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***CHALLENGE SUBMISSIONS CLOSED***
Hi everyone! Now that sign-ups are closed we're going to go straight in to getting challenges submitted so that our ficcers can start writing as soon as possible. So this is where you submit 'em!
A quick refresher on how this is going to work: anyone can submit challenges, whether you're signed up for the challenge (or the community) or not. When challenge submissions close- in about a week, depending on the volume of challenges we get- I'll collate them into one big post and stick the list up somewhere for participants to snag on a first-come, first-served basis (I will go last. :)) Because ideally there will be a really large range of challenges to choose from, please pimp this everywhere you like and suggest lots of challenges, it's greatly apprciated!
Also, just in case you've missed the eight zillion posts on challenge format, this is what a challenge has to have:
EITHER a theme or thematic quotation OR a requested scenario
PLUS an optional two of CHARACTER, PAIRING, SETTING or TIME PERIOD.
I probably won't be a total nazi about this, so there's room for a little variation: but this is the general format.
So! Get going! Be inspirational! Have fun! :D
***CHALLENGE SUBMISSIONS CLOSED***
June 8 2005, 00:25:48 UTC 6 years ago
BTW, if this is too many, or if you think some of them don't work, feel free to remove as many as you like :)
1. Theme: Misoneism
2. Theme: A death-blow is a life-blow to some,
Who ‘till they died, did not alive become
Who, had they lived, had died, but when
They died, vitality begun
—Emily Dickenson
3. Scenario/theme: Cosplay
4. Scenario: Popsicles
5. Theme: Potentiality, discarded and/or discovered
6. Theme: Self vs. other
7. Theme: Lost in translation
8. Scenario: A button, a feather, a stack of unsorted papers
9. Theme/scenario: Deus ex machina (God in the Machine)
10. Theme/scenario: Dog’s best friend
11. Theme: Faith and fear
12. Theme/scenario: Improbable cause
13. Scenario: End-user license agreements (EULAs)
14. Theme/scenario: Bureaucracy
15. Theme/scenario: My time remaining
16. Theme/scenario: 42
17. Scenario/theme: Loch-ness monster
18. Theme/scenario: Twice forsworn
19. Scenario: “There’s no way this is going to work.”
20. Theme/scenario: Full circle
21. Theme/scenario: “I say the world shall end in ice”
22. Scenario/theme: Teen existantial angst
23. Scenario/theme: Flowers for the dead
24. Scenario/theme: Tarantula
25. Scenario: Unfortunate typos and/or slips of the tongue
26. Scenario: “That’s what they told me.”
27. Theme/scenario: Overkill
28. Scenario/theme: Piano lessons
29. Theme/scenario: Learning to walk again
30. Theme/scenario: Danger to myself and others
31. Theme/scenario: Fermata (stopped)
32. Theme: 缘份 (yuanfen)
33. Scenario: The Powers that Tea
(Notes: no. 21 is a quote, but I forget where from. Several of these have multiple meanings--for an example, "fermata" is also a music term--but I'll leave it up to whoever picks them to choose which meaning to use. Also, please excuse any bad puns that may have been included in this list.)
June 8 2005, 02:47:53 UTC 6 years ago
Mmmm, Emily Dickinson.... *g* Some of these may be a little short? Feel free to elaborate a bit if you want. But I'll put them all up anyway, definitely. Thanks!
6 years ago
6 years ago
6 years ago
6 years ago
6 years ago
June 8 2005, 03:43:26 UTC 6 years ago
My bunch....
... so you may notice something about the quotes: they're all from the beginnings of YW books. This is because I like them all. :D And they're all YW-themed already, so...1.THEME: How shall only faithfulness prevail
against the peril of the overarching deep?
--Trigram 63/Chi Chi: Water Over Fire
CHARACTER: Nita
TIME PERIOD: futurefic!
2. THEME: I have been a word in a book... there is nothing which I have not been.
-- The Song of Taliesin
3. THEME: (because now
is all you ever get:
now is)
-- excerpt from a private recension of the Oath
Diane Duane
CHARACTER: Carmela
TIME PERIOD: A Wizard's Holiday
4. THEME: Footsteps in the snow
suggest where you have been,
point where you were going:
but where they suddenly vanish
never dismiss the possibility
of flight...
--The Book of Night With Moon
PAIRING: Nita/Kit (don't give me grief. I had to have it somewhere...)
5. THEME: I'd like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over. 50
May no fate wilfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
Not to return. Earth's the right place for love:
I don't know where it's likely to go better.
-- Birches, Robert Frost.
