TURKEY MAMBO MAMA
BIG SALE!
If you don't own my book I Was Someone Dead, now may be a good time to pick it up. Oni Press is having a Scratch & Dent Sale, and you can get a somewhat cover-damaged copy for half price. There are lots of other great books there, and if you don't already have stuff by my pals Chynna Clugston, Andi Watson, or Ande Parks (among so many others), load up!
THIS WEEK IN DVD REVIEWS...
* Brothers of the Head, a bizarre and thoroughly involving rock 'n' roll mockumentary
* Cary Grant: Screen Legend Collection, five B-movies Grant made for Paramount in the 1930s
* The Double Life of Veronique (Criterion Collection), finally, at long last, Krzysztof Kieslowski's masterpiece collaboration with Irène Jacob
* Holiday, another Cary Grant film, this time a bonafide classic with Katharine Hepburn and directed by George Cukor
* Looney Tunes - Golden Collection, vol. 4, the latest collection of hysterical Warner Bros. cartoons
Current Soundtrack: Lucas on AMC
Current Mood: don't care 
golightly@confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * The Blog Roll * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon
[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2006 Jamie S. Rich
SAYING LIFE IS AN IMPOSSIBLE SCHEME, THAT'S THE POINT OF THIS PHILOSOPHY
The leader quote is from the Pet Shop Boys track "Miserablism," which in its own odd way--right down to the arched eyebrow--wouldn't be bad as a retroactive theme for Hieronymus Zoo, he who was Someone Dead
Ignoring that last dreadful slam at comics, I'd say the writer, Justin Wescoat Sanders, is extremely fair in his criticism. Obviously, I'm not in agreement, but it's not one of those reviews where you wonder if they mixed up the book you sent them with another book. I can see where he's coming from. It does prey on some of my insecurities about being a shallow writer, if I'm being perfectly honest, and naturally I'd have preferred a whole-hearted endorsement, but this is the gamble one takes.
And points for using the word "allegedly," which has been my favorite sarcastic tool recently. I love sticking it in sentences just to be a bitch, which, allegedly, I am quite often.
Incidentally, in reading the very essential liner notes that are included in all the Pet Shop Boys reissues from a couple of years ago (the indispensability of which makes the artist commentary on their otherwise fantastic compilation DVD
Hear, hear. [Edit: Fixed because Maryanne said she thought I had it wrong, and sure enough, I did. I'm still waiting to see if I messed up "whoever" below and will get a lecture from JdG.]
The B-side that leads the "Further Listening 1990-1991" disc in this particular reissue, Behaviour
"We're meant to be friends
That's what it says in the script
Is it really the end
If, sometimes, I stray just a bit?
Oh no,
It should be poetry, not prose
I'm in love with you
Do you think it shows?
And everyone knows when they look at us
'Course they do, it must be obvious
I never told you, now I suppose
That you're the only one who doesn't know."
Read into this what you will. I'm usually in love with so many people at one time (allegedly), even I lose count, so pick whoever you wish and pretend I am sending a secret message about him or her.
Current Soundtrack: Pet Shop Boys, Behavior 2001 reissue, disc 2 (it appears to be a synth kind of week by my soundtrack choices)
Current Mood: melancholy 
golightly@confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication
[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2005 Jamie S. Rich
THAT'S WHAT JAZZ IS TO ME
I wrote up the following for the Oni Press message board, in response to a question sparked by my interview with Ian Shaugnessy. It seemed worth posting here, since I already had it ready to go:
Jamie's crash course in the Novella:
Length is a determining factor, but not the only determining factor. In fact, the first novella, The Decameron, runs over 600 pages in my edition. Length often comes into play simply because the other determining factors in the study of novellas are things that can be found elsewhere. It ends up being a rather elusive form, nebulous and difficult to define.
Some of the less definable elements:
1. A sense of the fantastic
2. A vehicle for philosophical discussion (i.e. Faulkner's "The Bear")
3. A story that is purely symbolic (Hemingway's The Old Man & The Sea)
4. Writing itself as a matter of introspection (Philip Roth's The Ghost Writer)
Elements of structure and technique:
1. A compressed focus
a. details limited to the scene at hand
b. time, characters, and setting are isolated from the world outside the plot.
2. Repetition of events/themes for impact
3. The appearance of being grounded in reality while really being in fantasty, often relating back to the first section of this outline with stories as fables, or as a journey into the mind (Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness).
Boccaccio, Hemingway, and Conrad are the most strongly referenced in I Was Someone Dead, but in addition to those listed above, when I was originally working on this project (which in college was connected to a larger paper, the outline of which I keep at hand), I also really liked Solzhenitsyn's One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich and Melville's Billy Budd.
Quite some time ago, on the original Oni board, I advocated that comics get more in line with literary terms. It was after reading James Sturm's The Golem's Mighty Swing, which I felt was more like a novella than a graphic novel. Scott Morse also has called Visitations a graphic novella, which I think is spot on.
