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!!/7cMIiSCHvi/lit/24536636#24547708
7/14/2025, 12:27:56 AM
Who Holy Fools
by torus
>>24523232
>mosquito nets hang from hooks like wedding dresses.
>In the silence coughs and sighs ring like gunshots
The best metaphors are those which upon second read-through emerge as their teller’s tacet disclosures.
Offhand as they are specific, such comparisons subconsciously tee up the topics of derailed-relationship(s) and organized-religion as military—you’re laying it all out without our even realizing it.
To me, this is the clearest indication of an author’s total immersion in creating their world, their being so “into it” that every analogy bends toward its most fundamental arguments.
If the nets looked like “frozen waterfalls,” or the coughs and sighs sounded like “slow-cooking popcorn,” yeah, those would be more creative references, but they would exist within a truly empty context.
Given the subject matter, it’s appropriate/ironic just how self-disciplined you were in this regard. Great job.
>But we, the Burmese,
With your story taking place between April 7th, 2020—April 12th, 2021 (Buddhist Era 2563), technically/officially the MC is “Myanmarese.”
This is not a “gotcha” observation—of course some of the most isolated, modernity-eshewing people in the world would cling to their old 1989 demonym—but an “opportunity” observation:
Yours is a two-layer story (concerning the MC and their internal struggles), but it could be have been a three-layer story (also concerning Myanmar during this particularly tumultous moment in time).
I don’t believe it’s a coincidence that that span of dates I listed above includes the government’s coup d'état and the start of their still ongoing civil war—you chose that on purpose, no?
But the “military-as-a-mirror-to-religion” aspect of your story was incredibly half-baked, even glib at times, compared to the richness of your MC’s dilemmas.
I’m saying that all corners of your story should be nuanced and variagated, even if the point of view we’re seeing them from (your MC) is unequipped to understand their complexity at all.
The MC does not have the the bandwith, interest, or ability to contemplate the status quo outside of the monastery, but their simply mentioning a few offhand-offhand aberations would do.
Extremely subtle clues—like there being more military helicopters overheard, or how a protestor was running through the temple grounds—can prompt the reader to think critically, even when the MC couldn’t care less.
There’s an argument that the thrid layer IS there—just from the date alone, and how cloistered/ignorant/apathetic your MC by not even commenting on the news—but I felt it as a missed opportunity.
>like Hesiod’s men
The MC sits in the back with “other novices and foreigners”—I think they could be either one.
People in Myanmar read Hesiod, but name-dropping this famous Greek in such an ancient Eastern place lends plausability to all interpretations.
>flesh eating disease
flesh-eating
by torus
>>24523232
>mosquito nets hang from hooks like wedding dresses.
>In the silence coughs and sighs ring like gunshots
The best metaphors are those which upon second read-through emerge as their teller’s tacet disclosures.
Offhand as they are specific, such comparisons subconsciously tee up the topics of derailed-relationship(s) and organized-religion as military—you’re laying it all out without our even realizing it.
To me, this is the clearest indication of an author’s total immersion in creating their world, their being so “into it” that every analogy bends toward its most fundamental arguments.
If the nets looked like “frozen waterfalls,” or the coughs and sighs sounded like “slow-cooking popcorn,” yeah, those would be more creative references, but they would exist within a truly empty context.
Given the subject matter, it’s appropriate/ironic just how self-disciplined you were in this regard. Great job.
>But we, the Burmese,
With your story taking place between April 7th, 2020—April 12th, 2021 (Buddhist Era 2563), technically/officially the MC is “Myanmarese.”
This is not a “gotcha” observation—of course some of the most isolated, modernity-eshewing people in the world would cling to their old 1989 demonym—but an “opportunity” observation:
Yours is a two-layer story (concerning the MC and their internal struggles), but it could be have been a three-layer story (also concerning Myanmar during this particularly tumultous moment in time).
I don’t believe it’s a coincidence that that span of dates I listed above includes the government’s coup d'état and the start of their still ongoing civil war—you chose that on purpose, no?
But the “military-as-a-mirror-to-religion” aspect of your story was incredibly half-baked, even glib at times, compared to the richness of your MC’s dilemmas.
I’m saying that all corners of your story should be nuanced and variagated, even if the point of view we’re seeing them from (your MC) is unequipped to understand their complexity at all.
The MC does not have the the bandwith, interest, or ability to contemplate the status quo outside of the monastery, but their simply mentioning a few offhand-offhand aberations would do.
Extremely subtle clues—like there being more military helicopters overheard, or how a protestor was running through the temple grounds—can prompt the reader to think critically, even when the MC couldn’t care less.
There’s an argument that the thrid layer IS there—just from the date alone, and how cloistered/ignorant/apathetic your MC by not even commenting on the news—but I felt it as a missed opportunity.
>like Hesiod’s men
The MC sits in the back with “other novices and foreigners”—I think they could be either one.
People in Myanmar read Hesiod, but name-dropping this famous Greek in such an ancient Eastern place lends plausability to all interpretations.
>flesh eating disease
flesh-eating
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