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Dec. 21st, 2011 02:26 pmMaybe you don't know this about me, but the thing about me, the main thing, is that I'm a science fiction writer. I say science fiction and it means different things to different people. A lot of people would classify me as a fantasy writer – but I've read Asimov and Clarke and everyone else who's a science fiction writer and they write fantasies, fables, just like Tolkien and Eddison. So I say I'm a science fiction writer, but you could be forgiven if you took me for a fantasist and I wouldn't be hurt if you called me one.
Now, the true thing is, that I'm not really that either. Really I'm a forger. What I do is I fabricate texts and pass them off as being written by people who live in a world that I've invented. I write fake histories and reference made-up languages and tell people's harrowing stories from their perspectives in their own words. And I made all of them up, out of my imagination. I made up their metaphysics in painstaking detail, I made up their courtship rituals, their family patterns, their names, their hopes and dreams. All of it. I made up a whole world from out of myself and my dissatisfaction with the world that I live in. So I forge these people, like a blacksmith does and then I forge their words like they were banknotes or bad checks.
I write these all down and then I fit them together into a book. These books are sort of novels, and mostly something else. Not quite novels, the stories and the plots are sometimes hidden, sometimes very subtle, probably too subtle. I don't tip my hand, not this early. I'm four books down, really 3 and ¾ and four 1/2s. I 'finish' one of these books every 18-20 months and if you asked, and you wouldn't, but I'm telling you all the same – if you asked- I'd say without irony or pride that this is my life's work. That I have a plan to write 18 more of these books and that I expect it to occupy me till I'm dead. That's it. That's the thing about me. The main thing. I have 18 more to write and I don't want to give away the ending too early, don't want to reveal everything right up front. I want there to be a slow development and I want there to be strength in what I'm doing. So the plot unfolds somewhat slowly, the character's conflicts go unresolved. There are 18 more books for that. Be patient.
I mention this because sometimes I write in my blog, and sometimes I write other things. I like writing, as a pastime, as a cool and engrossing hobby that I see as being partly related to my Life's Work. So I write these things, entries. I do this when I need to prime the pump, when I need to get my fingers to come alive and when I can't think of the next thing to write that will bring two or more desperate parts of a book together. When that happens I write things like this- because I feel like I have to explain all of this.
And by all of this I mean, obscurity, absence, weird uncomfortable solitude, severance. I'm working and I'm doing, I'm pursuing my calling, which I do for free, which I do because I'm called to do it. I don't know if I would even want to do this for a living. If I made a living doing it? That'd be alright I guess. But that's not why I do it, and anyway I doubt that I'm good enough at it to make a living, a real living at it. So fine. It's fine. Never for money, always for love.
But I have a rich inner life that makes me neglect the outer world. I have a better world to dream about than the world I got born into. I have that and it's a gift. So I work on the gift, and make it better and better as I'm able. I'm a few books in and I keep getting better. Eventually I might even be great. I have that to help me, that thought. That and wondering and really, really caring about what will happen next, and who I will invent next and what documents I'll forge next. It's satisfying, but not always perfectly appealing.
Now, the true thing is, that I'm not really that either. Really I'm a forger. What I do is I fabricate texts and pass them off as being written by people who live in a world that I've invented. I write fake histories and reference made-up languages and tell people's harrowing stories from their perspectives in their own words. And I made all of them up, out of my imagination. I made up their metaphysics in painstaking detail, I made up their courtship rituals, their family patterns, their names, their hopes and dreams. All of it. I made up a whole world from out of myself and my dissatisfaction with the world that I live in. So I forge these people, like a blacksmith does and then I forge their words like they were banknotes or bad checks.
I write these all down and then I fit them together into a book. These books are sort of novels, and mostly something else. Not quite novels, the stories and the plots are sometimes hidden, sometimes very subtle, probably too subtle. I don't tip my hand, not this early. I'm four books down, really 3 and ¾ and four 1/2s. I 'finish' one of these books every 18-20 months and if you asked, and you wouldn't, but I'm telling you all the same – if you asked- I'd say without irony or pride that this is my life's work. That I have a plan to write 18 more of these books and that I expect it to occupy me till I'm dead. That's it. That's the thing about me. The main thing. I have 18 more to write and I don't want to give away the ending too early, don't want to reveal everything right up front. I want there to be a slow development and I want there to be strength in what I'm doing. So the plot unfolds somewhat slowly, the character's conflicts go unresolved. There are 18 more books for that. Be patient.
I mention this because sometimes I write in my blog, and sometimes I write other things. I like writing, as a pastime, as a cool and engrossing hobby that I see as being partly related to my Life's Work. So I write these things, entries. I do this when I need to prime the pump, when I need to get my fingers to come alive and when I can't think of the next thing to write that will bring two or more desperate parts of a book together. When that happens I write things like this- because I feel like I have to explain all of this.
And by all of this I mean, obscurity, absence, weird uncomfortable solitude, severance. I'm working and I'm doing, I'm pursuing my calling, which I do for free, which I do because I'm called to do it. I don't know if I would even want to do this for a living. If I made a living doing it? That'd be alright I guess. But that's not why I do it, and anyway I doubt that I'm good enough at it to make a living, a real living at it. So fine. It's fine. Never for money, always for love.
But I have a rich inner life that makes me neglect the outer world. I have a better world to dream about than the world I got born into. I have that and it's a gift. So I work on the gift, and make it better and better as I'm able. I'm a few books in and I keep getting better. Eventually I might even be great. I have that to help me, that thought. That and wondering and really, really caring about what will happen next, and who I will invent next and what documents I'll forge next. It's satisfying, but not always perfectly appealing.
