Death is Eternal #366

Sunday. September 17, 2023. 1,160 words.

After six weeks (I thought it was two or three only!), I’m finally writing a brand new Death is Eternal on a Sunday. Why? Well, I have some time today because... Well, if you really want to know, you’ll have to read the “Life” part of this newsletter. After this completely necessary but maybe somewhat unfair teasing—could this be considered a cliffhanger, too?—let’s get this party started.

Contents

1. War of the Spanish Succession

2. Writing: Short stories

3. Bye!

4. Life (from September 11 to 24, 2023)

5. Death is Eternal review #237: Speed

6. The end

1. War of the Spanish Succession

Amidst the opulent chamber, cloaked in a suffocating silence, the weight of mourning was eclipsed by the palpable tremor of apprehension that gripped them all.

“The King is dead. Long live the... Oh, shit!”

The air hung heavy with the unspoken truth—King Charles II, bereft of an heir, had left Spain adrift in a sea of uncertainty. The throne, a vacant symbol of power, now beckoned ambitious hands and coveting nations to the hallowed halls of the Royal Alcázar of Madrid.

France, with its hungering ambition. Great Britain, with its watchful eye, the Holy Roman Empire, seeking its past glory. And the Dutch Republic, desiring to show its power. Each cast their covetous glances towards the kingdom. A mosaic of motives, entwined with veins of duplicity and hunger for dominion, painted a treacherous tableau.

In the chamber, tears flowed freely, yet they did not mourn Charles II’s passing but rather the cruel certainty of an impending tempest. It was not a dirge for a man but a requiem for a nation. Spain’s horizon stretched not towards serenity but through a tempestuous expanse that would not relent for fourteen long, weary years.

The end

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The War of the Spanish Succession (1701–1714) was an early-18th-century European war triggered by the death in November 1700 of the childless Charles II of Spain. It established the principle that dynastic rights were secondary to maintaining the balance of power between different countries. Related conflicts include the 1700–1721 Great Northern War, Rákóczi's War of Independence in Hungary, the Camisard revolt in southern France, Queen Anne's War in North America and minor struggles in colonial India.

2. Writing: Short stories

Credit: Substack (a person holding a paper, reading it, and reflecting)

Last week, I mentioned my new plan to—try to—become a published author. And I also said, not only last week but many times before, that I believe I can do it because I wrote 150+ short stories throughout my life. The thing is, I never did it with the intent to send them to prizes, literary magazines, and journals; I always wrote them as a way of improving my writing. But now, things are different. Now, I’m planning to send them, which increases my internal pressure.

It increases because, unlike my novels, I’m not confident in my ability to write short stories. Since I never wrote them intending to do more than learn how to write, I never cared for learning how to be a great short story writer. They were the means to an end, but now that they’re the end in itself, I’m questioning how capable I truly am of writing them.

A big reason for that is that I was never a big reader of short stories. So, the “learn by example” situation is inexistent in my life in this case. Also, because I never saw myself as a writer of short stories, I never tried to learn what separates a good from a bad one. I may even be incapable of explaining why I liked one more than the other. I have close to zero theoretical knowledge when it comes to short stories, so I’ll use this section to ask you, dear reader, what do you think makes a short story a good short story? What are the elements? What sets them apart? And last but not least, which is your favourite of all the short stories I have published here in this newsletter?

3. Bye!

Here’s where we say our farewell to the free subscribers. If you want to read the rest of Death is Eternal, consider becoming a paying subscriber. If you already are a paying subscriber, first of all, thank you very, very much! And second, I’ll see you on the other side of the paywall.