[insert most salable title here]

[greygirlbeast]

Yesterday, I wrote 1,010 words on "Bradbury Weather." I spent a good bit of the day getting a grasp on the Zubrin Mars Calendar. This story is shaping up to be darker sf than, say, The Dry Salvages. At least, I think it's darker, in that it's more concerned with human violence and weaknesses and fears than with great, cosmic Lovecraftian big-bads. A lot of my readers seem to disagree with me on this score. I thought, for example, that Low Red Moon was a far, far more horrific, frightening novel than Threshold. A lot of people didn't agree.

It might be the things I wrote yesterday, in part, which have me in this mood. But I know it's not only the things I wrote.

I'm sick of the internet, of Blogger, LiveJournal, Amazon, hypertext, e-mail, the whole goddamn mess of seemingly (but not actually) instantaneous communication.

I'm sick of video games.

I'm sick of the little plastic spouts with their convenient screw-on caps that juice cartons have to have now, helping to insure that no part of our lives can be free of petroleum byproducts.

Maybe I'm just sick. I think I have a minor sinus infection.

But if all that there is for me in life is this writing gig, then I'd really appreciate it if I could just focus on my writing. Not on reviews (both real and Amazonian), or sales figures, or return rates, or cover art, or schmoozing with other authors, or popularity, or any of that crap. Just the writing.

Forget the signings and public appearances. Forget the interviews. It's nothing that has anything to do with writing. Celebrity and art are always at odds, even minor celebrity. You might win the hearts of the masses, but then you have to keep them happy, or they'll turn on you in a heartbeat. And they have sharp teeth. I'd rather not bother winning them over in the first place.

I'm trying to say something important about writing and about being an author, but I'm afraid that, for whatever reason, I'm not being very clear.

If it were only a matter of writing my stories, of sitting in this dark little room, writing my stories. If it were only a matter of being the best artist that I can be. That's exactly what it never can be.

I have long bemoaned the online journal as a place to whine and self-pity. I certainly shouldn't be perpetuating the problem myself.

Comments

[sleepycyan.livejournal.com]

I think that Low Red Moon is darker than Threshold in some ways, because the reader gets a glimpse into Narcissa Snow's psyche. It didn't creep into my dreams in the same way that Threshold did, though.I had quite a few dark, damp, subterranean nights while reading Threshold.

[jacobluest.livejournal.com]

I'm trying to figure out what you were saying about writing. For me writing's always been about two things: creation, and immortality. If no one read a single word I wrote I'd still do it, because I'm a writer, I suppose, for good or ill. But I'm also scared of death, as most people are, and so writing for me is also a way to tangibly work towards a sort of pale aferlife. Tending my immortality.

Sounds like you've gotten sick and tired of tending your immortality, and would rather just create. Which is the nobler of the two, I think, but in the same breath the more tragic.
Milan Kundera said all this with much more eloquence and beauty in his novel Immortality, but ah well. I work with what I have.

~Jacob

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

For me writing's always been about two things: creation, and immortality.

Creation, immortality, and money.

But yes, sadly, I've spent much of my life tending to my "immortality." There could be no more futile undertaking.

Sounds like you've gotten sick and tired of tending your immortality, and would rather just create.

It's a more palatable prospect, yes.

Nice comments.

[jacobluest.livejournal.com]

You know, I've been thinking a lot lately about writers, their art, and the Audience. And one thing I've thought is that we writers (if I can be allowed the conceit) are actually characters from stories. But the mundane world can't handle that. In order to assert our right to be characters, we have to spin out characters and stories, sacrificing them in order to be an artist, to have our character-qualities tolerated. I say this because you, a self-professed goth when most goths are in their teens or tweens, strike me as a character. Especially your Nar'eth alter-ego. Perhaps our writing is nothing more than the product of our longing for the place we came from, our fumbling way to buy a way of life tolerable to our strange proclivities. If you were in Ireland we could have a pint and talk about it, but as it is...[shrug] good luck.

~Jacob

[pinkteaset3.livejournal.com]

This is why we must fake our own deaths.

I say without reservation that you are the best artist I know.

xx
Mella

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

This is why we must fake our own deaths.

I've faked mine so many times they're onto me...

[happyspector.livejournal.com]

Total agreement on how "human" darkness is stronger than "cosmic" darkness, psychologically. Yeah, well-rendered cosmic, or "outer" darkness, when well rendered, is great for giving the readers the willies. And for the more sensitive of us, it can heighten our awareness to what just might be lurking on the peripheral vision throughout our daily surroundings. But the long-run lingering emotion more tends to be fascination and speculation about the ideas brought up. Highly morbid fascination/speculation, but you get the idea. The darkness of our own condition, rendered with emotional truth ... now that's more likely to go straight to the gut and stay there. Not to say anything against "Threshold," though all its subterranian legions, seen and unseen, don't add up to ONE Narcissa Snow.

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

Not to say anything against "Threshold," though all its subterranian legions, seen and unseen, don't add up to ONE Narcissa Snow.

I am inclined to agree. But that's a given.

[happyspector.livejournal.com]

Then again, fear isn't my immediate reaction to "the other" (though "proceed with respectful caution" is generally wise). Humans, though ... now those fuckin' things can scare me right over to the dark side, and I'm talkin' like Yoda mapped it out!

