At 02:48 AM 11/19/98 -0500, Mike Noakes wrote:

On Wed, 18 Nov 1998, Matthew Lewis wrote:

Hehehehehe. I'm tellin' ya, blame Lawrence Sterne (that dead
for a couple of centuries bastard). On one level we have chapter VII

[clip]

and cold and empty(?) Ranma is. This is the kind of thing that makes
us English majors say, "very symbolic" and get really, really excited.
^_^

	Nah.  That's the kinda thing that makes me go 'bleah'.  With
Sterne, I could tolerate it -- after all, he _was_ one of the first to try
funky stuff like that. Besides, Tristram Shandy was just a big joke,

Not just a big joke, but a big _dirty_ joke! I mean, I thought _I_ had my
mind in the gutter, but I can't compare to Sterne....

anyway.  But there's too much such silliness in post-modern crap that
tries to sell itself off as literature: poems written in circles and
fragmented lines to reflect the 'inherent confusion of the human mind', or
some such tired crap.  Like stream-of-consciousness, used too often by
shity writers as an excuse to look cool, without realizing that _real_ SOC
stuff isn't just a random dumping of words on the page -- it's the
illusion of random thought process, but _writing_ it is the meticulous
choosing of the proper words and following of specific ideas.  Joyce,
Woolf, they didn't just puke up on a page...  Again, bleah, I say. 
	Ummm, sorry.

No worries-- an occasional ranting is good for the soul. Actually, I'll
agree with you on that, if it's totally random, doing it just to do it,
then there is no real reason or purpose, and why should I bother reading
it if you don't put any effort into it? Sterne, however (for instance)
did have a purpose, and that made him cool, in a really, really frustrating
way.... My opinion, of course, and nothing more (but nothing less, either).

	Actually, it's not even a comment on your story.  Heck, I liked
the little chapter with the snowflakes.
	(Gee, can you tell that I've got an essay due?  Ah,
procrastination, everyone's favorite friend...)

	Of course the real reason for them is two-fold: a) to make me feel
clever because no one else would hopefully get them ;-) and b) because I
wanted to share my frustration in reading Tristam Shandy with all of you.
^_^

	Heh.  All too well understood.  ALthough I avoided  some of that
frustration by simply not reading the whole damn thing.  Maybe I should
get back to it some day... nah, maybe not.

What can I say? I'm a petty, petty man, and the only redeeming feature is
that I'm quite aware of it. I've accepted it and am comfortable with myself
though, so there! :)

	Hmmm.  While I'm here I guess I oughat drop a few quick comments
about the story itself.  My brain's a bit scrambled right now (essay on
the go, lotsa caffeine buzzin'), but I'll try to be coherent.

Coherency's over-rated if you ask me (which you didn't, true, but...).
Essay/project/whatever and metric tonnes of caffeine are something I
think most of us can relate to.... ^_^

	Loved the idea -- loved where the first two chapters were bringing
us -- was disappointed with the conclusion.  Opposing theories of martial
arts, neat.  Ranma submitting himself to one and 'falling prey' to its
doctrine -- didn't like as much.  The way you redefined the character, I
supposed it made since, especially with the emphasis on 'weakness'.
However, I would've prefered -- and actually expected -- a true 'thesis',
as the title led me to suggest: Ranma forging his own way, by unifying the
two opposing schools of thought.

The title "Thesis" came from the origin of the whole Soul of Ice thing,
actually. Originally, it was just Soul of Ice, which became Soul of Ice:
point. The thesis then is Cologne's. It also reflects back on the beginning
of the title, 'Soul of Ice.' Ranma forging his own way would be something
like 'New Thesis,' if I were to do it (H-Packrat has started one called
'The Path He Walks, if I recall). 'Hypothesis' would be an acceptable
title as well.
	At any rate, Cologne had first crack at him, so it made sense for
this one to be entitled 'Thesis' (well, to me it made sense, at least, but
then again I'm like that).

	(Well, that's the whole thesis thing, as I understand it.  Thesis
- antithesis - synthesis, which is what I assumed you were alluding to in
the titles -- the Hegelian theory of opposing and joined energies. (or
whatever.  It was never fully explained to me, not that anyone really
understands Hegel anyway.)

