Talkin Shop: First Lines (brief)

I used to attribute the following statement to a notable lyrical poet, but after consider searching for the attribution to that particular wordsmith—or an attribution of anything even resembling the quote—I guess I'll step up on my soapbox platform and take the blame for it.  If anyone wants to debate that... let's sit down for a cup of coffee and spend some time talkin shop.

If one isn't otherwise presenting itself to you, here's a guideline for your consideration:

The first line of a story should be a simple statement of fact.


· • ·

Honors Project: Thesis Statement V.1

Ken Kesey said, "Some things can't be true even if they happened." In considering this statement, (notes from) The Tourist would be a consideration that if accounts of history—even by the people involved in particular events—are subjected to the same rubrics with which literature is critiqued, history takes on a questionable veracity similar to that told by an unreliable narrator. Specifically, The Tourist would present the quest for understanding the Siege of Sarajevo (1992-95) and its confusing array of participants as analogous to the various methods with which we consider meaning in a given work of literature.

"Some things can't be true even if they happened."
To paraphrase Ralph J. Gleason:
Sarajevo was like that.


· • ·

In case you didn't notice, I was being sarcastic.

I don't watch tv. Don't even own a tv. Well, that's not precisely true; I own one, but it lives in the storage unit. The point being: commercials. Even without tv, there are still commercials.

I've taken to watching recently an old tv show on Hulu. I used to watch The Daily Show on Hulu but now that's not on Hulu anymore. Hulu is thick with commercials. Not as bad as tv, but hell, we could go on about that for hours.

In my lifetime I've seen some pretty bad commercials. Awful ones. Those Doxidan commercials linger far longer than they should have. Imitation country music singer: "Doxidan, gentle Doxidan/When nature needs a helping hand..." Oldies are no match for the entire series of amazingly insipid Axe Spray/Shampoo/Stink-fume commericals. It leads me to believe that in addition to strange rather lurid chemicals, it also features a high content of brain repellent. My favorite awfulness—you know, the sort of trainwreck aspect of any given subject, horrifying in the extreme but also alluring in its grotesqueries?—is a wonderously STOOPID movie within an already moronic tableau of brief scenes for the Verizon Network G231/2 or whatever: a man is riding a roan horse cross the surf of a deserted beach with his hot babe straddled behind him. And what is he doing...? Texting or twittering or what-have-you.

Her: "This horse ride on the beach is so romantic, so sexy. I want you."
Him: "Hey, look. With the new Verison Network, I can GPS our exact location right here."
Her: "You use Axe Body Spray, don't you?"
Him: "And I wear Dockers."
Her: "Tell me just one thing..."
Him: "Anything."
Her: "Are you a Pepper, too—?"
Him: "—Hold on, I just got a text."

Brain repellent. Must be the brain repellent.

Hc Sunt Dragones.


· • ·

Talkin Shop: Unexpected Turns

So in the midst of this novel/novella, I-as-writer (as opposed to the I-as-narrator function) ask myself, where as this is going? Sometimes I know, but other times I'm writing my way towards something and don't know what. This is one of those sort of stories. And, as I-as-narrator answered that, I initially thought, how ludicrous. But then I realized that was exactly the way this Brett Easton Ellis-meets-Shirley Jackson tale goes. And the path there is quite wonderful. I hope sometime to find out if you think so as well.

Such unexpected turns are one of the tasty reasons I love what I do—the thrill of being in the midst of pure story as it manifests from the what-it-is-not. If it can surprise, challenge, convince, and thrill me, I suspect/think/hope/pray it may do similar things for others.


· • ·

Forbidden Boolean String

According to this article in the LA Times, the internet makes it easier to become a terrorist. Easier than what? I ask, but deduce from the open-ended question they mean easier than without. The logic in that is shoddy, but we'll ignore such a discrepancy in order to have the discussion move past the poor rhetoric it displays.

Another objective flaw in the article is its attention solely to Islamic radicals.

From charismatic clerics who spout hate online, to thousands of extremist websites, chat rooms and social networking pages that raise money and spread radical propaganda, the Internet has become a crucial front in the ever-shifting war on terrorism.

to

[F]iery Internet imans who use English to preach jihad and, in some cases, to help funnel recruits to Al Qaeda and other radical causes.

I've encountered plenty of radical hate-mongering from far more than Islamic voices. I think the easy way to rationally discuss this sort of thing is by just killing everyone who's viewpoint is different than . . . hmmm, that doesn't work because then . . . we'd all have to . . . end up shooting . . . each other.

Okay, to rationally discuss this topic, instead of pointing fingers at just one religious sect of wingnuts, how about point our fingers at all spectrum of wingnuts.

