Directions
Had a bunch of company show up out of the blue today, which means I didn’t get to polish Part 3 of Coyote. I’ll try to get it posted by tomorrow night.
I’ve been doing some thinking about writing lately. I’m conciously attempting to avoid all mytho-folklore tropes in the fantasy work I’m doing now. This is beastly, bitchily hard considering that the very structure of storytelling is bound up with those tropes.
It can be done, though. LeGuin’s mid 70’s and early 80’s short work, Jeff Ford’s entire career. Jeff VanderMeer, Hal Duncan and Steph Swainston also labor in this particular garden.
My…hmm, direction may be the best term…at the moment is a sort of focused use of the unexplained as both a reflection of and map through various human conditions, which are then distilled through the individual characteristics of normalized characters. The responses of everyday folk faced with ‘reality unmasked; naked and with no excuse’ to quote a work-in-progress (Meeting The Last Man On Earth, For Coffee: A Raincheck) functions as a form of hyperactive allegory. The metaphor rests not in the description, but in the interpretation of events and facts that fit no previous dataset.
Why? Because, to be honest, I’m bored with reading about vampires, werewolves, ghosts, elves, fairies and the like. The idea of writing about them holds even less appeal since it’s so much more work.
Another reason is the simple fact that a framework like the above is far more amenable to inserting my pro-individualism ideals on a subconcious level. The idea that the universe is a funhouse mirror construct that requires subjective interpretation makes a case for individualism in a basic, brass tacks sense. Objectivism and the like then becomes a mindset (or toolset) to strive for rather than the ultimate truth of existence.
Or, as I said to a guy on a debate forum years ago, I have no idea if there are objective truths to life or not, but I see no reason in not behaving as if there were. You have to ground your actions in some form of value. I choose to ground mine in a respect for life, compassion for others, preference for beauty and a goal for finding joy in the days that I have been alloted.
