Ditto!
May 2006 bring us peace and happiness to all of you, your beloved ones, and the rest of Humanity and Life on Earth...
As for writing, I'm on it again (back to Sparta, where I left it before moving to part II) and have self-gifted some books on Sumer and Mesopotamy, and a new translation of the Epic of Gilgamesh, hehe... ;-)
Best wishes to all!
Kallisti!
2005-12-30
2005-12-16
Kambuyiyâ and plotbunny
Ah, the joys of reading!
After Nano, I've taken some time to rest and read literature, which I wasn't really able to do while writing, as most of my reading time is my writing time as well.
Thus, I'll re-take my writing soon, but in the meantime I've enjoyed a couple of novels, one a very funny parody of Harry Potter, the other a cool HF book by a German author I didn't know.
The book is Tamburas, the Greek (original title unknown, don't you hate when publishers don't do their homework on the ISBN page? A quick INet search threw the original title Tamburas), by Karlheinz Grosser. Originally published by Heinemann in 1967, I have a spanish translation of Belaqva of 2002.
I got it at a discount price (EUR4.95, really cheap!), it's 447 pages (I'm on page 427) and it's been a pleasing and interesting reading. Tamburas is a bastard son of Pisistratos, tirant of Athens (ca. 530), who must leave his town and face the unknown when assaulted by pirates and forced to serve Polikrates, tirant of Samos, and then to serve Great King Kambuyiyâ (Cambises).
The book is written in 1st person POV, well constructed, and pleaseantly flowing. The author did his homework, and despite some things I have frowned at, it's very well researched and it shows. It was a bit weird reading the battle of Pelusion from the POV of the Persians, when I have read it less than two months ago (you can check the archives) from the POV of the Egyptians in Scott Oden's Men of Bronze. The battles are very different, but that's understandable. However, where Scott stopped, Karlheinz went on.
Now, the second part:
I have a strong, I'd even say a stronger, plotbunny biting my shiny... um...
OK, I want to finish this novel (The Libyan), then finish Damned Linneage, my 2004 NaNovel. But (and it's a big 'but', hence the bold face) this plotbunny bit me last year as well, and it's demanding attention.
More and more attention.
Will I say it? I will, I feel generous... ;-)
It's a HF novel telling, as historical fact--at least inasmuch I am able to--, the Epic of Gilgamesh.
I have read it several times, and loved it all of them. Bronze Age culture is fascinating, and it's a chance to explore strange, new worlds. I am very tempted to go for it.
So, warning, don't feel weird if in some months you see a new work-in-progress bar on the blog...
Take care and Merry Full Moon!
Kallisti!
After Nano, I've taken some time to rest and read literature, which I wasn't really able to do while writing, as most of my reading time is my writing time as well.
Thus, I'll re-take my writing soon, but in the meantime I've enjoyed a couple of novels, one a very funny parody of Harry Potter, the other a cool HF book by a German author I didn't know.
The book is Tamburas, the Greek (original title unknown, don't you hate when publishers don't do their homework on the ISBN page? A quick INet search threw the original title Tamburas), by Karlheinz Grosser. Originally published by Heinemann in 1967, I have a spanish translation of Belaqva of 2002.
I got it at a discount price (EUR4.95, really cheap!), it's 447 pages (I'm on page 427) and it's been a pleasing and interesting reading. Tamburas is a bastard son of Pisistratos, tirant of Athens (ca. 530), who must leave his town and face the unknown when assaulted by pirates and forced to serve Polikrates, tirant of Samos, and then to serve Great King Kambuyiyâ (Cambises).
The book is written in 1st person POV, well constructed, and pleaseantly flowing. The author did his homework, and despite some things I have frowned at, it's very well researched and it shows. It was a bit weird reading the battle of Pelusion from the POV of the Persians, when I have read it less than two months ago (you can check the archives) from the POV of the Egyptians in Scott Oden's Men of Bronze. The battles are very different, but that's understandable. However, where Scott stopped, Karlheinz went on.
