Not gonna work today!

[greygirlbeast]

Yesterday went well, so far as the writing is concerned. To my great surprise (and relief) it only took me 364 words to reach THE END of "For One Who Has Lost Herself." The "final" word count is 5,860 words. Now I'm stepping away from the piece for a couple of days. I need some perspective before I read through the whole thing, start to finish. I've gone ahead and sent the uncorrected version to Vince so we can start talking about the illustration. I also did a great deal of revision on the pages I wrote on Wednesday. Note, this story isn't erotic, and "pas-en-arrière" is only very subtly so. The pieces just came out that way, and I wasn't about to force sex upon them if they didn't want it. Wouldn't that be a sort of literary rape? Anyway, what I was going to say is that if you've been fence sitting about subscribing to the journal because you were afraid the sex stuff might not be your cuppa, here's a chance for you to try Sirenia Digest relatively sex free.

I've grown to love Klaus Nomi's music, but it inevitably makes me sad, in the way that joyous things can sometimes make me sad if I know too much about the life of the artist who created them. Bittersweet, I guess. I'm listening to Nomi on the iPod as I type this and thinking perhaps I'll switch to the Dresden Dolls.

I did a little more thinking on the avatar thing yesterday. It occurred to me I'd left out a few major ones. Keith Barry, for instance, who, I believe, was a sort of proto-Deacon. Also Jimmy DeSade, and he's an important one. He and Salmagundi may in fact form two halves of a greater compound avatar. Jimmy was my fury at things that have been stolen from me, my guilt at not having done more to prevent those losses, my determination to make the whole world pay (for whatever). There's also Echo from The Dreaming. Echo's obvious. Anyway, yeah, I'm still working all this out.

Spooky just came back from the p.o. with a nice little package from girfan, which included a really beautiful set of British postcards adorned with images of Ice-Age mammals (Smilodon, a woolly rhino, woolly mammoth, cave bear, and Irish elk). They're much too cool to ever actually use.

The mailman brought new books yesterday. That's always a good thing. Kathe Koja's The Blue Mirror, Jeff VanderMeer's City of Saints and Madmen, and Ronald Hutton's Triumph of the Moon.

After downloading Typewriter 2.10, I was seized with the need to find an image of the old Royal I used as a kid. Here's the best one I've found so far:


Royal Model KMM (circa 1938, I think)


I'm giving myself a day-off after five straight writing days. I want to be outside, and I've got to spend the weekend finishing with the Alabaster galleys. We're supposed to reach 82F today, with rain tonight. Hopefully, I really will leave the house and not wind up spending the whole day working on Wikipedia or playing videogames or some other such indoor silliness. Oh, I've noted Poppy's poetry meme, which I think I shall do at some point today or tonight or tomorrow.

Comments

[galaxiezero.livejournal.com]

i can't say that i've ever heard anything from klaus nomi, but one of my friends gave me a taste of keren ann's music- melancholy and haunting, without the slightest effort to be spooky.

i've never had an avatar for any aspect of myself, but there are always the ones out there that i can relate to. i see my stubborn logical self in chance, and sometimes the rage and fear of narcissa and dancy. of course, these are all open to a person's interpretations, and we will always see what we want to see in those people...

is the new dresden dolls out already? i'll have to look...congrats on your day off, you deserve it (lest your brain seep out of one ear from overuse).

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

is the new dresden dolls out already?

Nope. Almost. I think the website says the release date's April 18th.

[galaxiezero.livejournal.com]

yeah, i checked it out because i was going to buy it, then saw that it's not out yet. boo. i can wait, though...

[bosstweed.livejournal.com]

I spent an inordinate amount of time last night thinking about your comments about avatars, especially your thought that DoH is sort of a "farewell" to your avatars. Is a story no less a part of an author if the characters -- some or all of them -- aren't a direct analogue of some part of the author? I don't think so. At a certain point (just my opinion, of course) I think the story, or more subtle elements of it, becomes the avatar. Just because there's no longer a straight-line Spyder-is-Caitlin's-unsane-mind sort of thing doesn't mean there's no longer part of you embodied (avatar-ized?) in the story. I would think it's just a more complex sort of avatar, either representing a more complex flavor of the author or representing a straightforward element with greater complexity.

As to the public psychoanalysis, I hope it continues. I hope that doesn't come across as snarky as I'm afraid that it might. The problem with so much fantasy and horror is that it doesn't flow from seem deep well inside the author. There are times I enjoy reading shallow fantasy, but when "genre" fiction moves beyond the generic it seems to stem from authors' long-term obssessive concerns, whether their work qualifies as public psychoanalysis or not. So much fantasy is so trite because the authors are not willing to put a deep part of themselves into it, and most of your stories seem like the sorts of things that really come from within. I really have a hard time believing you started writing Threshold by saying "dude, what if there was, like, Lovecraft and dinosaurs and a goth chick all in one book?" -- or that I would have liked it if you had. This has maybe stretched a bit from the original avatar point, and I'm not trying to imply that you're less invested in your current work, but I hope you get what I'm saying.