Well, the next one would be 'Antithesis,' being appropriately enough 
Happi's way, which can be considered to be the polar opposite of
Cologne. It'll be a divergent, not taking place before or after this,
but besides it, instead of it.

	Instead, we got a Ranma 'as cold as ice' (suddenly I've got a
craving for a beer, for some reason...).  Which is interesting in itself,
but the presentation was very... unsubtle, it felt to me.  I mean, sheesh,
he was just so _extreme_ -- and utter extremes, independant of
qualification, are rather dull.

But that was the point, the absolute and total extremeness of what he
became; there was no room in him for anything else which might have
mad it more subtle. In this case being unsubtle was the only direction
I could go, I think.
	Of course there is a basic problem with being subtle-- being so
subtle that no one notices it. One has to be subtle in an unsubtle
fashion, otherwise it's just another in-joke that no one else gets. I
like being unsubtle, I like bludgeoning people... with my stories, that is.
Yes, my stories, and not, oh, let's say a hammer, for instance....
Takahashi wasn't very subtle in Ranma 1/2 with a lot of her humour.

	(Which is why Utopian literature is so tediously dull to read.
You're an English major, you've probably had to read some Utopia or
News From Nowhere.  Major Zzzzzz stuff.  Dystopian is much better, but
that's because the authors can never go the full way, they always keep a
little hope alive, a little struggle -- even 1984 doesn't crush hope until
the very end, otherwise, why read it?)

Well, the word utopia means 'nothing' right? Of course nothing is boring!
Of course perfection is boring! That's only right, that's the way it
should be-- it is our struggle towards perfection that is interesting. 

	But in your story, it's quite clear that Ranma is all the way gone

>from the start, and with that certainty, the story loses (for me) a lot of

its attraction.  Like those really, really evil and powerful guys in
movies (or shows or anime or whatever) -- I mean, do you _really_ care
what happens to them?  They're usually more laughable than anything.

Hehehe. But if we think of this story as an ending, and not complete
in and of itself, I think it changes things, because Ranma is not gone
all the way from the start then. This is just to show what might happen.
Thesis would be one ending. It does take place after Point and Counterpoint,
if you recall. There is (I hope) a certain inevitability in Thesis which
is compelling, like a car crash in a way.

	Wow.  Am I _ever_ procrastinating.  Major digression here.  So.
Liked the first two chapters a lot.  Great premise, and the uber-Ranma
character is neat.  No comments on the writing or grammar or any of that
stuff -- didn't notice anything wrong!  Good stuff, I guess you just lost
me on the third chapter (sorry!).

Nothing wrong with grammar and that stuff, wow! Usually there's stuff
wrong with it that I notice if I go back a bit later and take a look.
Rather glaring errors, I'm afraid. Just laziness on my part, I would
hazard to guess (i.e. I don't get paid for it, nor do I get marked on
it). Usually I send it out as soon as I finish writing it, a first draft.
	No need to say you're sorry, in fact, I want to say thanks, to you
and to pretty much everyone who's responded, actually. I'd much rather
have 2 or three mails with this kind of comments and analysis as opposed
to 10 'I liked it' messages-- the former is not only far more useful to
me (for current and future projects) but also implies a much closer reading.


As a side note, and probably the only thing I'll reveal about Antithesis
before I actually complete it (sometime in the future) is that it will
have a different structure, focusing on the process in which Ranma
becomes, instead of the resolution, the after-effects of his choice.
(It was about the only way I could think of doing Thesis, to be honest;
unwilling or unable to spend the time/effort to come up with what Ranma's
training would entail, although I will admit more interest in this end
than in how Ranma got to it.

Matthew "Maybeso" Lewis is:
InDefinitelyso on IRC
See him on FFIRC [bachman.newberry.edu fanfic]
Sojiro_Seta on Kawaiimuck
	maybeso@ican.net
Playing the fool in a foolish world
____________________________________________________________

Sheen watched his flight. "I forgot to mention the most
important thing," he murmured. "If there's one thing a mind
can't avoid, it is its automatic aversion to evil. The
moment he lets it into himself, he places his feet on the
road to demolition."
 		    -excerpt from A Billion Days of Earth
			by Doris Piserchia
____________________________________________________________