I realized that I already had a New Media Category so I’ll likely lose the Hyperfiction one I just set up; although triple-thinking it, it would keep the project out separate from all the millions of other things that go with new media such as the games, etc.
Big problem: With my dedicated (obsessive) nature, I’m wondering if I shouldn’t do some housework and framing before I start into this project…
No doubt my interest in writing in a multimedia platform has made me more aware of audio and visual effects. (I’ve just added a new category of Hyperfiction.)
The senses open themselves up to overlap each other to confirm experiences, as well as become fine-tuned in learning and accumulating a knowledge base on their own.
What tells me, at five a.m. that it is Springtime? With the visual negated, although the earlier rising of the sun–yeah, I know it’s not earlier, or earlier than what, according to Socrates–will be a guidepost, and disregarding the tactile sense of warmth (the night lies to us this time of year), I turn to sound; birds are chirping at five a.m. This doesn’t occur in winter. Also by now, the sense of smell can detect the warmed soil, the scent of young green things pushing their way into the air.
While hyperfiction will allow the sounds to come through beyond text, we still need to depend upon language skills to reveal what our minds, through our noses, tell us.
So far.
Although I usually feel an immediate attraction to a particular author’s style (Marquez, Faulkner, McCarthy), I am questioning Vonnegut’s pull.
Aside from the most annoying, "So it goes." that is overdone in my opinion–although I do catch its revelation of a hopelessness in the constancy (?) of man’s nature and affinity for war–I do like the voice of the narrator. It is a style that forms an intimacy with the reader in its easygoing conversational tone, especially after having forged a closeness of sorts by the direct author to reader background of the first chapter.
I trust Vonnegut. I may not agree with him and his opinions as are defined by the story, which transcends fictional novel form more than usual, but I trust him. And that, for a writer of fiction, is one of the underlying goals.
There is a definite relationship between Boethius’ interpretation of Divine Knowledge in answering the question of man’s free will versus the seeming contradiction of foreknowledge, and Vonnegut’s highlighting of that concept in his attempt to understand man’s free will to choose war.
"I am a Tralfamadorian, seeing all time as you might see a stretch of the Rocky Mountains. All time is all time. It does not change. It does not lend itself to warnings or explanations. It simply is. Take it moment by moment, and you will find that we are al, as I’ve said before, bugs in Amber."
"You sound to me as though you don’t believe in free will," said Billy Pilgrim. (p. 82)
Not surprisingly, The Consolation of Philosophy, with its exploration of the question of the purpose and goal of man, is once again very relative to this reading as it has been with everything I’ve read since. It’s a subject that’s as important to man today as it was centuries ago.
Vonnegut plays with time in the story, precisely stating that the character of Billy Pilgrim becomes "unstuck in time." But it is not only the character, but the author’s own way of handling backstory that plays with time.
Once Vonnegut has explained Billy’s situation, then he is allowed to move the present to a place in the past, and the present then becomes the future. It’s a most interesting trick of writing as well as an intrigueing thought; brings to mind Boethius’ in The Consolation of Philosophy wherein Divine Knowledge is explained as the past, present and future all being one simultaneous event. (Which is exactly Vonnegut’s statement of the alien’s version of time.)
Vonnegut also travels in space; Billy Pilgrim has been abducted by aliens of the planet Tralfamadore, and this bit of information is easily absorbed into the reader’s view of Billy’s world. After all, we believe him up to this point, or at the very least, have come up with our own reasons for his beliefs.
This "unstuck in time" is brought full front when the answer to Billy’s "Why me?" to the aliens is answered by pointing out the beetle in the amber example; something which IS obviously stuck in time.
The only thing that bugs me a whole lot about this novel so far is the repetitious: So it goes.
I am ironing and watching Lara Croft, Tomb Raider, or whatever. Yes, it’s daylight, but I think this movie would still be a bit too dark even if watched in a dark room. All I’m getting is the sound effects, which is a whole lotta noise. Upon occasion the screen lights up with explosions. I look, attracted by the noise, and there’s an image among the deep blue rocks of a glowing yellow brick and something that looks like those horrid skinned-alive creatures from Silent Hill that is drowning in bubbling pools.
Suddenly I’m more aware of the visuals; as I explore Flash form for writing.
Uh, story too–the guy just hit Lara and then said that she loved him. She’s standing there with a dopey look on her face. By God, I think she does.
In the interest of art, my husband’s breakfast was interrupted when, upon shutting off the shower, I heard the grinding of the peppermill and realized that he had prepared himself poached eggs.
Now, since I am looking to transform my pseudohyperfiction piece The Paths into Macromedia Flash 8 format, and since one of the main visuals in one of the four stories is a runny egg, and since I know my husband likes ’em that disgusting way, I ran out, grabbed the camera, fed it batteries and shouted, “hold it!”
Quickly explaining my purpose (although luckily he didn’t read the story), he patiently followed some direction in eating his breakfast. All I needed was just a base image to play with, so I wasn’t too critical.