[cucumberseed.livejournal.com]

Oh, thank you for the link.

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

I really have a hard time believing you started writing Threshold by saying "dude, what if there was, like, Lovecraft and dinosaurs and a goth chick all in one book?"

That makes two of us!

[cucumberseed.livejournal.com]

This week, a few of my friends of the role-playing variety and I were speaking of something similar: the sort of character a player ends up portraying and how many different sorts you have. The lot of us (all experienced dorks of many years) came out with less than a handful, when we were totally honest with ourselves, which become our versions of avatars.

I had about 4, and they've gone through different settings, systems, names and such, but they run at four different angles from my personality.

(I'll spare you the gory details of who and what they are)

Now that I think of it more, this journal is not quite the person that one would meet outside of the magic of the intarweb, and is something of an avatar, itself.

When I started writing this, I thought I only had 3 that I'd developed and used, and that, in my current writing project, I was writing a main character that had little to nothing to do with me, but that isn't so. But there is a 4th, and that is the one I've been writing.

A host of nosy questions.

[cucumberseed.livejournal.com]

Actually, here's a couple of questions regarding your experience with avatar characters:

Have you ever had a character become an avatar you didn't expect? Sort of an avatar drift? Again, this is mostly based on the serendipitous connection between your posts and the conversation, but I find that happens pretty often in games. It also, sometimes, happens in writing, though not quite as much - I suppose it's because I have more (*snerk*) control over the circumstances of the characters in writing.

How strong do you think a personal trait (yours) has to be in order to animate a character? Now that I'm thinking, I've also written and portrayed a whole lot of different aspects of myself and the first post I made involves those that are, in some way (to me) fit to make protagonists.

Finally, how do you think the gender, sexuality and species of each character informs or is informed by the fact of it being an avatar?

Re: A host of nosy questions.

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

Finally, how do you think the gender, sexuality and species of each character informs or is informed by the fact of it being an avatar?

I'm not sure. I mean, the effectiveness of my avatars doesn't seem bound by any of these factors. Hence, Jimmy DeSade, Salmagundi Desvernine, Narcissa Snow, Dead Girl, Gin Percel, and Nar'eth. It only matters that they can contain some fragment of me with needs containing and expressing. I might not have understood your question.

[girfan.livejournal.com]

Wow! That was quick!
I sent them on Monday afternoon.

Glad you like them. The Royal Mail had a slogan "I saw this and thought of you" when I first moved here, and, well, I did what it says.

I want to get you something from Whitby (we go later this month) as well (due to something you said earlier).

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

want to get you something from Whitby (we go later this month) as well (due to something you said earlier).

A rock would be marvelous. A fossil would be marvelouser.

Actually, it just occurred to me...I have some ammonites from Whitby. Still, more is always nice. ;-)

[morganxpage.livejournal.com]

I know just how you feel about Klaus Nomi's music.

~Morgan

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

I know just how you feel about Klaus Nomi's music.

It's a difficult thing, wanting to hear and enjoy the music as he meant it to be heard and enjoyed, wanting to get from it the delight he clearly put into and took from the process of making it...and yet...

[morganxpage.livejournal.com]

Speaking of Klaus, if you ever get a chance to hear it, I highly suggest the song Army of Klaus by Patrick Wolf. It's a semi-cover, semi-remix of Bjork's Amry of Me by Patrick Wolf who claims to have been "possessed" by the ghost of Klaus Nomi while recording it. It's delightfully strange. It's on Bjork's Army of Me charity cover album.

~Morgan

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

Speaking of Klaus, if you ever get a chance to hear it, I highly suggest the song Army of Klaus by Patrick Wolf. It's a semi-cover, semi-remix of Bjork's Amry of Me by Patrick Wolf who claims to have been "possessed" by the ghost of Klaus Nomi while recording it. It's delightfully strange. It's on Bjork's Army of Me charity cover album.

Sounds drad. I don't have that Bjork CD, but I bet I can find the track via Acquisition.

Delilah

[subtlesttrap.livejournal.com]

I was listening to the Dresden Dolls track "Delilah" and I thought of you so I re-read "Waycross" and it spooked me even more the third time around. "Delilah" is a tearjerker, woudln't you agree?

Re: Delilah

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

"Delilah" is a tearjerker, woudln't you agree?

Yep.

[sovay]

Also Jimmy DeSade, and he's an important one. He and Salmagundi may in fact form two halves of a greater compound avatar.

I had meant to ask about Jimmy DeSade. He is my favorite, if that is the appropriate word, character in your earlier work: I love his complications.

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

I had meant to ask about Jimmy DeSade. He is my favorite, if that is the appropriate word, character in your earlier work: I love his complications.

I was once so in love with Jimmy DeSade. I understood him so perfectly.