PAIRING: Tom/Carl (see above.)
6. THEME: I am the Cat who took up his stance
by the Persea Tree, on the night we
destroyed the enemies of God...
--Pert em hru, Tr. Budge
CHARACTER: Kit
TIME PERIOD: Futurefic, pref university/college age. (Not that he necessarily would go to uni. just around that age.)
7. THEME: Bite: bite hard, and find the tenth life.
--The Gaze of Rhoua's Eye, Diane Duane
SETTING: an alternate universe. Can take that in YW-context- ie one of the myriad worlds as seen in TBONWM- or in a general ficcer's context, I'd love to see either.
8. SCENARIO: Wizardry is one of the most ancient and misunderstood of arts. Its public image for centuries has been one of a mysterious pursuit, practiced in occult surroundings, and usually used at the peril of one's soul. The modern wizard, who works with tools more advanced than bat's blood and beings more complex than medieval demons, knows how far from the truth that image is.
-- excerpt from the Manual (Diane Duane).
CHARACTER: Carl
9. Scenario: on the use of master words.
CHARACTER: Dairine
10. THEME: ...it is not uncommon for a man to become lost in a single letter, or to hear a voice rise up rom the silent page; and then only one imperfect letter, one missing page, can bring him back to the land where a book, once opened, may still be closed...
--Midrashim, Howard Schwartz
CHARACTER: Dairine
11. SCENARIO: one of Nita or Kit has lost their wizardry; how? Why? do they/can they get it back again? Prefer hopeful ending. ;)
PAIRING: optional Nita/Kit if you like. But not soppy.
That's it for now...
June 8 2005, 03:48:57 UTC 6 years ago
THEME: When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears:
Did He smile His work to see?
Did He who made the lamb make thee?
-- Tyger, Tyger, William Blake.
CHARACTERS: Dairine, the Lone Power.
And I just thought of this one:
SCENARIO: something with a Cockatrice and Dairine. Maybe about the "rafting project" trying to save them. although perhaps that's not in Dairine's usual style of work. :D I feel like Dairine fic, I confess.
June 8 2005, 04:11:01 UTC 6 years ago
SCENARIO:
CHARACTERS: Dairine, Nita, Kit optional. Sisterfic!
June 9 2005, 23:05:16 UTC 6 years ago
Theme: "It went many years,
But at last came a knock,
And I thought of the door
With no lock to lock."
- The Lockless Door by Robert Frost
Pairing: Nita/Kit. Note the 'at last came a knock,' from above. Not too fluffy, either -- more serious.
Time period: Any time that the situation could fall in well, which would be future-ish, I suppose.
Another-
Theme: "For beauty is nothing
but the beginning of terror we can just
barely endure,
and we admire it so because it calmly disdains
to destroy us."
- Rainer Maria Rilke
"The First Elegy," Duino Elegies
Characters: Nita and the Starsnuffer.
June 10 2005, 01:11:18 UTC 6 years ago
June 9 2005, 23:13:51 UTC 6 years ago
Hmmm....
I won't promise never to write on any of these myself, but there you go....1. Scenario: The Lone Power's POV on the confrontation/climax/resolution in High Wizardry.
2. Theme: Reconciliation. (Scenario-ish notes: Either between persons or between a person and an idea, etc.; if between characters, might be good to establish the conflict if it's not one that's already in the books.)
3. Thematic quotation: "When you call my name/It's like a little prayer/...." (Madonna, "Like a Prayer") ...Yes, in fact, I did just suggest songfic. *angelic smile* Any portion of the lyrics may inspire the fic, but should not be included in wordcount.
Pairing: Genfic
4. Thematic Quotation: "Does Your Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavor On the Bedpost Overnight?" -- or other lyrics from that song; lyrics should be excluded from wordcount
Note: Just because I wanted to see if anybody came up with something for that....
5. Scenario: Reenactment. Reenacting previous conflicts in a ceremonial (but not at all perfunctory) way seems to be something that comes up a lot in wizardry, and not just in the sense that every Ordeal and every Choice has something in common. I mean things like the Song of the Twelve, Moytura, the feline Powers' battle with the Old Serpent at the root of the Tree -- write about a reenactment. (Curious point: does narrative causality play a role? Or, well, something else about the situation? It's demonstrated that the reenactments can be modified by intent on either side, but what are the implications of starting a particular one? How does it affect the ways in which things can go wrong or right?)
6. Scenario: This is sort of related to the previous one, but instead of a deliberate ceremonial reaction, how about a YW living-out of some favorite story? Either a "how it really happened" sort of thing (Remember the Defender talking about how she was Prometheus, but never had to steal the fire?) or just... how it works out.
