Guilt is a bar of soap

[twilight661]

First thing first. I love this piece, Burntpunk. It's not flawless, but let's be honest, there's a lot of piece occupying our local Barnes & Nobles at the moment, so don't sweat.

The use of colours on certain words is a stroke of brilliance, you've highlighted red, blue, yellow and green -- I do ask: why not the others? But I've noticed you repeat a lot of the colours, I assume this is for effect. Thinking about symbolism, after a quick look around the internet, I think I've hit upon some of your subtext with colour symbollism.


Green = Guilt, Greed, Money, Jungle Life which is prominent in a lot of sweat shops, Sickness, (am I pushing it a bit?), Islam ... all themes in the story. Also Hope, which is alluding to the soap and how he's hope to rid himself of the sin. Also Life -- is he seeking redemption?

Red = Opposite of green so big contrast, guilt, sin, hell, sacrifice.

And together they make blue in colour theory.

Blue = sadness, capitalism, materialism.

Most of this really comes into play when one considers the context of the line and the colouring of the colour words allows this to stand out. Example below.

You wanna hug all the blue-eyed Africans...

How beautifully ironic is this line? First, how many blue-eyed African do you get? An odd image, one that sticks into your mind, but the concept of abnormality here resonates as we consider blue, the colour of capitalism (and materialism), which shows the African child as the victim.


As for the swearing, I think it's good, we can sense the guilt in the character, and the swearing and vulgarites show him in denial of it.

[dingyjoe]

where's the rehash??

hurry!

[JacobF]

First thing first. I love this piece, Burntpunk. It's not flawless, but let's be honest, there's a lot of piece occupying our local Barnes & Nobles at the moment, so don't sweat.

The use of colours on certain words is a stroke of brilliance, you've highlighted red, blue, yellow and green -- I do ask: why not the others? But I've noticed you repeat a lot of the colours, I assume this is for effect. Thinking about symbolism, after a quick look around the internet, I think I've hit upon some of your subtext with colour symbollism.


Green = Guilt, Greed, Money, Jungle Life which is prominent in a lot of sweat shops, Sickness, (am I pushing it a bit?), Islam ... all themes in the story. Also Hope, which is alluding to the soap and how he's hope to rid himself of the sin. Also Life -- is he seeking redemption?

Red = Opposite of green so big contrast, guilt, sin, hell, sacrifice.

And together they make blue in colour theory.

Blue = sadness, capitalism, materialism.

Most of this really comes into play when one considers the context of the line and the colouring of the colour words allows this to stand out. Example below.



How beautifully ironic is this line? First, how many blue-eyed African do you get? An odd image, one that sticks into your mind, but the concept of abnormality here resonates as we consider blue, the colour of capitalism (and materialism), which shows the African child as the victim.


As for the swearing, I think it's good, we can sense the guilt in the character, and the swearing and vulgarites show him in denial of it.

I don't want to piss all over Burntpunk's work more, but honestly, I just don't see how symbolic colours make a story's themes more valid. Anyone can slap in a bunch of colours with cultural connotations. It doesn't make it a more well-crafted story. Symbolism can be effective as a motif and as a tool to communicate a theme, but when the whole story revolves around symbolism it comes across as shallow and gimmicky.

In other words... I'd rather read a cohesive story with a good plot and likable characters than a story that relies on symbolism and tries to communicate some grand cultural message.

And Twilight, how does blue represent capitalism/materialism? And you said both red and green symbolize guilt...

[aBIGsheep]

In the first world war they used a massive propaganda campaign to spur the people into action. They used solid colors like blue, hence the blue jumpsuits and blue suits, to emphasize labor and a good work ethic.
But blue meaning sadness? Not so sure.

But, when they say blue eyed Africans, I think Burnpunk was actually mention white South Africans. Africa isn't completely black, you know.

[burntpunk]

Yeah, I did consciously patch together some colour symbolism, but yeah, it's rather patchy and inconsistent, like JacobF said tools like this are gimmicks, if the story is bad then the story is bad. Haven said that, I like to think I've reached some measure of competence in storytelling, thus I've merely experimented with gimmicks here. Testing them was my motivation to compose this, so symbolism doesn't make the story anymore valid if it is badly written, I'd just like you to know that my writing head was centered on the symbolism not the whole package that is strong writing.

No, I wasn't referring to Caucasian South Africans in particular.

[twilight661]

I wasn't talking about the validity of the story, and by, validity, do you mean quality? Validity is more to do with relevance etc. Needless to say, it doesn't exactly stop the symbolism being effective -- story still patchy. Can't wait to see what the rehash is like.

[dingyjoe]

disagreed. heres what dictionary says.

"validity - the quality of having legal force or effectiveness"

so if something works sound, then its valid. yes?

[Delta40]

You are so lucky Burntpunk to have your story get so much attention. I'm jealous.....!

[burntpunk]

Dude, I'll take a peep at your work. ^^

[prendrelemick]

Dont over do the rehash and lose the freshness and originality of the original.

