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herzog
02-06-2010, 02:19 AM
Hi, mainly curious as to some extraneous opinions of my writing. Any criticism whether it be constructive or not is welcome and much appreciated. Thankyou.


With a cigarette languidly burning down between his fingers, Ernest sat sullenly by the window, withdrawn from his previous life. Raindrops fell from the roof’s guttering to create an expanding pool on the sill. The room he now inhibited was ageing, paint flaked from the walls and ceiling to create a fine layer of dandruff over the scalp of the floor. His favourite chair, worn by harsh sunlight and the remnants of heavy smoking, was sedentary by the window.

Looking down, he witnessed the hustle of the city street from his vantage point. A beach of suits lapped against the ocean of rubber and steel. Every passing car, every passing person: all with a sense of purpose. A foreign concept for Ernest, who now fixated his attention to the blank, antiquated wall before him.

The babbling stutter of an old radio emanated from the bedroom, spreading forth a sensationalistic story of little interest to anyone with any evolutionary distance from the primate. He lit another cigarette.

Mangled pictures hung from the vertical confines of his world, relics of the past. Being disturbed by his presence with others in the photographs had led to an outburst carried out with a sharp blade. With careful precision he had removed himself from the artefacts, leaving only complete ambiguity to his previous existence.

Ernest’s uneasy gaze clambered onto the rope that hung from a decaying coat hook adjacent to his door. His mind conceived all the possibilities of the slightly fraying twine. Suffering from an ever-growing feeling of ennui and encumbered by isolation, he raised himself with considerable effort from his lethargic position. Stumbling over a copy of Hemingway’s ‘For Whom The Bell Tolls’ that lay on ground, he took the rope and started to tremble.

He worked away delicately at his scuffed linoleum-topped table. His hands, littered with self-inflicted cigarette burns manipulated the rope in a familiar fashion. The end result was a way out of his decrepit apartment. A way out of his isolation. A way out of everything he had ever known.

The rope hung taut from the ceiling. A wooden chair fell toppled on its side. Ernest’s body levitated a foot from the floor.

The radio stopped.

Nobody noticed until his rent was due.

Steven Hunley
02-21-2010, 07:54 PM
Depressing but well written. Even if a subject is depressing when it's this well done you gotta read it anyway. So in a way I can't say I liked it, but sure liked how it was said, but not so much what it was saying. Make sense to you? There's a reply for you. Wellcome to Lit Net.

millymichaelson
02-21-2010, 08:47 PM
Ernest is such a sad soul. I can only assume he didn't have any close friends or family or anything if nobody noticed until the rent was due. This was very well written, you set up the story with wonderful imagery that really put me there. I would like to read something else of yours that isn't quite so depressing.

herzog
02-22-2010, 03:30 AM
It definitely is quite sombre, which is what I wanted with the depiction of near complete isolation.

Thanks for the replies anyhow.

MANICHAEAN
02-22-2010, 09:36 AM
herzog
I liked the fatalism of the suicide a la Hemingway. You evoked the atmosphere well. If I may make one suggestion ( not criticism), get into the mental aspects of this. Is it an act of courage, or an act of total despair? I've had to deal with two suicides in my work & I find them more difficult to cope with than straight forward accidents. That may sound perverse. If so I'm sorry. But in one instance I was called to, an Indian labourer had hanged himself in the camp after recieving a note from home that his wife was now with another man. I found it difficult to grasp the sheer despair & humiliation that man had endured.

herzog
02-22-2010, 10:22 PM
I intentionally left his background and what drove him to his current state as purposefully vague to let the reader draw their own conclusions.

Call me lazy, but I feel it results in a curiosity that implies thought and creates interest.

Delta40
11-07-2010, 06:45 AM
You're a natural writer Herzog. Like my previous review, I would suggest you expand on the stories. Personally, I want to become more acquainted with the character so that the pull of death and/or other conflicts or crises are more forcefully felt.

Maryd.
12-01-2010, 07:49 AM
Oh, this one is by far my favourite. Well dones sir. I love the last line...