Saturday, April 14, 2012

GLORIOUS WRETCHEDNESS

It was a town of machinery and tall chimneys... It had a black canal in it, and a river that ran purple with ill-smelling dye, and vast piles of buildings full of windows where there was a rattling and a trembling all day long, and where the pistons of steam-engine worked monotonously up and down like the head of an elephant in a state of melancholy madness.


                                                                                           CHARLES DICKENS  Hard Times, 1854


You can see it, hear it, smell it -- if this doesn't inspire, what would?

While my steampunk expedition is not full of squalor and stink, I may have to re-think this and add more of have-nots. Showing the great differences of wealth. I just don't know if I have the expertise for this...of course, I'll never have it iffen I don't try.

My heroine is a "found girl," young girls who are either abandoned or orphaned -- foundlings -- left to their own devises. People can bring them home, and put them to work. Yet it is a way to ensure a roof and some food on a daily basis.


I don't go into it, her fortune changes soon after the opening, but maybe it needs to be shown...hmmm. Or, maybe I could incorporate found girls into her new home.

See? I told you that Dickens was inspiring!

What, who inspires you?

4 comments:

  1. Pictures and music inspire me, though in different ways depending on my mood.

    I wish I could wrap my head around writing steam punk. I can never make it pure tech. Magic always creeps in.

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  2. My newbie try with steampunk is full to the brim with magic!
    Thanks for stopping by Stephanie!

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  3. oh yeah! magic. Love magic. space opera is like that, too. seems like futuristic, end of the world theme...but it's magic!

    I'm writing a time travel. just the idea of time travel is magic. :D :D I'm not mechanical enough for steampunk, though.

    Hmm, what inspires me? History. Life. ...and USA television shows, like Burn Notice. haha.

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  4. Burn Notice, hahaha...love Burn Notice!

    You are so right, I think magic comes into play with any major shifts, right? Well, even if it doesn't, it should. And there's a touch of time travel in my Steampunk too. If you're doing time travel I can't think why you can't do mechanical, but that's just me.

    Thanks for stopping by and thanks for the follow back!

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