clues at the scene

clues at the scene

Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Speculative

I should have something meaningful to contribute right now. I've had a pretty "literary" day thinking about writing, reading a little about writing, and writing. I can't say that I do.

I have something of which I am proud to share. I'll do the edit and post it tomorrow. It's content and I'm fairly happy about it.

It isn't very "literary." It's speculative fiction in that it offers a small distortion of reality in an otherwise conventional existence. I don't think that "clever" and "funny" are somehow substantial. I'm prejudiced and admit I believe that work of literary merit is serious and somehow opaque in its machinations.

I wish I could get over that opinion.

The three writers in my life who have done as much as anybody to create my voice are the late Mike Royko who I came to read in late high school and in college [ Pulitzer] ; Art Buchwald of whom I read voraciously in my youth [Pulitzer]; and Douglas Adams [ should have won the Nobel - yes, I'll stand by that statement]. None of them wrote three serious words in a line and all of them showed us profound truths.

If you don't call Daley and Nixon profound, well. Then I'll assert you're no student of political power and its abuses. If there is a better lesson to be absorbed from the twentieth century than that we're incompetent at managing our own human affairs, you haven' been paying attention. Douglas Adams said as much without the  examples so I'll place him in the category of theoretical satirist. I like to think Adams a Steven Hawking without the black holes, Phd. or a presence on the state's "enemies list." [ Just checking if you're still with me.]

So, tomorrow - content. Bare the viscerals and all that. It is what we do.




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