Any Poets doing Lit Survivor this year?

[Guest]

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[unpredictablebijou]

I watched a bit of the huge drama that happened over the survivor contest in the author's hangout this year. It was amazing, how het up everyone got.

I'm assuming the poetry version is slightly more drama free.

I could be wrong.

But I went and looked at the link, and while I suspect I'm just not organized enough to do anything like that, i do have an extraordinarily obtuse but sincere question. What's the purpose of Survivor? Is it just a cool way to get people to write regularly? Is it a status thing? (seems to be all about that for the authors, from what I could tell) Or are there way cool prizes or something?

I know. dumb question. but even though I am most definitely not going to enter the contest, or whatever it is, I've wondered about it for a while.

bj

 

[Guest]

............

 

[Liar]

But I went and looked at the link, and while I suspect I'm just not organized enough to do anything like that, i do have an extraordinarily obtuse but sincere question. What's the purpose of Survivor? Is it just a cool way to get people to write regularly? Is it a status thing? (seems to be all about that for the authors, from what I could tell) Or are there way cool prizes or something?

Yes on all accounts.

It gets many stories in many categories written.
The really prolific writers gets to show off and have their high production rate oohed and aahed at.
And there's a cash prize.

It's also a nice challenge for smut writers, to be forced to take on categories outside of their usual comfort zone. A bunch of poems is mandatory for all contestants, for instance. And I wouldn't be surprised if some of the now regular poetry posters once had their first try at it in the Survivor race.

 

[unpredictablebijou]

Thanks for the explanations. I've tried to figure out the deal with Survivor before but now it makes more sense.

That being the case, wouldn't it be cool if there were as many categories to fill in poetry as there are in stories? One could go a lot of different directions - topical, stylistic, choices of form.

Makes me think it might be an interesting challenge to do some sort of mini-version of that in here. Like, just off the top of my head, one has a month in which to produce:

a sonnet
a villanelle
a sestina
a ballad
something formal and sentimental
a raw erotic poem
an epistolary poem
a poem of less than 6 lines
a poem with at least 6 stanzas...

Anyway, you see where I'm headed with this.

A microcosmic, non-competitive form of survivor might be pretty damn neato. I'd help brainstorm it if anybody decided that sounds good.

bj

 

[Angeline]

Thanks for the explanations. I've tried to figure out the deal with Survivor before but now it makes more sense.

That being the case, wouldn't it be cool if there were as many categories to fill in poetry as there are in stories? One could go a lot of different directions - topical, stylistic, choices of form.

Makes me think it might be an interesting challenge to do some sort of mini-version of that in here. Like, just off the top of my head, one has a month in which to produce:

a sonnet
a villanelle
a sestina
a ballad
something formal and sentimental
a raw erotic poem
an epistolary poem
a poem of less than 6 lines
a poem with at least 6 stanzas...

Anyway, you see where I'm headed with this.

A microcosmic, non-competitive form of survivor might be pretty damn neato. I'd help brainstorm it if anybody decided that sounds good.

bj

Put the sestina at the end or poets will drop like flies. The sestina is the form all poets love to hate (but a paradelle is much more hateful; it was designed to drive writers nuts). How about a terzanelle? A dramatic monologue?

 

[unpredictablebijou]

Put the sestina at the end or poets will drop like flies. The sestina is the form all poets love to hate (but a paradelle is much more hateful; it was designed to drive writers nuts). How about a terzanelle? A dramatic monologue?

Hell, let's just drop the sestina altogether. At best, it's an acquired taste, and it's so damnably easy to write a really bad one...

I would like to see what we could do with a list that had both form challenges and topical challenges. I like the idea of a dramatic monologue, too. REally, that list was a pure hallucinogenic brainstorm, so we could just create a whole new thing if we're actually going to do this.

I'd be in, she said, knowing she would regret it fiercely.

bj

 

[Guest]

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[Angeline]

I'd punk out on that contest for sure.
cuz
N0
one
really wants me to do a sestina.


Trust me.

Check out the contest I just started. I think you'd do great with it, it's so creative. And mebbe you could use poems for Survivor?