Separated by a Mutual Language

So, after reading more of what both Jay and Elizabeth mean with the knife and bleeding language, I actually tend to agree with them. It's still not where I start, and it's a set of metaphors and structures that I would never use to describe what they're describing, but now that I get it, it makes sense. Lyda and I still seem to have been talking at cross purposes this whole time, because what I mean by bloodletting is clearly not what she thinks I mean, and I'm guessing that what I'm getting out of what she is saying is also not what she means, but I'm sure we'll be able to work it out with swords or pistols and a little friendly bloodletting.

For the record: Yes, character-driven writing is a perfectly acceptable model. No, it is not the only acceptable model. Yes, characters are important. Without them there would be nothing to write. Yes, they need to have and to evoke honest emotions. Yes, a writer has to draw on their own experiences to craft character, though from long experience with critical readers I know that the closer I get to my own bones the less convincing are my characters-I'm a weird monkey and I don't seem to process a lot of things in a way that makes sense to the other monkeys.

My problem with the bloodletting language was that it seemed to be focusing on pain for pain's sake and not as a tool to accomplish something. I've since been corrected, but I still don't much like the language of bloodletting because what it evokes for me, darkness for its own sake, is so very far away from what Jay and Elizabeth seem to be talking about. There is too much pain in this world for me to want to add to it without very good reason. I don't like bleak stories with bleak endings, which is not to say that they're a bad thing, just that they don't suit my needs or tastes.