I should also mention that one of the people who was most influential on me as far as looking at the multi-tiered structure of stories was Dr. Charles May, author of Fiction's Many Worlds. It's a marvelous critical anthology with some great stories and analysis. The "new" price is scary, but you can buy used ones pretty cheap. He's mentioned on the dedication page for I Was Someone Dead.
I used to have a T-shirt that said "Novella Fella" on the front. It was given to me by some friends from my teenage years that were making fun of my high-minded goals. It was, for me, the final sign that we had grown apart. But, I wore it all the time...only backwards, because on the back they had put "Mr. Asshole."
Current Sountrack: Morrissey, Live at Earls Court; John Wesley Harding, Why We Fight
golightly@confessions123.com * The Website
[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2005 Jamie S. Rich
MORE HYPE
I Was Someone Dead and myself are also featured in this week's online newsletter of Brave New World Comics.
http://www.bravenewworldcomics.com/news/detail.aspx?NewsId=82
It's in the "Dear Atom" section, which is down the page. Atom is one of the cool guys at BNW, and he answers letters from fans and hype-seekers alike.
For those who don't know, Brave New World is a great shop in Newhall, CA.
Current Sountrack: Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, B-Sides & Rarities disc 2
golightly@confessions123.com * The Website
[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2005 Jamie S. Rich
EVERY ACTOR NEEDS AN AUDIENCE, EVERY ACTION IS A PERFORMANCE
I was talking with Lynn Adair, who did the copyediting on I Was Someone Dead, about what we were calling "glacial movies." These are films that move at a rather slow pace, letting the moments play themselves out and not necessarily explaining them, letting the viewer drift into the mood and feel along with the characters. Some of the movies we placed in this category are Lost In Translation, Krzysztof Kieslowski's Blue, Hiroshima Mon Amour, and the work of Wong Kar-Wai and Michelangelo Antonioni. A lot of my thoughts on the topic were prompted by my weekend viewing of the latter's L'eclisse, recently released as a Criterion DVD.
I've often said of Wong Kar-Wai that he makes films like a novelist in the way he rewrites as he goes, shooting footage that takes him down unplanned avenues and that often gets scrapped, something most directors can't do once the camera is rolling. I've posited, possibly even in this journal, that I can't figure out how to write novels like Wong Kar-Wai makes movies.
Pushing this idea further, I wonder if there is a way to capture those empty, still moments from these kinds of films as prose. (Both Lynn and I referred to the films as poetic, and maybe poems can capture similar feelings, but I set that question aside.) For instance, when Antonioni crafts a moment between Monica Vitti and Alain Delon where the two don't speak, where he stands stock still in the street as she moves slowly around a wooden fence and looks at a half-built (or is it half torn down?) building, he gives no explanation as to his intent. You can infer his motives by how he frames a shot, by the objects around the characters, even how long he lets it linger, but that engages the audience in an entirely different way. It compels each viewer to ascribe his or her own meaning to the moment.
But in prose, you don't have the benefit of blankness. I can't write, "The two don't speak, and he stands stock still in the street as she moves slowly around a wooden fence and looks at a half-built (or is it half torn down?) building," and then leave the rest of the page bare, picking up with a new sentence on the next page. And even in that simple of a statement, each word choice comes bundled with its own meaning. Saying they don't speak suggests it's intentional, there is a forced reason. Why "stock still"? Does it relate to "wooden"? If I choose to make it either half-built or torn down, the image of the building changes, and even to pose the question such as I do in the version of the sentence as it exists seems to have a particular thrust. Each word I would add to the statement would only fill in the gaps for the reader more and more, and any description of the mood of the characters would topple the whole experiment. It all also runs the risk of being too formalized, and then I create a truly excruciating reading experience a la Robbe-Grillet.
So, what to do?
Current Soundtrack: Pet Shop Boys, "Flamboyant (Scissor Sisters Remix);" Scissor Sisters, "Take Me Out (Franz Ferdinand cover);" Garbage, "Bleed Like Me;" Kaiser Chiefs, "Caroline, Yes;" Moby, "Temptation (New Order cover)"
golightly@confessions123.com * The Website
[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2004 Jamie S. Rich
JUMPIN', THUMPIN', SHOUTING SOMETHIN'
Spent yesterday with Lynn Adair, the freelance copy editor on I Was Someone Dead (and who worked at Dark Horse when I did), going over her notes and making the corrections. It was a strange experience. A copy editor questions everything, pulling sentences out of context and forcing them to speak for themselves. It's interesting to hear/see your words like that, almost as if spoken by another voice.
It's also a little demoralizing to see how you make the same kinds of mistakes over and over and over. I was pretty drained by the end of the day.
