Hey WriCampia! Huh. Do you know what WriCampia reminds me of? Writing. What is writing for, though? It can be used for so many things, from tax bills, to receipts, to wills, and even to speeches, but that’s not what we’re here to do. We’re here to write stories. To entertain, to astound, to wonder! That got me thinking about all of the limitless stories being written, so I sent out a survey in The Daily WriCampian and boom! We were in business.
About 30 campers responded to the survey with their favorite stories, genres, and favorite quotes from their works—and then I compiled them into a big ol’ heap of statistics. Sadly, this year, due to technical difficulties, not many campers’ responses made it through to us, so this data does not represent the whole WriCampia community. We are, however, still able to examine some of our story trends in microcosm.
We know that about 37% of WriCampians from among our sample are currently writing fantasy stories; while, what some would argue to be the polar opposite of fantasy, sci-fi, only had 7.4% of campers working on the genre. Then, with other genres, such as romance, horror, and fanfiction, the percentages were 18.5%, 14.8%, and 6.14%, respectively. Other types of writing, like play scripts, dystopian, poetry, fall and redemption, historical fiction, and mysteries, all topped off at 3.7%.
When story plotlines were mentioned, a motley crew of characters figured into them, including a Temu hot dog, a cannibal butcher, some demons, and a woodland spirit. One camper is even writing about a WWI soldier’s diary. Later on, I read a story idea with an evil necrolord taking over the darkness. With all of these great story ideas and characters, I figured that it would be nice to get some quotes from these stories in the making, and I specifically asked for the authors’ favorites. Several campers were especially fond of particular lines of dialogue. ‘“Right, I spent my entire paycheck on Robux,’” read one camper’s favorite line. “THE BRAIN IS INEDIBLE, DUMBA**!” read another. A third line read: “I don’t care if I get a medal or not, I just want this to end and I don’t want to fight anymore.”
Other lines were more philosophical in nature. “‘Hope. What is hope? It’s something to die for, something to fight for. Despair was to be conquered for the sake of hope, always,’” a fourth character spoke.
Some campers shared lines of exposition. “The words flowed from his mouth like music, only Philip didn’t like the tune,” narrated one camper.
“Even in the most interesting of historical times, while we may only look back on the words of popular media and politicians, there were plenty of people like Esther. People who lived quiet but equally extraordinary lives,” observed another.
A third camper opined: “The issues around phones do not start with the phones themselves, but rather the way people choose to use their phones, and especially social media.”
“‘Okay, for context, I stabbed the guy who said this,’ Shikibu began, ‘He asked, What are you going to do, stab me? And then I stabbed him,’” read a final, funny passage.
It is inspiring that these worlds can be created by anyone., whether through voice, quill, pencil, pen, or computer, because there is only one force in the universe that can stop you: copyright. ✎
