The Dukedom of Aberdeen 香港仔公國

It depends what you want to do really. If you publish your works for profit, or write crap like the above column, then fair enough. You can certainly feed yourself, but don’t ever dream of winning the Nobel prize in Literature.

Conversely, if you want to write literature and devote your whole life to literature, you must be prepared to starve to death…that’s all.

嘿嘿，剛打算寫文鬧「徐護法」樓下的劉健威，也順道寫對徐護法此等「呃稿費」行為看不過眼，原來發現持同一看法的人不止我一個！

小弟雖是港大人，也搞不清楚為何你稱徐小姐為”護法”。不過，香港不稱職的專欄作家大有人在，我想有些網友的文筆識見比他們更好。

又真是幾過份，我也試過在報紙專欄登出整首歌詞，不過那歌詞是我自已作的，我已經怕比讀者話了…

在互聯網和Blog流行的年代, 專欄作家只會越來越難混水摸魚, 因為大多數讀者都可能有blog的寫作經驗, 增加其對文章的要求. 徐小姐真的想想辦法自我增值一下, 不是港大出身就不用增值.

信報的品質管理有時令讀者難以理解。

哈哈, 佢真係以為自己係寫緊BLOG…其實邊份報紙既專欄都不乏不堪一讀的文章, 如果將洋洋千字的文章看完才知原來是廢話連編,這才算是”真氣憤”。

有時我覺得睇 bloggers 的文章更精采, 專欄很多都是寫又36, 唔寫又36.

如此地明目張膽地騙稿費﹐作詞人大概可以向徐小姐追討稿費的85%。

哇，公國，你這篇 blog 引來的回應的讀者的 blog 都很精采！

哇哈哈!
針針見血……….
如果shall we dance都唔知原出日本著名影片的話，則不止要回家再修煉，更是已經和真實江湖脫節，歸隱之期不遠矣

Man, what a dreadful article on orientation. Seriously she could have at least comment on the lyrics of the song, but just stating the facts! What magazine is she writing for?What has she actually been talking about that is even remotely relating to varisty students? She really is 騙稿費!

Outrage by her actions, I would rather return to my interestingly, somehow absurd student magazine. Which translate to, I rather read about my friend writing about his prank calls to the police.It proves to be much more entertaining and more skilled. And by the way, I haven’t seen J Lo’s version of ‘Shall we dance’, but the original japanese version is great. To be honest, I am sick of Hollywood versions of japanese movies. Hollywood scriptwriters should write new genre of stories to amuse us, oh but silly movies make big bucks. The formula of romantic comedies etc.

Another question to ask you is, in your opinion, what is HK book market like? Where are the main, great bookshops of HK? Where do you find English books in HK, except in Dymocks that’s been around forever. And what are the prices for books in Hk? What sort of chinese or english books do people read, Da Vinci Code, Harry Potter, or all those cosmetics, diet books, or self-help books? And about the reading habits and reading attitudes of the common readers in HK. And what do you think of the writing qualities of Hk writers? And would you have any chance know anything about a group of Hk academics writing english post-colonial novels or can name me some names, because my professor muttered something about it earlier during the year but he simply forgot on the names, and I simply am curious.

If you are inspire by my questions, please write a blog entry about reading culture and books in HK. I am preparing myself from digging into the amazing world of books when I move back to HK next year, can’t wait to get my hands to exciting chinese books, or english books in that matter, I surely expect hk bookshops to stock very different english books from New Zealand.

其實為什麼會有出書的情意結?

Thanks a lot Duke and the same to Wally. (is that your name??)

It’s so true, 讀得書多也不一定代表有文化。It depends on what you read and most importantly of the qualities of your character. You can be very well informed in many areas, but if you would, eg. throw rubbish off your apartment windows, or smoke in a non-smoking area, you are not really an ideal sort of citizen. I know that Taiwanese politicans are infamous for fighting in their parliament debating chamber. I am not saying that is not part of their political culture, but maybe, that is some part of another culture, where we don’t necessary want to bring into HK society. (or NZ society)

文化 is very abstract. It depends what you think is the basis of how you judge culture. Eg. if you think drinking coffee is a better culture than say, drinking chinese black tea, then you may have base your anchor of judgement upon Western ideals. Though, high or low culture are equally part of a society. Food culture such as fish balls or mooncake are equally part of our culture.

好在我寫o既係blog, 間中揸o下流攤都冇所謂! ^o^
(我睇呢篇文時, 第一個感想真係咁!)

最近好想寫d o野, 但… 又寫唔出o番…
於是唯有放放佛偈 (自己有份出聲, 都唔算太呃人),
放放訪問, 甚至轉載書展(公益廣告).

見你, Alex, 熊一豆及其他人如此精進寫文, 又反思,
我實在懶得可以… 汗顏呀o下~~ -_-”

Re-Wally

I totally agree that abstract is not quite the right word to describe culture.I tend to say things are ‘abstract’ and ‘complicated’ when I am lazy to push the idea further. So it’s great that you pointed out my misuse of word and concept.

Maybe ‘fluid’ is a better word to describe culture because culture has an everchanging nature, that’s why we are always busy trying to define culture, because it is always changing.

What does 「廣義」and 「狹義」mean? I don’t totally understand the termonologies (that’s the problem of talking about things in 2 different langaugaes, you don’t always grasp the ideas entirely, because the meaning of a term can be slightly different depending on the meaning of that particular word in that specific language). Can you please explain 「廣義」and 「狹義」?

One concept always lead to more other inter-relating concepts.

徐小姐篇文大鑊之處係：不要說她在寫blog，寫blog也要做好功課的，她又做文抄公，又放鱔，簡直可以寫篇檄文圍剿她。

真不明天下間為何有人做專欄作家都不好好珍惜地盤，如此不負責任。

有身份證原來可以出書, 仲可以寫專欄, 哈哈哈哈!
每天引述一首歌詞, 一個月也可騙到幾萬塊!