I finished up the rest of the work on the manuscript today. We had a highlighter system to track our changes: yellow was corrected on the digital file, pink was rejected, and blue was something I had to think over. I think there were five or six blues. So, I messed with those this morning, as well as snipping out 2/3 of the preface. I then went through and made notes to Keith Wood about layout, including where Andi Watson wanted illustrations, discovered I had spelled Lao-Tzu wrong, and then sent the whole thing to Keith to work his wizadry on. We are currently ahead of schedule, I think.
Typed up the last of my handwritten work on "No Brakes, I Don't Mind," and decided what I had thought might make a provisional ending doesn't work, and I am kind of starting to think I don't care for the story that much. 10,000 words. I may have to let it rest for a bit.
Current Soundtrack: iPod shuffle: Robbie Williams, "Radio;" Luke Haines and The Auteurs, "Bugger Bognor;" Doves, "One of These Days"
DEAD MAN'S PARTY
Randy Lander at The Fourth Rail lists I Was Someone Dead in his picks for May books. Follow the link to read what else he is into, but here is my blurb:
Also, Oni welcomes 100 Books blogger Maryanne Snell to its fold. Read about it here. Go, Maryanne!
Finally, look for the Hopeless Savages: B-Sides one-shot in comic book stores this week. It's a fun read, and that Toby kid looks eerily familiar.
Current Sountrack: Suede, Suede (Japanese edition)
WE COULD SEND LETTERS
The postcard for I Was Someone Dead, designed by Keith Wood.
If you want one, e-mail me with your address. golightly@confessions123.com
Current Soundtrack: Molly Ivins talking to Al Franken
COMING UP
The March 2005 edition of Previews, the monthly solicitation catalogue for the comic book industry, has been released. It's the catalogue for items being released in May, and so includes I Was Someone Dead on page 322. The preceding two-page spread (320-321) is the regular Oni Press Bulletin. The Dead excerpt is thus:
It's a little hard to read in this format, but you can download the entire double-page at full size right here. I recommend all four books listed on it.
Oni has also started to build the page for the book on their website, which includes pricing information, ISBN number (for ordering through bookstores), and the Diamond order code (for ordering through comic book shops, which you should do as soon as possible, if that's the route you choose). For people like me who shop online a lot, I have not yet seen an etailer listing anywhere.
Oh, and in case anyone cares, my leg is doing much better, and my meeting with the copy editor on I Was Someone Dead went ahead as planned yesterday. (And I just looked it up: "copy editor" the noun is two words, while the actual verb "copyedit" is one. Interesting.)
Current Sountrack: Manic Street Preachers, The Holy Bible: 10th Anniversary Edition (US Mix)
golightly@confessions123.com * The Website
[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2004 Jamie S. Rich
IT'S WHAT MEN IN STAINED RAINCOATS PAY FOR
Andi Watson turned in all of the drawings for I Was Someone Dead. The whiny limey was all, "Wahhhh, I don't know if I can make my April deadline," and then he turns around and whips out a slew of amazing drawings in February. I don't know how he can live with himself.
But they are brilliant. On Cut My Hair, I told people what to draw; on this one, I let Andi have absolute free reign, and he picked some interesting stuff and approached it in a really amazing way. I'll give you one of them, one of the more straightforward ones, but this is just a tease, you have to wait:
I would be remiss if I didn't mention that the first issue of Andi's amazing new series, Little Star, is in stores this week. It's marvelous, his most complicated and mature narrative to date, all about the joys and horrors of fatherhood and a man's struggles to come to grips with the changes in his life.
We're also told the story Andi and I did for Four Letter Worlds is due out on March 2nd. Order it here now.
In other news, I have been working on various and sundry. Chynna Clugston roped me in to assist on a short story for the Blue Monday: Painted Moon collection, which has been kind of a bitch to write. I've also been working on a new comic book idea of my own that I've written about 27 pages for that I don't want to really reveal too much about yet. I am playing with a specific form and genre, and as part of the process I am trying to bend to its will rather than bend it to mine. It's been interesting, as I've already learned a lesson or two from going into it that way.
For instance, as we know, I have very specific ideas about how to approach point of view in comics. Every sequence in 12 Reasons Why I Love Her, for instance, I had a rationale for how the point-of-view character was privvy to the information if he wasn't in the scene. In this new book, though, I work with a more conventional cinematic approach, a third person omniscient narration. In one two-page sequence, I managed to leave my main character, and in so doing, establish a setting and a supporting character and heighten a paritcular mystery in a very economical fashion, and it was like a big "duh" smacking me in the face. Of course this is why these sorts of sequences are done. How obvious!
It won't change me from normally sticking with a limited narrative voice, but I think it will be good for me to step out of that for a bit.
Current Sountrack: The Smiths, Stop Me Japanese EP; Pulp, This Is Hardcore Japanese edition, disc 1
golightly@confessions123.com * The Website
[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2004 Jamie S. Rich