“Perfect!” I said.
“Yes,” he said, “when they’re still warm.”
Now, where do I find a stand of corn in April?
…of attack. The war wages on, and the General plots out her strategy. Battles have been won and battles have been lost, and just like in the trenches of the Western Front of WW II, the positions change very little. It’s just a matter of passing the territory back and forth between me and them. The general is me. Them is the voles.
New plans of attack must be made as the enemy changes faces. With the Army of Cats wiped out by the Renegade Coyotes, the voles are free to mingle, meld and make more of themselves. There is one option: Get rid of voles by starving them out. I can either poison and destroy the food supply, or, I can let Sergeant Skunk eat all the grubs himself.
Been thinking a bit on new directions I’m planning to take with my own writing. Spending twelve hours at a writers event makes you do that. Again. But sometimes it helps with planning and seeing things a bit more clearly than just it’s good or it sucks.
I never thought I would have bothered with the short story format, and yet that’s been the overwhelming bulk of my creative output for the last five years. While I don’t intend to give it up, I think it’s coming closer to establishing its own voice(s), and I just need better story to feel more comfortable with it.
At the writers festival I listened to a few hours of poetry readings. Some were okay, some were great–in my opinion. I stood ready to fill in if necessary just so there wouldn’t be a lull in the program, and had brought some short prose and some of my poems. I’d always felt confident in my poetry–despite what anyone else said and despite lack of encouragement. Yet I’d always felt not so great about my story writing, and was encouraged in this form. After listening to some of the poetry readings, I quickly scanned through the few pages I’d brought, and suddenly, they all seemed horridly amateurish and uninteresting.
Wow. I felt like I’d been hit with a bolt of lightning, but in a bad way. Surreptiously I snuck the pages back into my bag, and when needed, went up to the microphone with some quickies I’d written in prose form. They say that lightning doesn’t strike twice, but that night it did. I realized why my poetry wasn’t good. Not that it’s all that bad, but it’s just not good enough.
That second bolt that hit left me this revelation: I’m more discerning and unforgiving of my fiction because I know good from bad, right from wrong, outstanding from mediocre; I know the elements and how to play them–whether I always do or not, I know what should be done. With poetry, I simply don’t. So that’s why I haven’t been able to figure out the decided lack of response to my poetry, I thought it was good because I didn’t know what was missing, what was different about it that made it barely there.
I still don’t know exactly what to call it, but I think it has something to do with voice and depth; over and above using symbolism and metaphor and pretty language to cover it all in clouds and shrouds of non-emotion. Again, I don’t intend to stop writing poetry,nor will I suddently sprout stanzas that will twitch your mind and heart; poetry has helped me tremendously in story writing. If I keep at it, it may improve both mediums.
But yet another direction that I’ve been blathering about and am finally ready to dig into: Flash and hypertext fiction. Pseudohypertext was a start; using my usual method of learning in applying the new to the old to understand it more fully. Now, I’m ready to have a go at it. The technological aspects of learning the software will not detract from the process, as not only is it a highly creative process in itself, if I use the story group I already have plotted out in pseudo form, it doesn’t disturb the story, and could only enhance it with changes made to suit the format. In other words, I’m not merely rewriting for story, plot, language, but as as well for sound, visual image, and cohesion above the already in-place plot line.
I’m psyched. Or maybe psycho. I forgot which.
There must be, I thought, a reason other than a busy schedule to have laid aside so interesting a theory on life and living, death and dying as presented in logical argument by Socrates in Phaedo.
Socrates attempts to prove the existence of an eternal soul by argument of opposites: If smaller, than greater must have existed prior, and vice versa. More just is a product of unjust, as unjust must once have been just. While the "change" or transition would certainly prove this point, I’m not sure I have not been lulled by Plato’s "therefore’s" to agree to the opposities of life and death. Certainly death springs from life, but does the theory still hold as undoubtable that life springs from death?
After an intimate revelation of his personal involvement in the novel he offers us, Vonnegut hits his reader hard with a very strange character in Chapter 2:
LISTEN:
Billy Pilgrim has come unstuck in time.
Billy has gone to sleep a senile widower and awakened on his wedding day. (p. 22)
It seems that I have been fairly consistent in my simulaneously reading of Philosophy and Fiction in that the selections assist each other in theme. Socrates speaks of a linear timeline that traverses several lifetimes. Vonnegut’s Billy Pilgrim appears to wander in out of sequence segments of a single lifetime.
This should be a very interesting partnership, this trio: Philosopher and teacher, visionary and writer, and reader and student.
Something that I rarely do, and yet it’s not that I have never seen an image of the man before: Without immediate immersion in the story, I think upon the dustjacket of Slaughterhouse Five.
