Ariel over at Bittersweet Life wrote yesterday about rekindling his relationship with his novel. He wanted some advice and offered some quotes from various different authors about their relationship with the written word. One of the quotes listed was; "Even in literature and art, no man who bothers about originality will ever be original: whereas if you simply try to tell the truth (without caring twopence how often it has been told before) you will, nine times out of ten, become original without ever having noticed it. Give up yourself, and you will find your real self. Lose your life, and you will save it." - C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity. This quote obviously stuck with me last night as I tossed and turned and tried to sleep.
Insomnia has been gnawing at me lately. It is a productive time as the cares of the world wash away in half dreams and half baked ideas that have been unusually productive. In the past so many weeks I've had three really good ideas either during my "sleep" or directly upon opening my eyes. I've tossed and turned and sounded like a hard drive laboring to render a movie, play You Tube, and run Itunes at the same time. But DING! - and I get the answer I've been trying to discover without realizing it. Last night, that quote had a productive ring to it.
As I'm trying to consummate my relationship with one book, I'm about to start an affair with another. This story has been floating in my head for years - lost, without a rudder, on a wide expanse of story ideas. A couple of weeks ago (again, while asleep) I found a rudder and have been steering the story idea to shallower waters so that I could hop aboard. But last night, with C.S. Lewis in my head, I realized that I wasn't quite ready to set sail with a fictional story until I truly explored the factual story that might as well serve as a prequel.
All of this is a long, convoluted, and round about way of saying that starting tomorrow I will be writing a long, long, story here in the ICON blog. This story will take a while to reach a conclusion. It will likely be uneven and sometimes vague - bad writing will no doubt abound. I will be using the story to flesh out ideas for my second novel. Although it will likely be something close to 90% autobiographical, names and incidents will be changed as it suits me to either enhance the story, protect national interests, or to keep from being sued. (oh, also because I really care that some people might not want their names in my blog... really... ;)
The reason for the warning is that it will be R rated. I will not be pulling any punches. You may like some things and hate others. Be that as it may, I'm sure you'll discover that I like some things and hate others too - but I have to live with both of them.
So, starting tomorrow, a new story and a new adventure here at ICON...
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