Now, the second part:
I have a strong, I'd even say a stronger, plotbunny biting my shiny... um...
OK, I want to finish this novel (The Libyan), then finish Damned Linneage, my 2004 NaNovel. But (and it's a big 'but', hence the bold face) this plotbunny bit me last year as well, and it's demanding attention.
More and more attention.
Will I say it? I will, I feel generous... ;-)
It's a HF novel telling, as historical fact--at least inasmuch I am able to--, the Epic of Gilgamesh.
I have read it several times, and loved it all of them. Bronze Age culture is fascinating, and it's a chance to explore strange, new worlds. I am very tempted to go for it.
So, warning, don't feel weird if in some months you see a new work-in-progress bar on the blog...
Take care and Merry Full Moon!
Kallisti!
2005-11-30
NaNoWinner!
$ cat Inaros_advancing_20051130.txt | perl ../wc.pl
W: 91025 (MP: 364.1, PP: 182.05), %: 75.8541666666667
And from NaNoWriMo:
Excalibor's Novel: The Libyan
Word Count So Far Winner!
50077 / 50000 words
Yeah, it was hard, but I've made it, and added a big punch (of crappy, shhh) to the novel in the process!
Thanks to all my supporters and sufferers, it's been great, now I'm back to reading, and planning (that battle at Memphis ain't gonna be easy!)
Kallisti!
W: 91025 (MP: 364.1, PP: 182.05), %: 75.8541666666667
And from NaNoWriMo:
Excalibor's Novel: The Libyan
Word Count So Far Winner!
50077 / 50000 words
Yeah, it was hard, but I've made it, and added a big punch (of crappy, shhh) to the novel in the process!
Thanks to all my supporters and sufferers, it's been great, now I'm back to reading, and planning (that battle at Memphis ain't gonna be easy!)
Kallisti!
2005-11-29
Agony...
$ cat nano/Inaros_advancing_20051129.txt | perl wc.pl
W: 85124 (MP: 340.496, PP: 170.248), %: 70.9366666666667
Validated Nano-counter: 44,416 words
I should be able to do it, I mean, I've got some 36 hours, and just over 6,500 words to go, the problem is finding time to do it... Fortunately, I skipped ahead for a part of the story considerable more dynamic than "Mission: Sparta", and the rythm will start raising to the next grand check point, the battle of Memphis, which is closer and closer... *grin*
I expect to get into the flow and do a good run for the battle, but, you know, plans are what you'd like to do and finally don't, so I'll be expectant...
Good luck to all the Nanoers who are close to the deadline mark! We can do it, gang! Those who are far behind their word counts, you can make a final push, and, nevertheless, you've been doing something unique, don't you dare to feel you have failed, just getting yourself into this makes you all winners, anyway...
Finally, my cheers and best regards to HF writer Scott Oden, who's pushing his Memnon's deadline with us, you can do it as well, Scott!
Kallisti!
W: 85124 (MP: 340.496, PP: 170.248), %: 70.9366666666667
Validated Nano-counter: 44,416 words
I should be able to do it, I mean, I've got some 36 hours, and just over 6,500 words to go, the problem is finding time to do it... Fortunately, I skipped ahead for a part of the story considerable more dynamic than "Mission: Sparta", and the rythm will start raising to the next grand check point, the battle of Memphis, which is closer and closer... *grin*
I expect to get into the flow and do a good run for the battle, but, you know, plans are what you'd like to do and finally don't, so I'll be expectant...
Good luck to all the Nanoers who are close to the deadline mark! We can do it, gang! Those who are far behind their word counts, you can make a final push, and, nevertheless, you've been doing something unique, don't you dare to feel you have failed, just getting yourself into this makes you all winners, anyway...
Finally, my cheers and best regards to HF writer Scott Oden, who's pushing his Memnon's deadline with us, you can do it as well, Scott!
Kallisti!
2005-11-28
The power of what?
