Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-25458443-20181105182854/@comment-9041013-20181112181300

EtherBot wrote: Why would dialogue make this better? Maybe if this was a traditional story with a beginning and end and a character arch to wrap things up nicely, but it isn't, and it isn't trying to be. Again, I'd prefer not to go into explaining my motivations or intentions because I don't think that's my place as the author. I am comfortable with saying that figuring out what the point is is part of the intended experience, which is why it would be counter-productive to explain the point to you. Addressing that, I expect a little more faith, honestly.

You say 'no actual effort is put into it beyond this' which I find really upsetting. How can you possibly know this? You read a story without obvious characters, narrative, or even a cohesive framing device, and your immediate response is "Well he didn't even try to put any of that stuff in!"

You're right, I didn't. It wasn't by accident or lack of effort that I didn't include any traditional storytelling techniques because what I was writing wasn't a story. I'd rather not go into it any further than that. Hmmm... I do think it is your place as an author to decide what is to be made of your story. Sure, if the point of this one is for us, the readers, to figure out, you could say it. Then again, you just told us what's the point, or some of it.

This piece of text, sadly, does not make me think too much and actually does have some characteristics of a story. Like characters (or a single character), a setting and well, like it or not an actual plot. The rest isn't exactly there. If you were trying to be thought provoking and/or philosophical here, it didn't come out well.