Kurt Vonnegut. The name itself is visceral. Aside from just the gut, the K, the V, the G and Ts are hard-edge, cutting sounds. I half expect the images McCarthy draws. The photo of the man is a bit disturbing; a young Mark Twain on drugs. This is appearance only, and opinion only. And imagination truly. But it forms a preface even to the preface of this intrigueing thought:
"The British mathematician Stephen Hawking, in his 1988 best seller A Brief History of Time, found it tantalizing that we could not remember the future. But the future is child’s play for me now. I know what will become of my helpless, trusting babies because they are grown-ups now. I know how my closest friends will end up because so many of them are retired or dead. Mary O’Hare is a widow now." (Slaughterhouse-Five, p. xi)
So then, the future is known; it is only a question of time in when we learn it. Just like trigonometry; a mystery until it changes into knowledge. I love this thought.
More madness this morning, like a cloud of insanity stirred up by cleaning up for company, or in preparation for a meeting of creative minds such as in yesterday’s festival of writers.
"What does it profit a man if he loses his own soul?"
Religious thought, and yet it points–despite the exhortation to do for all mankind without a selfish thought–it points to caring mainly for one’s own soul. Philosophy does this as well, even in its seeking understanding of man’s nature, and not withstanding sharing in discussion and in writing, it focuses upon a place wherein man sees himself with goal of a perfection in goodness of spirit that is clearly for one’s own self.
A dichotomy to be answered by…philososphy in reason and belief.
Very good day yesterday; spent at the Tunxis Community College Writers Festival. Listened to authors speak of the process of publishing, to poets and writers reading their work, viewed short films, the "draft" of a documentary that hopefully will see television presentation soon, a multimedia narrative of hyperfiction, and slides of story within visual art.
Listened with both head and heart to a poet/writer’s feeling that creative spirit should not be a saleable commodity but given freely. I understood this truly, felt this for the first time without a doubt in mind, and yet too many spirits lay silent because of time that’s portioned out to realistic needs instead. Must art then become a rich man’s game?
Am excited for otto, the college literary journal that is growing to include the visual form of narrative by taking advantage of the talent and creativity on display within that room and beyond its borders.
On a break, I wandered into the library and came out with my next novel reading: Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse Five. On another break I decided that, while more of a homebody than a traveler, death could be a journey filled with adventure. Though no itinerary could be planned, and flight is based on standby status, there is the excitement of visiting a foreign place that only speculation has offered intrigue and allure. If it were not an ultimate milk and honey place to settle, then why have none returned? And, you don’t have to pack.
A good day then. Obviously, creative wonder breeds creative wonder.
It is no secret that for the past few years I have focused a good part of my time and my mind on the learning of dying, and of course, the learning of living in that the two are inseparable. While The Apprentice is not one of my favorite shows, and I’d never consider working for Trump (though I’d consider marrying him for the money), it is a reality show that gives somewhat of a glimpse into human nature. Besides, nothing else was on.
But I learned something in tonight’s show. The losing team, led by Bryce, was 25 minutes late to an appointment (a big no-no), did not apologize for it immediately, and while their presentation of a jingle was okay, it missed one of the main points that the client had specified. Charmaine wrote the lyrics (and also made the appointment) and Tarick wrote the music. They worked very hard. Lenny made no contribution, and Lee was absent for a religious holiday. Bryce brought Lenny and Lee in for the "firing." He defended Charmaine and Tarick because they worked the hardest, and he felt that he would take responsibility for overlooking their faults. Trump fired him for not bringing in Charmaine and Tarick because ultimately, they worked on the project that lost. Lenny and Lee, having nothing to do with it, should not be held responsible then for its failure.
I probably would have done what Bryce did, although I would not have brought Lee in, except perhaps as strategy. It’s not good business sense, and it’s not logical, I can see that. But it’s what I likely would have done to protect two hard workers. That’s also likely why I am not a success in life. If you jump in front of the bus, the bus always wins.
See, you couldn’t make this stuff up. If I wrote it into a story I’d be called out on it. I wasn’t even going to post this but it’s why I spent my day bouncing off walls, praying for the peace of six weeks in hospital with a nervous breakdown. But not with my Polish stock; we’re built to take it.
Here’s the scenario: You’re a lawyer representing two clients as sellers of a property in negotiating a price with a third party, the buyer. The buyer wants to pay $255k. One of your clients’ bottom line is $281k, the other client says $280k. Do you, getting paid $200/hour for your great knowledge and wisdom, simply say that your two clients can’t agree on a price? Or, do you do what normal common sense would dictate, ask each of your clients to compromise at $280,500?
I can’t believe I’m paying this guy. He’s also trying to convince me that another contract is valid even without both buyer and seller signatures. I’m totally in awe of the lack of justice within the justice system. Who would think that at my age I could still be so naive and yet, I’m beating my head against a wall for nearly two years now, hiring one lawyer because I thought the other one was siding with the executor rather than the estate itself, and in this conflict of interest, she is. Meanwhile, I’m paying both of these lawyers to not help me in any way at all.
I really, really, really cannot take much more of this.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology
