Lyrique Tragedy

About me:

"Life has no purpose. It is everywhere undone by arbitrariness. I do this, and it matters not a jot if I do the opposite. But in the playhouse, every action, good or bad, has its consequence. Drop a handkercheif and it will return to smother you."

~John Wilmot, Second Earl of Rochester, The Libertine..








Kat: "I've been spilling my guts all weekend and I don't know anything about you."

Nick: "I'm allergic to fabric softener. I majored in comparative literature at Brown. I hate anchovies. And I think I'd miss you even if we'd have never met."

The Wedding Date, 2005



"A heart is a fragile thing. That's why we protect them so vigorously, give them away so rarely and why it means so much when we do. Some hearts are more fragile than others...purer somehow, like crystal in a world of glass...even the way they shatter is beautiful."

-Everwood,

↑ Grab this Headline Animator

Honestly, there's not too much to know...

I write various kinds of fiction (Historical, Fantasy, Sci-Fi, and Horror--sometimes all at once!), and I'm working on my current novel after abandoning the other two to the "Too much wrong with this to finish" pile.

Like the rest of my life and the odd combination of quotes above, it's complicated and a work in progress. Currently, I'm struggling between the ending that I thought the characters were headed toward when I first started writing this book almost a year ago, and the more positive, hopeful ending that keeps rearing its head. I'm working on both possibilities, even though my gut tells me that it should end well for the characters. Writing tragedy is easy, almost second nature, for me, but writing comedy (in the classical sense) is much more difficult. It's easy to be moving with the tragic. Comedies take much more attention and care.



I also have a comic book script in the final editing stages that my co-writer and I are hoping to send off. Then there are the short stories, and the myriad other novel concepts and worlds and characters that keep wracking my brain for attention...

In the meantime, visit Lyrique Tragedy Reviews for author interviews, Book, Film, and Site reviews, and links to Agent sites, publishers, and Author sites and blogs!

↑ Grab this Headline Animator

And don't forget to drop by for your weekly dose of "Words, words, words" on the new Podcast Minute Lit!


..About D.M. Papuga:..
I currently teach literature, composition, argument, critical reading, and Shakespeare at three different universities, and have taught at 5 different major universities all over the U.S. My specialization is in the Early Modern Period--specifically tragedies-- along with various modes of Literary Theory, Film, and Pop Culture.

N.B.: I understand that grammar is a sucking black hole of cluelessness, and I don't expect people to be perfect grammarians (Hell, there are only a handful in the world--not including myself), but if you message me and use l33t-speak, text messaging shortcuts (b4, gr8, 2, u, etc.), or fail to understand that a sentence includes punctuation (or proper capitalization of words like "I," for that matter) do not expect a response from me. Using standard English is a pet-peeve of mine, and if you want to be taken seriously (not only by me, but by other "adults" as well), it should be one of yours too. I teach ENGLISH, remember? That's all. I'll step off my soap box now...