[burntpunk]

That is an intention of mine. Yeah. Rawness is an element I value highly in writing. Rehash will be posted soon.

[dingyjoe]

stop discussing it,

come on you ***, post the damn thing!!!

[burntpunk]

Thanks Joe.
Below is the new rehash, whether or not it is improved, I would like to know.
Note the lack of colour.

I slouch in my golden-tapped shower, curdling the bar of soap in my gnarled hands.

Mulling, a thousand fireworks of thought thunder fast in my mind, but my brain is binary, so I slouch.

I shiver, letting the blue water drip off my nakedness, and I say whisper to myself. I whisper nothing profound, my brain is binary. I whisper to myself: guilt is a bar of soap.

The soap is green; my sins are red.

I stretch a little, blink a dozen times, and smile yellow teeth beautiful. And at that this moment I think I’ve lifted the burden. But Allah almighty, this isn’t gonna happen. I can feel it, the bomb planted to the bottom of my stomach, ticking. This is me, this is my guilt, this is how it’s gonna end.

I rub the green soap against my skin.

Your uncle Amir Shah imported this for you, as a present. He paid £44 for this. It was made in one of the 27 Dutta Factories in Lower Baghdad, Iraq, on the 5th August 2006, by starving children; the four that were involved in producing this piece of soap were Ali Sharma, Mohammad Rao, Ali Mehta and Khan Tamba, aged 6, 7, 6 and 8 years old.

The green soap doesn’t wash away my red sins, but does have a pleasurable texture, so this is okay.

I shake my head, wanting to deny everything. This is my fault. Bombs laugh. This is what I have done. I see clearly for the first time, for the last time. Perhaps it isn’t too late; perhaps if I dive onto the straight and narrow, I may not get recognized. I may be accepted. I may have a chance to do right.

I shake my head, I wish I could go back and ... well be honest I wouldn’t change what I did. But I wish I could go back, I wish I could act righteous. But, deep down I know, if I went back I would act the same. I would terrorise, and for what? My only motivation was, and still is: cash. And I have millions of it, and I slouch.

The soap is green; my sins are red. All I can wash away is grease.
I need some cheering up. Perhaps, when I’ve showered, I can head off to London, right into the city. Buy something — if that doesn’t cheer me up, nothing will — but what? I’ve got a £1,000,000 to play with. I paid for the shower with this. I paid for the tasteless mansion with this. I paid for the sex with this.

The soap is green; my sins are red. I have a lot of money and a lot of sin. I thought I knew which would come out the winner in the end. Not so sure now.

Heart blasts, feel the Glassman in me, waiting to break out through the rubble. Thought: glass is fragile. Maybe the explosion was too loud, maybe the Glassman has broken. Maybe I have no soul. I stretch, still slouching; glass flitters inside, piercing the slow soft red bomb that is my heart.
I sniff, the glass rushes to my nose, clogged, I can smell nothing but the sweet scent of abortion. Puce.

I’ve washed nicely now. I turn the heat up. Red hot. Wonderful. Splendid.
You know when you place your two index fingers so that they’re touching, right in front of your eyes, and then move them back and forward, and then you get the illusion that there’s a slab of flesh in between. And your eyes kinda take a weird stance. Well I get that, staring through the Perspex of the shower.

And I realise that I am trapped.

And water scolds red hot. I tighten, I turn. Skin pickles. I wait for a moist Satan to give me a kiss. For crows to rip out my smiling heart.
This is it, this is the moment that I give up living, this is the moment when the sin and the guilt rise. I look through the Perspex, and see nothing but green and red.

No redemption for me.

No God.

I’m gonna have to suck the red hot **** of karma.

I have sinned. And the soap will not wash it away.

I look through the Perspex again. Own so much that I don’t need. My Sony flatscreen fifty-six inch plasma blu-ray television. My two Ferraris. Electric Green. Scarlet Red. I can see them now. Stream-lined, low, gliding through Iraq, purposeless. A village full of malaria and aids and poverty. Rushing past.
I can be the butcher who became the vegetarian. Red. Green. Together, they make blue.

Turn the shower down. Cooler. Better. I wanna hug all the blue-eyed Africans, give away my £1,000,000, give away my two Ferraris, my Sony flatscreen fifty-six inch plasma blu-ray television.

I wanna forget my guilt. What’s done is done; I had a wrongful purpose before, but at least I had a purpose. I need a new purpose, a righteous purpose.
I dreamed about meeting Allah in paradise. I wondered whether I would bow or say my prayers first, I was ready to hug Allah. To be welcomed.
I lost belief. Or maybe I just screwed up. Nevertheless, I didn’t die. Everyone else did. I took the burden.

The world wants your head, maybe I could try and be good, or maybe I’ll give them it on a silver platter, alongside a nice green bar of soap.

[twilight661]

The note at the start looks too much like the text. Please divide it up and I'll critique.

[burntpunk]

Better?