Fran Di Benedetto

     ¡Hola! Esta vez decidí hacer un post en español porque en este idioma leí Primera Persona del Singular , de Haruki Murakami, y, en esta ocasión, voy a hacer una reseña de su relato Charlie Parker Plays Bossa Nova . Esta reseña, sin embargo, apuntará sobre todo al análisis de los elementos que constituyen el relato: el marco, la atmósfera, la voz narradora, los personajes, y la estructura. Por eso espero que te sirva también para poder analizar, a través de estos elementos, algún relato por tu cuenta, como un cuento que te guste, o incluso para construir tus propios textos. ¡Vamos!     El relato comienza con un fragmento de un artículo que el narrador, quien podría ser el propio Murakami si el libro de relatos es confirmado ser un libro de memorias, dice haber escrito en su juventud (año 1963) a modo de reseña de un disco completamente inventado: Charlie Parker Plays Bossa Nova . Él mismo aclara todas estas cuestiones en los primeros párrafos en los que su v...

 Oh, my! I should have written this a few days ago, but I have been really busy, so here we go (finally)! DAY 5 ~~~ PUT IT ALL TOGETHER We've learned a lot so far: we played around with line breaks, stanza breaks and images. Now, we'll work on that, apparently. Activity: You don't like your hair You say it's Like wires, like natives' And it comes out all white thus you die it Pony tails in dad's hair But you'd never let us play with yours No hairstyles I guess that's why you want me to keep my hair long Because you can't do anything with yours The wires tie my hair in tight ponytails OK -- this is all I could do. I struggled with some of the instructions, but I (sort of) made it😃 Conclusion     We are finally done with this challenge! I hope you enjoyed reading these results as much as I enjoyed writing them, and that you now sign up for 5 days to better poetry if you haven't already! I will now go on reading and writing poetry, paying close att...

Heyy! Welcome to day 4 -- we're almost done! DAY 4 ~~~ I IMAGINE YOU... Right now...: Today, we start writing. Immediately. So... What do I see?      I see my computer. I see the letters coming up in the screen, against the white background, as I press down each key.       I see my desk. I see the charger on it, next to my planner with a pen on top. It's rather neat today -- I decided to keep it clean, with just what I'll use in the moment.      I see the windows. This room is distinguished from the air outside by glass, so I see everything from my apartment.  What do I hear?      I hear the TV from the next room. There is also a buzzing from outside, maybe cars or trucks -- the usual city sounds. My mother is now walking lazily, sliding her feet instead of actually moving them up, forwards and down. I hear plastic bags and tape. What the heck is she doing? Now she's writing something down. What do I feel?  ...

Heyy! Are you ready for day 3? DAY 3 ~~~ WHERE DOES YOUR STANZA BREAK?      I'll assume you already know what a stanza is, either because you have some basic knowledge of poetry or because you have already signed up for 5 days of poetry, so I'll move on to my findings... My findings:      On day 1 , I told you my lines usually expand upon or refer back to something established by a previous line. Today, as I'm working with stanzas, I found out that mine do follow a pattern: I usually write stanzas of 4 lines when I start writing a poem, and from then, I try to establish a certain number of lines for all stanzas in my poem (for example, one of my poems consists on 3 stanzas of 7 lines each), though I do this consciously.      I also try to develop a concept or describe a setting or a thing in each stanza, so that the breaks make sense. For that reason, each stanza ends when a sentences ends, whether I put a full stop or not. Furthermore, in so...

Heyooo!     We're here again! This one is going to be a little bit shorter... DAY 1 ~~~ HOW LONG CAN YOU GO? Playing with my poem:      Sooo, the exercise consists on holding the urge to break the lines for as long as you can, and I should take the same poem (or stanzas, in my case) I used yesterday, so here it is in both languages. Me seguía un fantasma, u na sombra en mi caminar; Una sombra en cadenas q ue dificultaba mi andar En mis pies no pude p ies de gracia y gacela hallar… ¡Sólo pasto que crece p ara mi avance refrenar! I was followed by a ghost, a shadow, in my walking, a shadow in chains that made my walking more difficult. In my feet, I could not feet of grace and gazelle find, only grass that grows to my advance stop!      OK, I don't think I could make them much longer without making it feel like a prose poem. Actually, I would have preferred to keep them shorter because there are much more possibilites of interesting line breaks if t...

 Hey there!     This entry will be a little bit less formal than the previous ones, and the following of this series will be of the same tone. Why? Because I am going to be updating daily to share with you my progress on writing poetry!      The thing is -- I joined this Tell-Tell Poetry's sort of "challenge" or exercise (which I encourage you to try if you want a new perspective on poetry, especially if you have already attempted writing something), and I'll be posting the results of my process here, firstly, to inspire you, and, secondly, because it's my blog and I wanted to post about it😂Besides, the fact that I have to post about it will force me to avoid procrastinating and actually do it. DISCLAIMER: t his series is not intended to copying or redistributing the content or material that belongs to Tell-Tell Poetry . Its aim is to entertain, inspire and actually direct the audience to the very same page, also encouraging them to sign up for "5 days of ...

     Below Mercedes AMG Petronas Motorsport and Red Bull Racing Honda, the Formula 1 Constructors' Championship third and fourth place are disputed by Ferrari and Mclaren, two teams with brands very different from each other. In this review, we shall briefly compare the two of them on three different aspects: colours and design, community management and overall image on motorsport. COLOURS AND DESIGN      Ferrari colours have always been red, yellow and white. For instance, in the current season, cars are primarily red, with details such as drivers' numbers in white. The latter colour is also used for framing the images posted on social media, something distinctive to the team. Also, in case these images include a picture of the drivers, they usually are formally standing on their race suits.     On the other hand, Mclaren colours currently are orange and blue. Curiously, these colours are commonly associated with freshness, honesty and youth, blu...

  Dear friend:     I have read your last letter and would like to tell you how glad it makes me that you enjoyed last NaNoWriMo, and that you achieved your goal. Congratulations!  In my case, this NaNoWriMo (my first one, as you may know) was a little different than expected...     My original goal was of 13.000 words, and I was not even going to write a novel, but some short novels, stories and maybe a few poems, instead. After all, I knew this November would be rather complicated as I was preparing for my C2 exam and still had a few tests at school, and thus my expectations were not high.     Nevertheless, and to my surprise, I even had to reduce my original goal to the half! So, after having barely finished a few short projects, and started more than I could keep track of, I finished NaNoWriMo at November 27th, with nothing more than seven thousand five hundred and two words, and no actual novel whatsoever. For this particular reason, I feel a ...