7. Scenario: Lone Power vs. Lone Power -- when describing the battle beneath the Tree between the feline Powers and the Old Serpent, the cats point out that the Lone One is on both sides, being both the Old Serpent and sa'Rrahh who fights in this case alongside her dam and sisters. Where and how else might this happen?
8. Thematic quotation: Lyrics again. Clint Black's "No Time to Kill," lyrics here. Lyrics still are excluded from word count.
June 10 2005, 01:12:08 UTC 6 years ago
Re: Hmmm....
Thanks! We really needed these. *sigh* :)6 years ago
6 years ago
June 10 2005, 03:49:42 UTC 6 years ago
1. Theme - Father of Lies
Setting - between Deep Wizardry and High Wizardry
2. Theme - What is loved, lives
Character - Ed
Time Period - pre-Deep Wizardry
3. Scenario - That darn bird!
Pairing - Tom/Carl
June 10 2005, 08:56:59 UTC 6 years ago
June 10 2005, 04:13:03 UTC 6 years ago
The Winged Defender confronts the Lone One at some point in time after the war in Heaven and his casting out by the Powers.
Theme: This is mostly because it'd be the most awesome thing ever if someone wrote this, but Sandman's Death meets the Lone One. Imagine the conversation (or lack there of) they might have.
June 10 2005, 08:57:24 UTC 6 years ago
June 10 2005, 06:55:12 UTC 6 years ago
Until his body smothered him, until his being felt the need of soaring, the need
Of air...
-Wallace Stevens
CHARACTERS: Ronan, the Winged Defender
2)THEME: (long one here)
You will never be alone, you hear so deep
a sound when autumn comes. Yellow
pulls across the hills and thrums,
or the silence after lightning before it says
its names- and then the clouds' wide-mouthed
apologies. You were aimed from birth:
you will never be alone. Rain
will come, a gutter filled, an Amazon,
long aisles- you never heard so deep a sound,
moss on rock, and years. You turn your head-
that's what the silence meant: YOU'RE NOT ALONE.
The whole wide world pours down.
-William Stafford
CHARACTERS: Daryl
3)THEME: Death is the mother of beauty.
-Wallace Stevens
CHARACTERS: The Lone Power, Dairine
4)THEME: There are parts of me I'd love to lose
Simply and irretrievably
As a coin clatters down a manhole's spine,
Vanished in one thin chain of sound
-Liza Flum
CHARACTERS: Joanne, Nita
5)THEME: Patience vs. abandonment
CHARACTERS: Young Nita and Liused
6)THEME: Because these wings are no longer wings to fly
But merely fans to beat the air
The air which is now thoroughly small and dry
Smaller and dryer than the will
Teach us to care and not to care
Teach us to sit still.
-T. S. Eliot
CHARACTERS: Nita and the Lone Power
TIME PERIOD: Before Betty's death
7)THEME: I whisper your name
into places
sacred
the slanted lines
where waves
pound the shore
the beam of light,
streaming from my window
waking me like a caress
-Elizabeth Cooke
8)THEME/SCENARIO (choose which you wish to take this as. Can I do this?): "...Some mornings I'd wake in daylight to find my body covered with paw prints in blood; I looked as though I'd been painted with roses.
-Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
PAIRING: Nita/Lone Power. =o
9)Scenario/theme: Monsters under the bed.
10)Time period: Six minutes to three AM.
Characters: Nita and Fred
11)Theme: First cars
Characters: Kit, the (memory of?) the Lotus
12)THEME: The man bent over his guitar,
A shearsman of sorts. The day was green.
They said, "You have a blue guitar.
You do not play things as they are."
The man replied, "Things as they are
Are changed upon the blue guitar."
And they said then, "But play, you must,
A tune beyond us, yet ourselves,"
A tune upon the blue guitar
Of things exactly as they are."
-Wallace Stevens
CHARACTERS: Quelt
13)SCENARIO: Taking the SAT
And um. 's all I can think of, for now at least. I hope these aren't too long.
June 10 2005, 06:55:55 UTC 6 years ago
June 10 2005, 08:56:19 UTC 6 years ago
And, NO. Sorry, I thought this was really clear *facepalm* I'll go and make it more so though- but briefly, this is ONLY a challenge submission post, and it occurs to me I really should have screened the comments but... anyway, no, don't claim challenges here. Once this is closed- I'm not sure when that will be, but probably not more than a week from now- I will collate them together and make a post compiling them all, from which people will pick their challenges on a first-come, first served basis. Probably I will only allow one person per challenge, unless someone emails me and says "OMG THERE'S NOTHING I CAN WRITE THERE AT ALL ALL THERE IS LEFT IS OBSCURE SLASH PAIRINGS WAH", and then I will relax a bit, but I doubt this will happen, luckily. ;)
Um, does that help? :D Thanks for pointing out that that wasn't clear, too.
