation by vir gov mcdonnell of confederate history month has opened some interesting worm cans

not only was it civilwar revisionism but it didnt even mention slavery, this is in keeping with the confederate apologists position that the civilwar had nothing to do w/slavery

it was about states rights, a grand old way of life, etc, but surely not slaves and that blacks and progressives who insist that is was need to get a life and move on

some apologists claim that only a few southerns were slave owning elites so the confederate soldiers who died were fighting for their own causes

more like they were fighting for slave owning elites who tricked them then and trick them now into championing causes that are not in their own self interest

like being against health care

of course vir proclamation of independence claim itself aggrievance a slave holding state, lets go to the text:

The people of Virginia in their ratification of the Constitution of the United States of America, adopted by them in convention on the twenty-fifth day of June, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty-eight, having declared that the powers granted under said Constitition were derived from the people of the United States and might be resumed whensoever the same should be perverted to their injury and oppression, and the Federal Government having perverted said powers not only to the injury of the people of Virginia, but to the oppression of the Southern slave-holding States:

conservative black backers, sheila johnson of bet and douglas wilder, the 1st black governor
professed to be surprised that the repub they supported over the dem would do such a thing

shelia johnson, dismayed that the politican she thought bought and paid for had wandered off the plantation, wrote:

“I must condemn Gov. McDonnell’s proclamation honoring ‘Confederate History Month’ and its insensitive disregard of Virginia’s complicated and painful history, the remnants of which many Virginians still wrestle with today,“ said Johnson, an African-American business owner.

“The complete omission of slavery from an official government document, which purports to be a call for Virginians to ‘understand’ and ‘study’ their history, is both academically flawed and personally offensive. If Virginians are to celebrate their ‘shared history’ as this proclamation suggests, then the whole truth of this history must be recognized and not evaded.”

after a day or so of stonewalling mcdonnell backed up w/2nd proclamation proclaiming slavery as uncool

strictly political expediency, we know where his heart is

what, i must ask, did sheila johnson expect of him, she need to go back to her bootie butt videos and
leave the real world to those of us who really care

the moral of this story is that black conservatives should not be surprised when they lie down w/dogs they get fleas

on the flip side, organizing for america, is doing a summer training camp for organizers
that is so cool, the rightwing being using this to train their farm team of poitical/community organizers

wish i was willing, wouldnt mind having a little training on my organizing skills, but tis i believe a young persons game

all my love

rdoc




TUESDAY

ive reached the point now every day i write on it i make it better
a more fitting legacy, ive reached point now where its fun

4 months of woodshed will make it tight and right
it will take an act of god to knock me off this groove

rdoc




MONDAY

wow, has it been a week, i been on a shamans quest, looking for power
working on my vision
have always prided myself on my spiritvision,

dealing w/folk spirit to spirit

frank richs column yesterday refer to obamas ability to be all things to all people

call obama a shape shifter

thats a power i wouldnt mind having myself

how does that translate into the realworld

i have in my professional life  attempted

to deploy traditional magical powers in a contemporary manifestation

is shapeshifting being all things to all people or more what the power demand

i dont have time to work this, got to clock pages

rdoc

SUNDAY

well its official, when asked what he checked on the census
the whitehouse replied, obama checked, black, africanam, negro

in case there still any confusion, afroams have always been a bastard race
why would we give up the one drop rule just as its working in our favor

making us an expanding race/culture instead of a contracting one
giving us pretty good positioning in the multiculti 21st century

i grew up with blackfolk looked white and would tear the heart out
of somebody try to deny them their blackness

blackness is a state of mind

what we got to do is make it so cool to be black
that everybody in the world want to claim some

ima give them a mission greater than their adversity

ima give them a destiny

rdoc

WEDNESDAY

thinking about style today, cause of this novel, and my soph fiction class

their 1st groping efforts towards style
figuring out how you like to tell a story

mastery of craft that facilitate
your particular voice

the delicate handling baby steps require

thinking about this novel of mine
how i hope its a masterpiece

how it could so easily be a farce
sylee so unortho its hard to tell

i had a vision, a literary vision, saw this novel i wanted to write
sat down to write it conventionally and it just wouldnt dance

for awhile that cause me to question my own literary value, which
would be fatal, in a literary world that deny me

want this novel

to sing - for a variety of reasons
some high some low, all good

all my love

rdoc

Comments

[BuffaloSoldier]

SINCE THEY WANTED TO BE FREE BuffaloSoldier salutes EcholCole/RobertWalker Shapeshifter. That's one way of putting it. I've been saying all along The LionKing plays Identities. Black with the BlackPeople, Son of Immigrant with the Si, Se Puede crowd, Son of Africa, as expressed by Jerry Rollins and Qadifi, when in Ghana addressing the shortcomings of his father's native Kenya etc. At no point have I ever said these were false or even misleading identities. Just that anyone within the range of any of those identities should approach with caution. See, BlackAmerica, as you pointed out, SoulDoctor, and as one example, can't easily shapeshift or flip identities. Whether we like it or not, and ultimately, whether it's "fair" or not, We're seen as subculture,flashmobs,fifty killed in one Chicago week,cousin killing cousin over showing Easter leg. We're far from that identity in fact, but as we labor with that identity, you and I have chosen the route of novel writing to offset that torturous identity and our efforts make us more earthbound than is required to fly unencumbered through skies of changing identities. Our BlackAmerican identity will soar, though, when it is as commonplace to think of those Brothers who became doctors and made a Pact to remain in the city as it is to envisions flashmobs terrorizing our BlackStreets.
One last thing: The LionKing is very very smart. He pushed the idea of the census with his choosing Black/AfricanAmerican/Negro. Lifting the spirits of the %96 of the Black%96 that voted for him. (Infuriating the smaller less political significant BiRacialNation, by the way) But, those Biracials pointed out to me, at least, there was no block for them or him to push. You had to make a choose. And he certainly doesn't look white. Checking more than one block wasn't an option. One is not Black and White. One could be a mixture, though. I'm BuffaloSoldier and I approve this message.

[arthur flowers]

i also approve this message

[masterymistery]

Re plagiarism, I agree with most of what you say, and just to add also that providing the appropriate attribution doesn't make it any less bad! Sorry, I meant "undesirable" (there's no such thing as "bad").

There's a quote from the world of science, sorry but I can't remember who said it, Newton maybe: "If I have seen further it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants."

BTW, Absolutely adore the artwork of the sax player