[sovay]

I love that he's everything from a Gothic monster to a badass antihero to a genuinely tragic figure: the boy who pours brandy for Elgin Murray and the motherfucker who turns out the lights on Tam and Magwitch and the twins, and the prince who comes through the thorns just a little too late; a fall and no redemption. ". . . Between the Gargoyle Trees" is heartbreaking; he is terrible and terribly sympathetic.

Is he likely ever to appear again, or his cycle closed? I locate him and Salmagundi at the spatial and emotional core of Tales of Pain and Wonder, so I've assumed they were finished; but I hadn't expected the mention of Silas Desvernine in "Andromeda Among The Stones" either, so there you go.

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

I love that he's everything from a Gothic monster to a badass antihero to a genuinely tragic figure: the boy who pours brandy for Elgin Murray and the motherfucker who turns out the lights on Tam and Magwitch and the twins, and the prince who comes through the thorns just a little too late; a fall and no redemption. ". . . Between the Gargoyle Trees" is heartbreaking; he is terrible and terribly sympathetic.

You are now my favourite reader. :-)

[sovay]

You are now my favourite reader. :-)

*blushes furiously*

: )

[aoniedesade.livejournal.com]

I had meant to ask about Jimmy DeSade. He is my favorite, if that is the appropriate word, character in your earlier work: I love his complications.

He's also mine in the earlier works. In ...Between the Gargoyle Trees the scene where he is in the movie theatre, watching Salmaguni's film is perhaps one of the most beautiful pieces of modern literature I have ever read.

The last three pages of that story are heartbreakingly eloquent and beautiful.

For me to think that of something, it has to make me feel something profound, reach out, speak to me, something I can identify with on a deep core level. The last last five paragraphs are someting that emotionally, punched through my chest, grabbed onto my heart and would not let go. It made me weep, because I understood. Though my username is on no way related to the charater Jimmy DeSade, I see parts of his archetype in myself.

Currently, these days I rather like Deacon, Scarborough Pentecost and Starling Jane.

[sleepycyan.livejournal.com]

I adore Klaus Nomi, and I can certainly understand the sadness that his music can make you feel when you know the story of his life.

Also, I don't know if you've heard it, but Nina Hagen and Marc Almond did a fabulous tribute cover of "Total Eclipse."

[wishlish.livejournal.com]

Sonuvabitch.

I had that *same* typewriter as a kid.

I never would have remembered had you not put that picture up. I used to type all day on that thing. It was weirdly perfect for kids, a tremendously tactile thing.

Damn. Okay, now there's *three* things from my childhood my eventual kid needs- that, magnetic letters, and a Show-N-Tell projector/record player.

[tagplazen.livejournal.com]

City Of Saints and Madmen is a fucking great book. That thing had us hooked like lab monkeys wearing pleasure center wire jockeys.

That typewriter totally made me want to track down that fucking album that every elementary school kid has been forced to listen to where the woman typed in rythmn with the orchestra, except I can't remember the name of the damn thing, and so in frustration I would have to say blow the thing apart like Burroughs with a shotgun.

Especially since one time when I was still a wee little bastard, we found one like that along with a jews harp in this abandoned barn during a burly cold snap with a wind chill factor so cold that when you spit it turned to ice before hitting the ground. I tried playing the jews harp which went well at first, until I became over exuberant and twanged the living hell out of it which caused my lower lip to wrap around the damn spring. Needless to say it hurt like a motherfucker and I was screaming with blood gushing like a stuck pig and my head was spasming out like those freaky bastards in Jacobs Ladder arcing blood all over the place to make little hissing noises in the snow as it fell.

This is what the old timers refer to as 'good times' not to be confused with Early Times, which has sponsored this post.

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

Especially since one time when I was still a wee little bastard...

Okay. I laughed until I hurt.

[helena-draven.livejournal.com]

Triumph of The Moon is a very interesting book. Not at all 'dry' in the sense you'd expect an academic study to be. Although Hutton is a self-admittted historian, this reads more like a social study. It's got a lot of humour (read the footnotes!) and even more "oh, so that's where that came from!" moments. An extremely worthwhile read, in my opinion. He's a rather good public speaker too, from what I remember. His talk on Lord of the Rings and Paganism (circa 2003) is entertaining, even if the validity of his points is stretched a bit!

[bondgwendabond.livejournal.com]

Wow -- that's the exact make and model of Royal I grew up writing on. It currently sits on a table in our office. (I might take a picture if I get adventurous.) On it, I wrote such classics as "The Special Horse" (dad = horse meat seller) and "Life in the Year 2020" (building a bubble around cities = bad idea). But I love it anyway...

[aoniedesade.livejournal.com]

I'm for anything and everything in Sirenia digest. The weird, the erotic, the just plain sureallistic weird shit. An evolution on the themes and forms, which you are already doing a wonderful job of. It's a digest, after all.

Pardon me, I'm in a bit of an odd mood. I've spent the past two week slowing moving house from Picayune MS to Slidell, LA and eventually New Orleans.

I'll email you soon regarding the makeup artist you work with, and thank you so much for offering to put me in touch with him. I'm sorry I haven't done so sooner, things have just been...hectic to say the least.