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With the sending out of assignments for ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
remixredux08, there has been a lot of discussion about remixing and hard assignments and such, and it has occured to me to ponder--if remixing is so difficult (and it is the most difficult kind of ficathon I've ever been involved in, definitely), why do we do it? Why is the Remix ... Redux such a big deal every year, right up there with yuletide? And I think it's the same reason that poets write sonnets. Because sometimes it's better to do the hard thing because it is hard, because it really makes you focus on your craft, on getting every shred of power you can out of the words and the ideas and the characters you have available to you.
So. An appropriate poem.
On the Sonnet
If by dull rhymes our English must be chained,
And, like Andromeda, the Sonnet sweet
Fettered, in spite of pained loveliness,
Let us find, if we must be constrained,
Sandals more interwoven and complete
To fit the naked foot of Poesy:
Let us inspect the Lyre, and weigh the stress
Of every chord, and see what may be gained
By ear industrious, and attention meet;
Misers of sound and syllable, no less
Than Midas of his coinage, let us be
Jealous of dead leaves in the bay wreath crown;
So, if we may not let the Muse be free,
She will be bound with garlands of her own.
-John Keats, 1819
remixredux08, there has been a lot of discussion about remixing and hard assignments and such, and it has occured to me to ponder--if remixing is so difficult (and it is the most difficult kind of ficathon I've ever been involved in, definitely), why do we do it? Why is the Remix ... Redux such a big deal every year, right up there with yuletide? And I think it's the same reason that poets write sonnets. Because sometimes it's better to do the hard thing because it is hard, because it really makes you focus on your craft, on getting every shred of power you can out of the words and the ideas and the characters you have available to you.So. An appropriate poem.
On the Sonnet
If by dull rhymes our English must be chained,
And, like Andromeda, the Sonnet sweet
Fettered, in spite of pained loveliness,
Let us find, if we must be constrained,
Sandals more interwoven and complete
To fit the naked foot of Poesy:
Let us inspect the Lyre, and weigh the stress
Of every chord, and see what may be gained
By ear industrious, and attention meet;
Misers of sound and syllable, no less
Than Midas of his coinage, let us be
Jealous of dead leaves in the bay wreath crown;
So, if we may not let the Muse be free,
She will be bound with garlands of her own.
-John Keats, 1819