$ cat nano/Inaros_advancing_20051128.txt | perl wc.pl
W: 82227 (MP: 328.908, PP: 164.454), %: 68.5225
According to the on-line, official validator, I'm 41,525 words into the Nano... This throws a grand totale of 8,475 words left. Will I get there? I'm pushing for it! We'll see, anyway...
As for the story, after a really nice Gymnopaideia ceremony, and a meeting with one of the Ephoros of Sparta, I fell exhausted, and decided to skip the rest of the story for the time being... A big jump ahead, two years, and we are back in Sidunnu (Sidon), where preparations for the final assault are being conducted.
I currently have the army leaving southwards. Artabazos has contributed with 10,000 infantry, 2,000 cavalry and 1,000 engineers, while Megabyzos has put into the field some 6,000 cavalry and 16,000-18,000 infantry, plus another division (1,000) of engineers, food, and so on... The fleet has settled in 30 trirremes and 50 pentekonterae, because a bigger one to fight the yaunâ (Greek) fleet would be too much a nurden in terms of training and food (specially). My calculations are, anyway conservative. Total numbers, thus, run about this:
* 28,000 infantry
* 8,000 cavalry
* 8,500 sailors
Far from the half million assembled at Memphis, I know, but those numbers are simply impossible, and I won't pay more attention to them. I will join the Eastern army, sited in the East river bank fortress and Heliopolis with this army, I may try to get some more troops off Pelusion once is re-taken, though I'm not sure about it, and I may manage, probably, to get the Memphis army out for the final battle as well, but I'm not sure about it... No way near 300,000-500,000, but a pretty big army anyway, and I pre-visualize a huge battle, jay! :-)
Original numbers I attempted were closer to the 44,000 infantry and 10,000 cavalry, but moving that huge army through the desert down the Way of Horus is unthinkable, even if the whole of the fleet is devouted to carrying the food, which it is anyway.
Army size in ancient armies was not limited by the amount of men or food you could gather, but by the amount of food available in the places your army moved and were deployed. Not having any ways of refrigerating food, or maintaining fresh water, licquours and other spirits would have been mixed with the water to avoid corruption, and food should be mostly dried fruits, hard bread and fish, but a good part of the Way of Osiris runs away from the sea, I need the army to move and not die, therefore I must make it smaller... Even then, reducing the slaves to the minimum, the final size of the army with those numbers given above raises over 40,000 people, plus well over 10,000 animals, which is an unthinkable amount of daily water. I shudder only thinking about it.
Anyway, we'll start sweetly, warming up the less experimented troops by pacifying Syria and Judea (at this moment in the novel, I have most of what's south Dor in rebellion, or taken over by the Greeks, which means Dor, Samaria, Gaza, Jerusalem, and most of the important sites north the Sinai. If my calculations are OK, I'll have to pay a visit to byblical administrator Ezra, in order to put things into perspective, (hehe) before moving down to the full desert, and finally Pelusion.
The more I think about the size and complexity of all the operations I'm writing about, the more I get astonished by what was performed by our distant ancestors... Just incredible.
Well, back to work, still lots to write and think as well... Sparta will wait until Nano-pressure is a bit off and I can set my mind into political games mode...
Power to the Nanoers!
Kallisti!
W: 82227 (MP: 328.908, PP: 164.454), %: 68.5225
According to the on-line, official validator, I'm 41,525 words into the Nano... This throws a grand totale of 8,475 words left. Will I get there? I'm pushing for it! We'll see, anyway...
As for the story, after a really nice Gymnopaideia ceremony, and a meeting with one of the Ephoros of Sparta, I fell exhausted, and decided to skip the rest of the story for the time being... A big jump ahead, two years, and we are back in Sidunnu (Sidon), where preparations for the final assault are being conducted.
