Applied Living - By Shaun Meyers and Dave Olson

To begin:

I have academic records and I.Q. test results to tell me whether or not I'm smart. I'm not insecure about my intelligence. I have no need to try and prove to a couple of people on the internet (who I don't even know personally) that I'm not stupid. This isn't the eighteenth century. I'm not Alexander Pope or Johnathon Swift trying to flaunt my 'genius' or powder my ego.

There is a reason why Applied Living is written as it is. While I'd never label our comic as 'experimental' or claim that it pushes the 'boundaries' of writing, I do try and... well... push the bounds. So many comic creators use the excuse that their comic focuses on the 'writing' and not the art, but those same comics, when read, offer nothing but plain, uninspired dialogue and narration. I'm not talking about ideas being introduced or driven by lines of text.

When I say 'writing', I mean the lines of text themselves, not what they're saying.

I try and use unfamiliar words, words that are 'foreign', that are 'exotic'. Nouns, adjectives, and verbs that don't come up in normal conversation. I know how real people talk, and it bores me. I hear it all the time, everywhere. Everyone hears it all the time, everywhere. Everyone uses it. The English language, like all languages, offers a huge variety of words, and as such, a good number of them are lost, forgotten, unspoken, and unread. A small percentage becomes canonized and conventionalized, and, in quick order, over-utilized. I guess it could be said that I'm trying to combat the public problem of a stunted vocabulary base; I'm challenging the vernacular.

I'm not claiming that I'm successful in doing that. Far from it, probably. With archaic words comes a certain obstruction of clarity, and, subsequently, meaning, and that's something that I'm still working out. I'm still trying to find a balance between using 'fresh', unworn words and maintaining accessible dialogue.

But that's not the only reason for my word choice or style of writing. There's a craft to it. Dave takes care of the visual aspect of Applied Living, and I deal with with the audio. It's ironic that someone would suggest that I read my scripts aloud, because that's exactly what I do. My scripts, my dialogue, my conversations, are written to be read aloud. 'Poetic' devices like alliteration, consonance, assonance (all sound based) are the foundations of my style. I work with roughshod, improvisional meters-- enough to give a sort of flow and structure to lines that I write, but nothing that'll turn them into limericks or one of Shakespeare's couplets. It's all there. kingofsnake picks up on in it when he mentions the repetition of "-ity" in one of our pages. Obviously he views that negatively, but to me, members of Old English society, and others (sorry for the generalization) it's appealing, just as Dave's art is far more attractive than a stick figure.

The point I'm trying to make is that there is an intentional craft and method to the writing of Applied Living, and that it's not just an attempt to gratify myself by confounding readers. I know that it's not for everyone. I know I'm catering to a minority rather than a majority, and I apologize for those who are turned off by it.

And though Mark Twain (whom I have trouble associating with humility), when he used the word "proverbial", was most likely talking about an actual proverb, my use of the word "proverbial" is also acceptable, in the context of "having become an object of common mention or reference". Not to contradict my refutation of egoism, but I know what I'm doing.

And that's all, I guess, for better and for worse, and effective or ineffective as it all may be.

Anyone else who wants a page or two written about/in response to them, you're more than welcome to leave us a critique.

As always, thanks for reading.

--Shaun