6 years ago
6 years ago
June 10 2005, 22:52:21 UTC 6 years ago
THEME: It is legitimate to crawl, after the wings are broken.
-William Stafford
PAIRING: Nita/ The Lone Power. I'M SUCH A LOSER AHAHHA
THEME: I follow a trail so old the hounds lost it years ago.
-William Stafford
PAIRING: Nita/Kit
THEME: Actors, their relief. I have to be myself with no vacation.
-William Stafford
CHARACTER: Esmeli
THEME: Once you decide to do right, life is easy -- no distractions.
-William Stafford
THEME: The grace we need to find will not be found by the graceful only.
-William Stafford
CHARACTERS: Dairine and Nita
THEME: The greatest ownership of all is to glance around and understand.
-William Stafford
CHARACTER: Daryl
THEME: "What happens to a dream deferred?
-Langston Hughes, I believe
CHARACTERS: Roshaun (and Dairine if one wishes)
THEME/SCENARIO: Elvis
THEME/SCENARIO: Pots of gold at the ends of rainbows
THEME/SCENARIO: quiddity- the essence that makes something the kind of thing it is and makes it different from any other (definition taken from fanfiction.net's online dictionary because I am LAZY)
THEME/SCENARIO: Corn is not just corn. (Discworld reference ahoy)
THEME: Have you learn'd lessons only of those who admired you, and were tender with you, and stood aside for you?
Have you not learn'd great lessons from those who reject you, and brace themselves against you? or who treat you with contempt, or dispute the passage with you?
-Walt Whitman
CHARACTER: Dairine
June 11 2005, 01:02:33 UTC 6 years ago
you're right about the Langston Hughes, too- or at least he wrote a whole series of poems about the dream deferred, so I should think so. *resolves to go look it up*
6 years ago
6 years ago
6 years ago
6 years ago
6 years ago
6 years ago
6 years ago
6 years ago
6 years ago
June 11 2005, 18:26:43 UTC 6 years ago
Setting: Museum of Natural History
and
Characters: Kit and Carlotta
June 12 2005, 06:40:37 UTC 6 years ago
6 years ago
6 years ago
6 years ago
6 years ago
June 11 2005, 18:50:55 UTC 6 years ago
(Probably more fun for the writer to think of the details hisherself.)
June 11 2005, 19:14:10 UTC 6 years ago
Time period: Summer after that eventful spring break.
Setting: Ireland.
June 11 2005, 19:33:05 UTC 6 years ago
Character: Joanne.
June 12 2005, 20:05:16 UTC 6 years ago
Characters: Tom and/or Carl.
June 12 2005, 20:09:08 UTC 6 years ago
Setting/Timeperiod: You know when!
June 15 2005, 15:39:11 UTC 6 years ago
2. Scenario: Dairine having to work with the redeemed Lone Power.
3. Scenario (sorta): Could Dairine have cried for the Lone One after her mother's death? (Possibilities that come to mind include AU or being asked that question later....)
4. Scenario: Crossover with Star Wars. Please no prequel-bashing, if I may stipulate that, though fond mockery of any stage is acceptable.
5. Scenario: Crossover with the Chronicles of Narnia.
June 15 2005, 18:52:32 UTC 6 years ago
Thanks PK, for the heads-up
Scenario: What happened to those poor baby helicopters in the first book?June 15 2005, 19:52:59 UTC 6 years ago
June 15 2005, 21:32:27 UTC 6 years ago
June 15 2005, 21:43:47 UTC 6 years ago
The More Loving One
By WH Auden
Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
But on earth indifference is the least
We have to dread from man and beast.
How should we like it were stars to burn
With a passion for us that we could not return?
If equal affection cannot be,
Let the more loving one be me.
Admirer as I think I am
Of stars that do not give a damn,
I cannot, now I see them, say
I missed one terribly all day.
Were all stars to disappear or die,
I should learn to look at an empty sky
And feel its total dark sublime,
Though this might take me a little time.
June 15 2005, 22:09:43 UTC 6 years ago
June 15 2005, 22:19:05 UTC 6 years ago
Time period: Carl's past.
June 15 2005, 22:27:08 UTC 6 years ago
Characters: Ronan, Nita