Velvet Verbosity 100 Word Challenge: Want

I recently became aware of an interesting blog, Velvet Verbosity, and an interesting challenge run there each week. The 100 word challenge involves writing exactly one hundred words on a one-word prompt. Those words can be poetry or prose, fiction or an essay. Nevertheless, writing exactly one hundred words, not one word more or less, is much more difficult than it seems.

This week's challenge is on the subject of "want". The top of the post features entries from the last challenge, on Eden, but if you scroll down to the bottom of the post, you'll find this week's word. I hope some of my readers will take up the challenge. My own entry follows, in bold text, with my comments on what I've written following it.

Want was all Michael had ever known, the one thing he understood. It was a mixture of cold and hunger seasoned with fear. Watching his brothers and sisters turn hairless and thin as sticks, seeing his mother’s dull eyes follow them as she slowly wasted away, every cell of his body crying out in want, he was the last of his family. He died alone, surrounded by their bodies. All the while, mocking the want that consumed him, food left Ireland’s shores to feed the demands of mercantilism. Experts agreed with the British politicians such inhumanity was the best decision.

Some of you may think this is melodramatic. However, such things happened in the late 1840s in Ireland, and happened all too often. Food really did leave the shores of Ireland while her people starved. Politicians really did think their theories were more important than human lives. Granted, this isn't a balanced account, but it is true history.

Half my ancestors came from Ireland. I could legally qualify for Irish citizenship, on two grounds. I don't know the exact experience of every family during the Great Famine, but as they were Protestant Irish, they were likely to do better than most. Notice that I don't say I agree with how Irish Catholics were treated; that was, however, how it was at the time. At least I do know my ancestors were poor enough they weren't busy making life difficult for Catholic families.

In addition, contrary to the myth that Protestant Irish families had no Catholic ancestors, I am aware that any family that lived in Ireland since before Cromwell, as at least one of my lines did, had Catholic ancestors and relatives, however much some of them hated to admit it. So those people who died were my people, some of them related to me, however distantly.

For the past several years, this episode of history has haunted me. I've written stories set during this time, and have several unfinished ones I'm working on. When I saw the word "want", this was the subject that naturally leaped out at me. Those who died in the Holocaust also suffered from want, but they suffered far more from other, more pointed evils. The Great Famine is, to my mind, the perfect showcase for want.

And, yes, this is how I tend to think of politicians and the experts who advise them. All too often, they are trying to do the wrong thing. Even when they try to do the right thing, they pass laws that appear as if they're doing something, but don't really tackle the tough problems head on. That's why I haven't been all fired up about the election; I suspect at least half my blogger friends could do a much better job than any of the candidates.

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

Today is a day set aside to honour Saint Patrick, a man who converted Ireland to Christianity while respecting the basic values of their culture. This is perhaps one reason the Irish are so fond of Saint Patrick, because he left them happily Celtic instead of insisting they become more like the Romans. Once they were converted, this made it more difficult for would-be meddlers to interfere and ruin their culture.

It is also a day to remember Ireland, to think of those beautiful green shores, those lush fields, those magnificent coasts... Yes, a good part of my ancestry is Irish. In fact, I could qualify for Irish citizenship (and depending on how the Presidential election goes, I just may apply) handily; I have two family members who are, alone, enough to qualify me. And I love hearing Irish voices speak, seeing Irish landscapes, eating Irish soda bread (there will be some of that, nice and hot, later today), hearing Irish music...

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I do also want to share a little more with my readers about my plans for this blog. Before events kept me from posting for so long, I was considering some changes, and I've thought still more about those in the meantime. I may be setting up my own site, and moving this blog to a WordPress platform on that domain. Over time, once I get the ongoing projects I'm bogged down in cleared away, I hope to set up a more regular posting schedule, and post more on topics of interest to writers.

I will still be making some fiction available, but I need time to decide how I'll do this. The sad fact is, once a writer 'publishes' a story, it is virtually unsellable. If it is a very small blog, some markets may still agree to purchase "first publication rights" - but some will not. And if it is posted on a larger blog, or any public site, it can no longer be sold except as a previously published story. And, unless the author is very well-known, there is no market for previously published stories.

There is also the issue of doing this in way that won't interfere with my pursuing a more serious writing career. I have decided, even more firmly than before, that is the direction I am headed in. That means I have many decisions to make, and I'll be revealing those to my readers as soon as I have made them. Also, in an effort to make things a little easier, I have become an affiliate of Holly Lisle's shop, selling books of interest to writers and some fiction.

While I don't criticise anyone for what they choose to do with their own blogs, I don't plan to cram my own blog with ads; that just isn't what I want for my blog. I don't expect any of my readers to buy any of Holly's books, unless they truly decide they want to. I chose this program for several reasons. First, the products are ones I have bought, or would like to buy, myself. Second, when I contacted the program, I was specifically told, by Holly Lisle herself, that I was free to write honest reviews of her books, mentioning things I disliked or disagreed with as well as things I liked.

I will be writing reviews of some of these books, and I hope to have a nice offer for anyone who is interested up soon. In the meantime, I will simply say this. The books I have bought and read all share several qualities. First, they were written by an actual, working author who makes her living by writing, and knows what it takes. Second, they are, as much as possible, written to take into account all the varied and individual ways each writer must work. They offer useful suggestions and ways of coping, not rigid rules or useless theories.