It's been a decaweek since my last blog post (that's 10 days in ordinary money) and so I thought I'd have a wee maunder aboot some o the things haeppenin.
Wan o thase is a wee challenge o'er on twitter called #Scotstober. Fir each day o is the month a wird in Scots tae be used in a poyum or memry, or like. Below is the list. A think Michael Dempster mad the thing hiself, an ye can see it below:
Graphic by Michael Dempster
Scots bears a similar relation to English as Portuguese does to Spanish, or Ukrainian to Russian. They are cousin languages, bearing roots in common, but developing in their own ways (much as English in former colonial territories where it remains the main the language - think USA, Australia, NZ, Canada - is slowly changing despite the level of interconnectedness we have via media).
Scots has also borne direct attack against its usage. Even before the Jacobite rebellions of the 18th century the Scots tongue - be it Gaelic or Scots - was looked at with some disdain by the high heid yins who looked to London for a lead to follow. Following the rebellions a concerted drive to anglicize the tongue of the Scots took place. As recently as the nineteen-forties discussions around education spoke of the use of Scots as being indicative of lower class and lower educational achievement and a thing to be avoided and taught out of students.
In recent years there has been a turn of the tide and fowks are strievin tae bring the mither tongue back tae full life. It's an interesting project as the process is decentralised, being built in public, and benefits by mair fowks hain a wee keek at wits hauppenin.
Also, as there's no official orthography there is variation between spellings and meanings even amongst those using it.
My first two #Scotstober posts appeared only on twitter, the next two were posted to twitter from #dBuzz, the rest of the month will be a mixture of #dBuzz and #threads, then on to twitter. Watch out for them, hae a wee turn yirsel.
Ither Things Ane
This week saw the third of my QuarterReads stories going up on #scholarandscribe (links to them here, here, and here)
I'm happy to say they are earning more than the eponymous quarter, and I will definitely be looking to take up the suggestion by @jfuji of minting an NFT book at the end - which will contain a couple of stories not released through the series.
One thing I'm really appreciative of is the comments folks are leaving of where they are being hooked by these v short stories.
Ither Things Twa
I've been posting poems via #blockchainpoets, and Friday is my set day for doing so, but if health or circumstances makes writing a post difficult for the day I am allowing myself to dip in to my reserve of poems to keep up my daily posting schedule (that's what happened yesterday)
It's great reading some of the other poets and their works and one who regularly appears in my feed is @olawalium who seems to have a twenty line poem written most days. Definitely hae a keek at his scrievin!
I'm thinking of doing a blog post about formal poetry styles. I love the villanelle, and have also done a few sonnets, but there are others to look at.** Would anyone be interested in such a post?**
In fact, i wonder if anyone running #blockchainpoets would be interested in having a chat about a monthly competition where entries have to conform to some kind of structure, either already known, or ones created for the competition (regular but unusual rhyming patterns are something I like).
I might even be able to put up prize coin of some flavor.
Ither Things Thrai
The lovely @alessandrawhite runs a daily Creative Work Hour on Zoom, and I've been joining on a periodical basis for a few months. Last week I figured out what I'm going to concentrate on while on it. A novel.
I have a world, well, a city in a world, and I have just under 50,000 words written in different stories based in and around this city. The stories go back to about eight years ago, the last one was written maybe three or four back. I'm using CWH to make a concerted push to break these stories down and combine them into Solstice in Sar Chona.
If you like non-earth steampunk(ish) stories with love, loss, automatons, treachery, scheming, conniving, selflessness, mystery, and bizarre terminology, and you would like to read this novel, then keep hassling me for updates.
Also, @allesandrawhite, a CWH Community sounds like a good idea...
right, time tae awa an scrieve a thing wi the wird Skite.