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The Thread For Normal Blokes

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HCE

18:16 / 31.03.07

Yeah, sorry about that mw -- I wasn't really sure how to refer to it.

miss wonderstarr

18:36 / 31.03.07

I'm sorry if I responded sharply, but I guess I am feeling a bit bad about the idea that I brought down the thread!

ONLY NICE THINGS

21:50 / 31.03.07

If one wishes to substitute "personae" for "accents" , I think gourami's post otherwise sums up pretty well what happened here. However, comparison with the examples provided by MW seems to indicate that these personae are hugely exaggerated - see the different in the popularity of text speech, LOLs and "whateva"s - to the point of not being normal but rather abnormal in their fictionalising of a "normal" voice.

They were also, in their overt rather than covert presentation of misogyny, homophobia and transphobia, precisely not what Flyboy did in his opening post - which was present a Barbelith Normal Bloke - somebody whose prejudices are covert, if not necessarily well-concealed. This strikes me as a more interesting persona to sustain, and certainly one in keeping with the stated aims of the thread and the opening post. If there is life left in this thread, it might be worth aiming for that persona, or character accent, within it.

Triplets

22:03 / 31.03.07

Why does anyone want to?

Alex's Grandma

22:37 / 31.03.07

I'd like to talk about Tony Parsons, who book after book delivers, I think. And also my season ticket at the Cop in Anfield, which I bloody love, actually, even though I grew up in Guildford and was privately educated - what of it? In the fullness of time I hope to the same for my own children, and what's more I bet you do too. And also the stag do in Prague that me and my mates are about to go on over the Easter weekend, which might get a bit out of hand.

If nobody else wants to talk about this stuff, so be it, but they obviously don't enjoy the finer things in life, and may as well be sitting around in potato sacks outside the Windscale nuclear power station, or something.

Although I am in favour of Green issues and sustainable energy. Just not all the bloody time, you know?

Does anyone want a line of coke?

miss wonderstarr

22:42 / 31.03.07

I think the point was to satirise Sole Eater and John, the Boy from the Future. As is painfully obvious ~ again, I'd suggest that a couple of links would have helped me out, but fair enough, Flyboy was under no obligation to make the target of the satire blatantly clear ~ I totally missed that point.

I'm sorry if, in going down the path of adopting a different, more exaggerated type of persona, I offended people by being rude in that adopted "voice", and/or seemed to take part in an unfortunate, undeserved patronising parody of a social type not my own.

(This isn't meant as "sorry... sorry you're so sensitive!!!" I'm not truly sure if my posts were offensive to anyone, but I do think they had that potential. Overall, I'd say I got a wee bit carried away with the persona.)

ONLY NICE THINGS

22:43 / 31.03.07

I think you have to ask yourself, though, Alex - Tony Parsons or Nick Hornby? Not just as writers - you'd struggle, I think, to put one above the other, really, when you think about it, really - but also in terms of which one you'd rather have a pint with. Nick Hornby I think is edging it for me - he shares Parsons' intimate understanding of men, but combines it with a terrific, almost intuitive grasp of women, their dreams and desires. Also, he has season tickets to the Arsenal.

Tony Parsons may be a better prose stylist, but you can't forget that he knew the carnal embrace of Julie Burchill, a woman about as unlike Rachel Stevens as it is possible to be while still possessing two X chromosomes.

Alex's Grandma

23:00 / 31.03.07

I see what you're saying, Haus. 'About A Boy' is in many ways a superior book to much of the Parsons ouevre, being a satire masked as a celebration of a certain lifestyle, or maybe the other way round (this is really good stuff - not that it'll affect my performance in the office on Monday, of course. Although if my boss is reading this; you're a knob, mate!) On the other hand, I bet Nick Hornby has a really crap car.

ONLY NICE THINGS

23:10 / 31.03.07

Nick Hornby probably has a hybrid car, and to be honest if you don't care about performance or how your car looks that's probably not such a terrible thing, although what the point of having a car in that case instead of just taking the bus might be I don't know. You might sneer at it, but remember his explanation in "High Fidelity" of how all men behave all the time to get girls - in essence, by creating a glittering shell of total deceit to make themselves seem like far nicer people.

In that light, all that stuff - having a useless car, pre-sorting the recycling, reading the Guardian - might in fact just be a complex ruse to impress the girlies. Put like that, it's genius.

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