[setsuled.livejournal.com]

This story is shaping up to be darker sf than, say, The Dry Salvages

Cool.

I thought, for example, that Low Red Moon was a far, far more horrific, frightening novel than Threshold. A lot of people didn't agree.

I agree (well, as you know). But there's probably also the issue here of what people fill blanks in with. Threshold, and Dry Salvages, are, like you said, focused on a Lovecraftian "big bad." Some people mind find that more frightening simply because they're insensitive to human drama, or because they have a reflex reaction to be absolutely frightened by the big, unknown thing.

I'm sick of the internet, of Blogger, LiveJournal, Amazon, hypertext, e-mail, the whole goddamn mess of seemingly (but not actually) instantaneous communication.

I definitely find myself in that mood at times. Mostly it's when I get tired of seeing myself talk.

If it were only a matter of writing my stories, of sitting in this dark little room, writing my stories. If it were only a matter of being the best artist that I can be. That's exactly what it never can be.

Where is the Star Trek universe when you need it? Sometimes I fantasise about living on the Enterprise and simply writing holodek programmes for the rest of my life.

This subject always makes me think of the story by Kafka, the title of which escapes me, about the mouse people and the one mouse that didn't seem particularly useful except she sang oddly.

I do think it's true that art isn't comfortable in its capitalist reins. That the need for money is a constraint that never ought to be put on an artist. And that's kind of a shame, because I think the masses often need to hear things from artists they very much don't want to. Actually, I think artists ought to be revered as immortal sacred creatures that live in really cool, ominous caves.

Yes, I'm the social one . . .

[pinkteaset3.livejournal.com]

but the caves have to have tunnels between them, so we can sometimes have coffee.

xx
Mella

[setsuled.livejournal.com]

but the caves have to have tunnels between them, so we can sometimes have coffee.

Yes, I suppose . . . Gods, I want coffee right now, incidentally . . . The cave also oughta have special cars, alien zoos, Space Butlers (http://spacebutler.tripod.com/), and origami trainers.

Too long have I slept this day . . .

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

Where is the Star Trek universe when you need it? Sometimes I fantasise about living on the Enterprise and simply writing holodek programmes for the rest of my life.

If only. Then I could retreat into my art, truly.

the one mouse that didn't seem particularly useful except she sang oddly.

Never has there been a more accurate description of me. Caitlín R. Kiernan: The Mouse Who Sang Oddly.

Mostly it's when I get tired of seeing myself talk.

Abso-frelling-lutely.

[miltonsdavid.livejournal.com]

Ah, the eternal struggle between artist and patron...Da Vinci, Michalangelo, Joyce, Kiernan - you're in good company! Have to add Reznor (Tim and Trent, too) or I'll catch hell at home.

Pardon my sleep deprivation rantings above

[miltonsdavid.livejournal.com]

This post was our breakfast conversation, and as I'm visiting a house full of art students, was informed that it is required that the take a class titled "The 'Business' of Art" in order to get their BFA! Hmmmmm. Doesn't their future look bright?

Re: Pardon my sleep deprivation rantings above

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

This post was our breakfast conversation, and as I'm visiting a house full of art students, was informed that it is required that the take a class titled "The 'Business' of Art" in order to get their BFA!

Possibly, this is the first course art students should be required to take.

Re: Pardon my sleep deprivation rantings above

[miltonsdavid.livejournal.com]

As a result of taking the class my best friend, who started painting photorealism, changed his style to one more "salable" or what his professors have told him will be salable...
What's happened to art for art's sake?
Where have you gone Andy Warhol?
On another note; read in the papers that Billy Al Bengston (contemporary of Warhol and POPART very influential painter in "his day") retired and moved to Canada to dairy farm or something...
specifically because he couldn't find a gallery to represent him and/or a museum that wanted to mount a retrospective...even though he had kept actively painting until retirement.
Again, Hmmmmm

Re: Pardon my sleep deprivation rantings above

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

What's happened to art for art's sake?

Nothing, really. As always, it's a quick road to starvation.

Re: Pardon my sleep deprivation rantings above

[pinkteaset3.livejournal.com]

I've always wished they would offer such a course at my university. Everyone in the arts (visual, theatre, writing, cinema, dance) should be taught exactly what they're getting themselves into, should know strategies and resources etc. So many people go into it blindly & learn these things only through trial and error - and those errors can be costly, financially & in terms of keeping your artistic life going, and in just plain staying alive at all. We should learn about insurance & all of the legal things having to do with signing contracts and dealing with galleries, the public, copyright. in all the years I've studied various arts, I've never seen such a course offered. I've even tried to get a business oriented lecture series going here for the art students... but it's like the experienced professionals don't even want to talk about it. Maybe it's because they've been through so much hell, they can't look back & piece it together anymore in order to describe it to anyone.

xx
Mella

Re: Pardon my sleep deprivation rantings above

[miltonsdavid.livejournal.com]

University of California (any campus...it's a required course) Covers contract language mostly.

Re: Pardon my sleep deprivation rantings above

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

Covers contract language mostly.

That's a good start.