Color Enforcement
#5
(05-16-2025, 08:03 AM)busker Wrote:  
(05-16-2025, 06:38 AM)dukealien Wrote:  So, in Basic, you object to the run-on sentences.  That's fair.  Any other suggestions for improvement?
aka 'How do you make a tired old racist whinge interesting to readers of a dissimilar persuasion'?
Kipling provides the template. The same techniques can be used to write interesting little poems about how the potato famine was Ireland's fault, the good Nazi, and so forth.

In this instance, the knowledgeable reader can't empathise with the plight of the poor Boer who after all has more wealth per capita than the coloreds, blacks, or Indians. And who benefited from colonisation, apartheid, and the umbrella of the British empire thanks to the good fortune of having a Cape Town colony. 
It would be as ludicrous as writing a poem about a poor white southerner who lost his only slave.

To make it work, you have to write about the particular circumstances of ONE Boer. That may make it ambiguous rather than racist, but it will still do the job.
The reader has to care about the subject.
That's why Kim is readable, despite Kipling's overt racism.

An alternative is to resort to humour and song, funny little rhymes and a lot of rhythm.
With a hint of being more than merely racist.
That's Gunga Din. Those would be the Jungle Books.

Another alternative is to make everything grand, like Leni Reifenstahl. But that's difficult to do in poetry in a more cynical age.

In short, it's difficult but not impossible to write good racist poetry.
Interesting:  tracking with closeups, as it were.  Would the same advice apply to writing anti-racist poetry (which, spoiler, was the intent here)?
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Messages In This Thread
Color Enforcement - by dukealien - 05-16-2025, 04:22 AM
RE: Color Enforcement - by busker - 05-16-2025, 06:31 AM
RE: Color Enforcement - by dukealien - 05-16-2025, 06:38 AM
RE: Color Enforcement - by busker - 05-16-2025, 08:03 AM
RE: Color Enforcement - by dukealien - 05-16-2025, 08:16 AM
RE: Color Enforcement - by busker - 05-16-2025, 08:25 AM
RE: Color Enforcement - by dukealien - 05-16-2025, 10:29 AM
RE: Color Enforcement - by RiverNotch - 05-16-2025, 12:49 PM
RE: Color Enforcement - by dukealien - 05-17-2025, 07:33 AM
RE: Color Enforcement - by busker - 05-17-2025, 10:58 AM
RE: Color Enforcement - by dukealien - 05-17-2025, 11:25 PM



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