Young Writers Society

I'd like to think that love for Clara and Nico is a form of self-security and self-protection. In the comments you say that you do not know what love is, or the context of love is within the story, so that is my theory on their treatise. Love is pretty much what you define it as. I will say, the basis of it is wanting to spend quite a lot of time with one certain person. You need assurance that the person is happy to be with you or will not get bored of you. It is a consistent worry. Here, Clara and Nico are so embedded in each other that there is no worry. Their devotion is truly a manner of the aforementioned self-protection. Each has some knowledge, like with their project, that in the event of their own failure, they might rely on each other.

The evolution of dialogue throughout is fascinating. At first your characters speak nearly like educated cavemen (or Old English). Then it is more proper, followed by a dip into modernity with the use of the word "Actually" followed by a shift into something more philosophical, rooted in individualist arguments and fist shaking against authority. It is also quite funny how you could view either Clara or Nico as being of any age.

I had this idea going on about love, that, with the individualist ideals being impressed upon nowadays, people seemed to have lost themselves the conception of love. With the prevalence of the utmost importance of personal freedom, people seem to be very unwilling to give it up for anyone even for their lover, that is to say, that though they are in a romantic relationship, with someone they call the love of their life, their soul mate, their future, they still are in greater love of themselves.

(To get things clear, though, I might say that I couldn't speak for the ideals and conception of love in any other period, that I couldn't speak for any other forms of love than what I have observed among the young people of my country and among what I have frequently been seeing through the media, that I couldn't speak for my own opinions on love, for I had no conception of it myself; you could say, that I know not what I am saying.)

And I am not prefering something over the other; only, that I would like to entertain the idea of Mutual Slavery. The basic idea was that humans tend to be too protective of their freedom, especially now when the greater many in mainstream media is advocating it, that they even put their own selves first in between love, which kind of contradicts their own idea of love itself, whatever that is. I thought that couldn't work.
But how about the other way around? Slavery, being the opposite of Freedom, I thought of a romantic relationship wherein the couple actively serve each other, as one would to a master, except that there is no master. Service was also the most integral part of their relationship, as they are keen to serve each other with their entire being. They had given their being for the other. Hence the term Mutual Slavery. Though, slavery seems like an odd word, for they aren't being forced, and did in fact chose with their own freedom to give that exact same freedom up; despite those, I chose to kept the name.

I have my own criticism of the idea though.
- I have no idea what love even is, and how it exists in this context, because it was too focused on the deliverance of service to one another.
- Their happiness and the pleasure they derived from their service seems to be a sort of constant variable set to the max.

In the story, I tried to explore these ideas through the face of a student couple. The concept may have been infantile right now, that's why it's so fragile. But it's really interesting, think about it.

Hey, I'll be reviewing your work. Please have in mind when you read this critique that you do not need to find any of what I say useful. All of what I say is just my opinion.

What caught me first in this piece was the use of language and the writing style. The sentence structure you elect for in many cases is not contemporary, so you had me thinking you were going for a style more akin to that of other periods in literary history.

Furthermore, the words that some of the characters use in their dialogue is fancy and eloquent to the point of being unrealistic. While this could be a useful device, it may also have the consequence of the reader not taking what the characters have to say seriously.

The student who gives the speech to the teacher (the speech starting with "I say, if they wanted to serve each other to their fullest..."), reminds me of John Galt from the novel Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. If you don't know John Galt or his speech, I suggest a quick google search about it. Both of the speeches are complex in language and aimed at driving home a point. John Galt's speech was aimed at driving home a point that the author agreed with, so I ask if that is what you are going for with this student's speech. Something to keep in mind as you revise. (Also as a side note, the student's speech in your story has basically the exact opposite idea of Galt's speech, which is about, in part, radical individualism)

To be more specific on the language, there were some changes I think you can make with word choice without altering the overall style. There are some redundancies and usage of words which don't actually add anything to the story. For example, "Eventually that day" is a clunky phrase. I'd keep it at "That day" or even "later that day."

Additionally, I'm not a fan of the word "seemed." In most cases, it doesn't add anything. Why not just say "Dread dawned on Clara and Nico's faces"? Just some personal choices I'd make, but up to you if you find them useful.

Finally, the last paragraph. The last paragraph, halfway through it, switches to present tense, which confused me. Usually, it's a good idea to keep the tense consistent for the sake of clarity. Also, the last paragraph sounds like the author speaking directly to the reader, which is different from the rest of the narrative, which was the telling of a story. If that was the intention, then it works, but you may want to work on the consistency of the tone of the story.

Overall, an interesting piece of writing. It'll be cool to see a revised version of it. Good job

Hello! I'm Silk and I will be reviewing you today. As per usual, You know your work better than anyone, so If you feel like the things I offer up today are not relevant to the message you are trying to convey, or do not help your writing, feel free to disregard! With that out of the way, let's get started:

INITIAL THOUGHTS:
This short story is, on the surface, a satire piece about a devout couple at odds with each other and their instructor over a class project. The highly formal writing style and absurd characters works well to reinforce the comedic aspects, but does not take away from the reader's reflections on the idea of "Mutual Slavery" proposed. The overall writing felt inspired by romantic period authors, but did not necessarily stick to one era in terms of writing style. At some points I felt like I was reading something similar to Arthur Conan Doyle, other parts felt more Shakespearean. I don't have a lot of experience with the older classics, so I wont comment on that aspect any further. The archaic style did make make it difficult to parse what exactly was being said, and difficult to recognize if words were actually being used correctly by virtue of so many being thrown at the reader in such an extravagant style of writing.

AREAS OF IMPROVEMENT:
This piece could do with a going over by an editor, there are some spelling mistakes and grammatical errors throughout. Some of the adjectives used felt fancy for the sake of sounding fancy, and if that was the intention then it works. Overall, there is not a long wrong with this piece. A fun suggestion I'd like to make, that you can feel free to disregard because it is a little off topic, is naming Nico and Clara something that is anagram-ed, mirrored, or something of the sort, I think it would be a fun little detail to enhance their complete interdependence.

STRENGTHS:
This work is very interesting. The scene where Clara was being shaken by the instructor and is broken away by Nico is quite nice. The monologue in the scene about freedom accompanied with Clara physically breaking free was super effective!! That was my favorite part of the entire work.The absurdity and extremes of each character presented is done very nicely, I did not think there was an instance where they were "too much." The super formal way the couple speak to each other was immediately amusing, and I think that this piece overall just works really well in this style of writing. If it were written in a less formal way, it would not be as funny and would lose a lot of charm.

FINAL THOUGHTS:
This is a well crafted piece of writing, but could use a round of editing to catch some spelling mistakes. It was pretty funny, and kept em engaged throughout. Despite the satiric presentation, this work did make me reflect on the health vs happiness of the relationship Clara and Nico are in. Well done.

Thanks for sharing your writing!
-Silk