Hmmmm, that really doesn't work either, sing who defines who the wingnuts are?

"Decent society" I guess. Although I've seen damn little proof such a place exists.

And so I tried something. I used Google to help my terrorist indoctrination. But alas! Google failed me. I shan't be able to join my hoped for radical group since, apparently, they don't exist:

· • ·

Talkin Shop: The Pure Stream Flows

But turn from my tongue, o gods,
the madness of these men,
and from hallowed lips let a pure stream flow.

Empedocles

In my time of writing, I've completed more than 40 short stories and two novels (with a third novel that expanded to 260-280,000 words before I had to walk away from for mental and spiritual health), and several novellas in between that mix.

This past week I've knocked out the better part of another (almost 40k words since late Fri/Early Sat). Although it is very first draft sort of material, parts of it are among the best things I've ever written.

Which brings me to the reason of this post (the intent is less clear to me right now). I suspect this may be true with other writers but is certainly so with me: every time I write something that is shiver-worthy, I think, Where did this come from? and Thankfully, I'm the faucet for this, and How will I ever write something this phenomenal again?

Then, at some point, I write something else that is shiver-worthy and end up with the same trio of questions again, and for a few moments, am absolutely sure nothing I write will ever drip with such epiphanic dew again.

Until the next time it does.

It just amazes me that this has been a recurrence since 1991 when I wrote my first novel (the last couple of lines of which are still among the best things I've ever written) and my first really solid stand-on-its-own short story. I learned a lot from them and in the gulf of time between then and now.

In this novella/novel I've been recording these past six days, I've written some great material. And a few of them triggered those old, familiar questions.

Ah, the wondrous, fucked-up, glorious life of creativity.

There's a celestial reservoir of story-water in the universe. And sometimes, I'm fortunate enough to be a faucet through which that pure stream flows.

Thank you, O muse who sings^* to me. Thank you.

I look forward to as many more years of this as possible.



^* Ok. My muse doesn't so much sing to me as whispers sacred mysteries in the velvet hush of unknown tongues.

· • ·

Talkin Shop: Lingering Depth

I first read the following paragraph in the Atlanta Library. This is the opening of the book and it gripped me then and it grips my attention now. Something my friend Sean and I call the delicious morsels of writing: those tasty bits that explode with delight on the tongue and on the lips and in the heart-spirit center in the brain and linger wonderfully in memory's taste buds long after the meal/snack/dessert was first tasted.

Following the paragraph as it appears in the book, I included it again with some words underlined. These would (will) be what I would look up in a close reading/textual analysis, but also serve as the keyholes through which we'd peep (for if I were leading this critical mission, there would certainly be other voyeurs there beside me—I mean besides me...) to reveal what lurks beyond the edge of the page that is conjured there by referential association.

I also did this back in Fall 08 at Columbia, but I wasn't ready yet. Now, I think I am.


~•~


"Had you asked your average hippie about beginnings, you would have discovered there were as many as there were hippies—everyone had a favorite chronology. Some preferred to begin the psychedelic story all the way back at the Rig Veda, the ancient Hindu text that spoke of the ecstatic visions obtainable from the plant soma; others began with the mystery cults of ancient Greece and the Middle Ages—the Rosicrucians, the Alchemists, the Illuminati. The lure of higher consciousness had exercised a fascination across the centuries, and whether it was Athenians being initiated at Elusis, or Balzac and Baudelaire smoking hashish at the Club des Haschischins, the hippies recognized them all as parents.

"But if the psychedelic story had a hundred beginnings, at some point all the plot lines converge on Basle, Switzerland, at a few minutes before five on the afternoon of Monday, April 19, 1943."

—Jay Stevens,
Storming Heaven: LSD and the American Dream

•

"Had you asked your average hippie about beginnings, you would have discovered there were as many as there were hippies--everyone had a favorite chronology. Some preferred to begin the psychedelic story all the way back at the Rig Veda, the ancient Hindu text that spoke of the ecstatic visions obtainable from the plant soma; others began with the mystery cults of ancient Greece and the Middle Ages--the Rosicrucians, the Alchemists, the Illuminati. The lure of higher consciousness had exercised a fascination across the centuries, and whether it was Athenians being initiated at Eleusis, or Balzac and Baudelaire smoking hashish at the Club des Haschischins, the hippies recognized them all as parents.

"But if the psychedelic story had a hundred beginnings, at some point all the plot lines converge on Basle, Switzerland, at a few minutes before five on the afternoon of Monday, April 19, 1943."

•

That's 101 unique words in two paragraphs totaling 147. 45 of those words are reference keys (18 are "the"). I love this kinda thing. Confectionery words. Tasty. Yum.


· • ·