I currently have the army leaving southwards. Artabazos has contributed with 10,000 infantry, 2,000 cavalry and 1,000 engineers, while Megabyzos has put into the field some 6,000 cavalry and 16,000-18,000 infantry, plus another division (1,000) of engineers, food, and so on... The fleet has settled in 30 trirremes and 50 pentekonterae, because a bigger one to fight the yaunâ (Greek) fleet would be too much a nurden in terms of training and food (specially). My calculations are, anyway conservative. Total numbers, thus, run about this:
* 28,000 infantry
* 8,000 cavalry
* 8,500 sailors
Far from the half million assembled at Memphis, I know, but those numbers are simply impossible, and I won't pay more attention to them. I will join the Eastern army, sited in the East river bank fortress and Heliopolis with this army, I may try to get some more troops off Pelusion once is re-taken, though I'm not sure about it, and I may manage, probably, to get the Memphis army out for the final battle as well, but I'm not sure about it... No way near 300,000-500,000, but a pretty big army anyway, and I pre-visualize a huge battle, jay! :-)
Original numbers I attempted were closer to the 44,000 infantry and 10,000 cavalry, but moving that huge army through the desert down the Way of Horus is unthinkable, even if the whole of the fleet is devouted to carrying the food, which it is anyway.
Army size in ancient armies was not limited by the amount of men or food you could gather, but by the amount of food available in the places your army moved and were deployed. Not having any ways of refrigerating food, or maintaining fresh water, licquours and other spirits would have been mixed with the water to avoid corruption, and food should be mostly dried fruits, hard bread and fish, but a good part of the Way of Osiris runs away from the sea, I need the army to move and not die, therefore I must make it smaller... Even then, reducing the slaves to the minimum, the final size of the army with those numbers given above raises over 40,000 people, plus well over 10,000 animals, which is an unthinkable amount of daily water. I shudder only thinking about it.
Anyway, we'll start sweetly, warming up the less experimented troops by pacifying Syria and Judea (at this moment in the novel, I have most of what's south Dor in rebellion, or taken over by the Greeks, which means Dor, Samaria, Gaza, Jerusalem, and most of the important sites north the Sinai. If my calculations are OK, I'll have to pay a visit to byblical administrator Ezra, in order to put things into perspective, (hehe) before moving down to the full desert, and finally Pelusion.
The more I think about the size and complexity of all the operations I'm writing about, the more I get astonished by what was performed by our distant ancestors... Just incredible.
Well, back to work, still lots to write and think as well... Sparta will wait until Nano-pressure is a bit off and I can set my mind into political games mode...
Power to the Nanoers!
Kallisti!
2005-11-27
Almost there, but not quite yet (grrr)
$ cat Inaros_advancing_20051127_utf8.txt | perl wcutf8.pl
W: 79732 (MP: 318.928, PP: 159.464), %: 66.4433333333333
Nano-counter: 38,606 words
Sigh, yesterday was not a bad day, but it could be better... Today's a huge last opportunity for brilliant performance, but it has started badly (headache), let's try a boost... 3 days, 11,400 words, it's hard but not impossible...
Cheer me up (please)! :-)
Kallisti!
W: 79732 (MP: 318.928, PP: 159.464), %: 66.4433333333333
Nano-counter: 38,606 words
Sigh, yesterday was not a bad day, but it could be better... Today's a huge last opportunity for brilliant performance, but it has started badly (headache), let's try a boost... 3 days, 11,400 words, it's hard but not impossible...
Cheer me up (please)! :-)
Kallisti!
2005-11-25
Party!
$ cat nano/Inaros_advancing_20051125.txt | perl wc.pl
W: 74415 (MP: 297.66, PP: 148.83), %: 62.0125
It's Summer (maybe even the Summer Solstice) and the Spartans have wild party, with nude, young warriors dancing arround the agorê (yeah, wild party!)... I have several classical authors talking about this festivity to Apollo, but I haven't managed to know if it was in the Solstice, and at night or when...
Ah, the fun of research, indeed...
Well, I'm heavily behind my Nano-counter, let's see if I can manage to give it a jump this afternoon (I love Fridays, don't you?)
Laters and cheers for the Nanoers, we are getting closer to the end!
Kallisti!
