I am 14 years old. What classic literature, regardless of genre, should I read?
I am a huge fan of Jane Austen so I echo the several recommendations you have received about her books.I am also a fan of Elizabeth Gaskell. In particular, someone 14 years old can probably appreciate Gaskell's masterpiece, Wives and Daughters, as well as her other books (some people compare Gaskell's North and South to Austen's Pride and Prejudice, although I don't find them very similar.)Anthony Trollope is hilarious and you should give him a look and see if you like what you find.I also really enjoyed reading The Hobbit when I was about your age, and many people your age get into the Lord of the Rings trilogy.Have you read much science fiction or dystopian fiction? As a genre, SF is old enough to have classics of its own. If you haven't read Fahrenheit 451 you need to move it right up to the top of your list.I loved Isaac Asimov's robot stories, collected in I, Robot, when I was about your age. I also spent a lot of time reading short story anthologies in science fiction, featuring stories by Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, C.M. Kornbluth, Jerome Bixby, and others. In modern speculative fiction I recommend the "Bigend trilogy" by William Gibson: Pattern Recognition, Spook Country, Zero History.Then there are the classic American literary fiction writers: F. Scott Fitzgerald, Henry James (American and British), Edith Wharton. There's so much there. Read The Great Gatsby, Washington Square, The Portrait of a Lady, The House of Mirth, The Age of Innocence.Enjoy! Please feel free to come back and ask more questions.
What are some interesting English idioms and their meanings?
American: #1 Denial ain't just a river in Egypt - Mark TwainThe Nile is a river in Egypt, it exists, just like "denial". It is used to highlight the obvious point that someone refuses to see the obvious to protect themselves. #2 Gild the lilyTo apply a thin cover of gold on lily. To over embellish. #3 Paddle your own canoeBe independent and write your own fate. #4 As happy as a clamBe happy and satisfied. #5 All hat and no cattleA fake. All show but no substance. 6# Going to hell in a handbasketheaded for disaster with no chance of escape. 7# Up sheet creek without a paddleIn a tough or awkward situation with little support from others.Australian: 1# Full as a centipede's sock drawer very full, generally used after having a heavy meal. 2# Happy as a bastard on Father's DayJust the opposite of happy. 3# I'm as dry as a pommies bath matVery thirsty. Pommie is a derogatory term for a British person.#4 Face like a dropped pieUgly.# 5 Two-pot screamersomeone who can't hold their drink. Pot is equal to half a pint.
I like to write not rhyming poems and one day I would like to publish a collection of poems. How do I improve my creativity so I can write better?
Keep writing terrible stuff until it improves. Enter contests that include feedback so you can figure out what other people see in your work. Not only read poetry but deconstruct the poems you love the best, what makes them work? Why do you like them? See if you can write the same way.When you are just beginning, imitation is the easiest way to learn. So try writing poem like you favorite poet. Don’t publish them, but use them as practice. emerging visual artists copy great artists, and poets should do the same.Once you are confident, start sending out poems to small presses and contests, from there amass about 60 for publication.Good luck!
Any opinions/help on the novel I'm writing? I'm 13.?
Oh yeah, and the boarding school's called 'St Beavery's Primary Institution for the Parentless and Peculiar'. Just thought you'd wanna know. And the other two protagonists are Felix Pikery and Leonard Whittlecomb... Felix is, in essence, a casuist and is super-intelligent, and Leo is the oldest and perhaps most noisy of the group, his marvellous social skills enabling him to start the most random conversations with anyone whom he fancied (whether it be an intense discussion on the textiles of cross-stitching or a heated debate on how to properly bake rigatoni). If you want to know anything else, just ask! I have an interesting medley of staff and characters cooking up! -Ariane
Who is Disney's Princess Alice?
There is no Alice in the Disney Princess franchise, nor are there any Disney characters named Alice that posess royal blood or a title)Alice Pleasance Liddell the protagonist of the 1951 Walt Disney animated film Alice in Wonderland, adapted from the book, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll. She is (and always has been) part of the Disney Heroines franchise. This is a seperate entity from the Disney Princess franchise.Alice is an 8 year old girl whose curiosity leads her to following a white rabbit, dressed in a waistcoat and carring a watch, down a rabbit hole. This leads her to a series of adventures in a fantasy world known as "Wonderland". Much like the Wizard of Oz, the protagonists main goal is figuring out how to get home.spoilersIn the original book, Alice accidentally gets high on drugs at her parents fancy tea party in Victorian England, and the book is about the "adventures" she has while under it's influence. In the Disney adaptaion, Alice returns home by waking up from a nap, having fallen asleep during her private lesson.end spolierThere is another live Disney adaptation of Alice in Wonderland, directed by Tim Burton. In this version Alice returns to Wonderland as a savior against the terrible Jabberwoky monster.
What are some poems I should learn by heart?
A personal favorite, I recommend everyone learn "IF" by Rudyard Kipling. Short and sweet, it is easily able to be memorized in a few weeks. Not only is it an amazing poem, it may stay with you over the course of your life as you experience the trials and tribulations of life. You may find yourself repeating it to yourself during the darkest of times.If—BY RUDYARD KIPLING(‘Brother Square-Toes’—Rewards and Fairies)If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,Or being hated, don’t give way to hating, And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:If you can dream—and not make dreams your master; If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim; If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster And treat those two impostors just the same; If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:If you can make one heap of all your winnings And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,And lose, and start again at your beginnings And never breathe a word about your loss;If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew To serve your turn long after they are gone, And so hold on when there is nothing in you Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, If all men count with you, but none too much;If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run, Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it, And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!Source: A Choice of Kipling's Verse (1943)
I want to start writing; I don't have a vast vocabulary for it. Should I be concentrating on increasing my vocabulary or should I just start?
Write! Write, write, write!Too frequently, people are afraid to try something because they haven't mastered all the "prerequisites". Do I need to learn how to dice a tomato if I want to become a world-class chef? Absolutely. Do I need to know it before I start cooking anything? Absolutely not.Here's the truth: 90% of improving your writing is writing*. The rest of it--expanding your vocabulary, studying better writers, etc.--is icing on the cake.*If 90% of improving your writing is writing, and 90% of writing is rewriting, then it follows that precisely 81% of improving your writing is rewriting. Another truth: You'll get more bang for your buck by perfecting how to arrange the words you already know than by learning lots of new ones. It's how you deploy your words, more than which ones you use.A third truth (man, I'm on a roll!): George Orwell believed writers should "never use a long word where a short one will do." Rare, impressive, or sophisticated words have to defend themselves. They have their place--capturing the perfect shade of meaning, or hitting just the right emotional note (or lacking any simpler synonyms)--but you should never use them to show off or prove how smart you are. If you constantly send your reader to the dictionary it detracts from your writing and discourages them from reading more.Pardon me, I'm afraid I've gotten too lofty. Let me put this more simply:F*** vocabulary, start writing!