W: 74415 (MP: 297.66, PP: 148.83), %: 62.0125
It's Summer (maybe even the Summer Solstice) and the Spartans have wild party, with nude, young warriors dancing arround the agorê (yeah, wild party!)... I have several classical authors talking about this festivity to Apollo, but I haven't managed to know if it was in the Solstice, and at night or when...
Ah, the fun of research, indeed...
Well, I'm heavily behind my Nano-counter, let's see if I can manage to give it a jump this afternoon (I love Fridays, don't you?)
Laters and cheers for the Nanoers, we are getting closer to the end!
Kallisti!
2005-11-23
... go and tell the Lakedaemonians that we died as their laws commanded.
OK, after a hard trip from Sardes, in Phrigia (Asia Minor), to Epidaurus, in the Argolid, our Megabazos and his "band of merry fellows" (ahem) are finally in the Peloponnese, and ready to make their headway to their final destination, Sparta, in Lakonia.
$ cat nano/Inaros_advancing_20051123.txt | perl wc.pl
W: 71454 (MP: 285.816, PP: 142.908), %: 59.545
The title of this post is a free paraphrasis of the monument to Leonidas, in Thermopilae, where the Spartans and a big bunch of allies met the army of Xerxes I in 480BCE in a delay move to give time to the rest of the Greeks to prepare for the Persians. It didn't work, the Lakedaemonians insisted in defending the Corinth Ithsmus, while the Attikans preferred to set a defense near Eleusis (understandably). It didn't work, and the naval battle sought by the Athenians to defeat the Persian naby at Artemisium cape, at the same time, didn't work as well. However a huge storm sunk a good deal of ships in the Persian fleet, composed by Egyptian, Chipriote, Ionian, and Phoenician navies.
With sound victories in land and sea, Xerxes entered in Attika and the Athenians were forced to surrender their city, which was plundered, and make a escape to the nearby island of Salamis, in front of Piraeus. The battle of Salamis by a combined fleet of Athenian and Corinthian triereis against a weakened Persian fleet (later, still in 480BCE) was the first and definitive victory over the Persian army of Xerxes's. Not a huge victory, but enough to delay his plans to proceed to the Peloponnese, then he must leave to suffocate a rebellion in Babylon, while leaving a seriously under-armed general Mardonius to winter in Thessaly. The year after (479BCE) Mardonius met a huge combined Greek army at Plataea, and after a very confussing set of changing battle fronts, was forced to retreat with heavy losses.
But this is "old history" for my novel... I have finally located some "reliable" maps of the time, know the kings and important names (or at least some of them) in Sparta, and will head into the heart of this first half of Part II later today.
This part has been somewhat hard to write, as I am familiarizing myself with the characters, places and so that I hadn't visited for quite some time... That accounts for the poor wordcount, I'm afraid... I'll have to push it harder to meet with NaNoWriMo's deadline and limits. I'm determined to win this year, ¡by Athena!
More later, probably tomorrow, same blog-time, same blog-channel! (hehe, the TV series of 'Batman' in the 60's rocks... ;-)
Kallisti!
$ cat nano/Inaros_advancing_20051123.txt | perl wc.pl
W: 71454 (MP: 285.816, PP: 142.908), %: 59.545
The title of this post is a free paraphrasis of the monument to Leonidas, in Thermopilae, where the Spartans and a big bunch of allies met the army of Xerxes I in 480BCE in a delay move to give time to the rest of the Greeks to prepare for the Persians. It didn't work, the Lakedaemonians insisted in defending the Corinth Ithsmus, while the Attikans preferred to set a defense near Eleusis (understandably). It didn't work, and the naval battle sought by the Athenians to defeat the Persian naby at Artemisium cape, at the same time, didn't work as well. However a huge storm sunk a good deal of ships in the Persian fleet, composed by Egyptian, Chipriote, Ionian, and Phoenician navies.
With sound victories in land and sea, Xerxes entered in Attika and the Athenians were forced to surrender their city, which was plundered, and make a escape to the nearby island of Salamis, in front of Piraeus. The battle of Salamis by a combined fleet of Athenian and Corinthian triereis against a weakened Persian fleet (later, still in 480BCE) was the first and definitive victory over the Persian army of Xerxes's. Not a huge victory, but enough to delay his plans to proceed to the Peloponnese, then he must leave to suffocate a rebellion in Babylon, while leaving a seriously under-armed general Mardonius to winter in Thessaly. The year after (479BCE) Mardonius met a huge combined Greek army at Plataea, and after a very confussing set of changing battle fronts, was forced to retreat with heavy losses.
But this is "old history" for my novel... I have finally located some "reliable" maps of the time, know the kings and important names (or at least some of them) in Sparta, and will head into the heart of this first half of Part II later today.
This part has been somewhat hard to write, as I am familiarizing myself with the characters, places and so that I hadn't visited for quite some time... That accounts for the poor wordcount, I'm afraid... I'll have to push it harder to meet with NaNoWriMo's deadline and limits. I'm determined to win this year, ¡by Athena!
More later, probably tomorrow, same blog-time, same blog-channel! (hehe, the TV series of 'Batman' in the 60's rocks... ;-)
Kallisti!
2005-11-21
Megabazos
More words, Nano-frenzy, whooo!
$ cat nano/Inaros_advancing_20051121.txt | perl wc.pl
W: 66287 (MP: 265.148, PP: 132.574), %: 55.2391666666667
Bagâbigna a.k.a. Megabazos is in Sardes, capital of the satrapy of Frigia, with his team of gay fellows (in the old, original sense of the word, maybe I should use merry, as in Robin Hood's stories), from there they will move North, to the Pontos Euxine (a.k.a. Black Sea) --or maybe to some place in the Ionian coast, going up all the way to get back by sea is a bit too costly to create a good cover--, and from there to the Peloponnese, heading to Sparta.
It will be fun, indeed... :-)
OTOH, Megabazos is raising as a very interesting character, and I'm starting to think I should switch the Persian POV from Megabyzos to him... Having such a central POV will make it harder to write, and it should be easier to show the genius of Megabyzos's from a third person's POV, not from his... Besides, I think I like this character, his devoted to his leaders and people, idealistic, great commander, probably a great strategist, definitely a good leader of men, from a very noble and righteous Persian family...
Introduced a series of secondary characters to go with him in this part of the story --a Ionian Greek, a Canaanite (helmsman), and five soldiers disguised as sailors--, I'll let you know how it goes when I have them interacting, at this moment they are before Artabazos, satrap of Phrigia, with a message from Megabyzos, as the previous step to Sparta.
Cheer up every Nanoer!
Kallisti!
$ cat nano/Inaros_advancing_20051121.txt | perl wc.pl
W: 66287 (MP: 265.148, PP: 132.574), %: 55.2391666666667
Bagâbigna a.k.a. Megabazos is in Sardes, capital of the satrapy of Frigia, with his team of gay fellows (in the old, original sense of the word, maybe I should use merry, as in Robin Hood's stories), from there they will move North, to the Pontos Euxine (a.k.a. Black Sea) --or maybe to some place in the Ionian coast, going up all the way to get back by sea is a bit too costly to create a good cover--, and from there to the Peloponnese, heading to Sparta.
It will be fun, indeed... :-)
OTOH, Megabazos is raising as a very interesting character, and I'm starting to think I should switch the Persian POV from Megabyzos to him... Having such a central POV will make it harder to write, and it should be easier to show the genius of Megabyzos's from a third person's POV, not from his... Besides, I think I like this character, his devoted to his leaders and people, idealistic, great commander, probably a great strategist, definitely a good leader of men, from a very noble and righteous Persian family...
Introduced a series of secondary characters to go with him in this part of the story --a Ionian Greek, a Canaanite (helmsman), and five soldiers disguised as sailors--, I'll let you know how it goes when I have them interacting, at this moment they are before Artabazos, satrap of Phrigia, with a message from Megabyzos, as the previous step to Sparta.
Cheer up every Nanoer!
Kallisti!
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