Theodora Goss's Blog, page 53

Shabby Mission

Status report: I didn't work as much on my dissertation today as I should have, because I was still working on The Thorn and The Blossom. Today was the day we made the final edits, so I spent quite a long time on the telephone with my editor, and then there was some email correspondence. (Thank goodness for my Blackberry.) While all of this was going on, I thought, this is a new paradigm, isn't it? Because I don't think this is the way publishing used to work. I like the new paradigm: I think it gives authors more freedom than they used to have, allows them to do things they didn't used to be able to do. But I can understand why it makes some writers nervous. It means inhabiting a world that moves more quickly, in which you have to be more connected than before. It's harder to live in a cabin on the side of a mountain and just write – I mean if you actually want a writing career.

So it was a busy day, but in the middle of it, I took a walk around the neighborhood and took pictures of the sorts of things that inspire me. I said once that I called my decorating style Shabby Mission. The "Shabby" comes from Shabby Chic, a decorating style associated with the designer Rachel Ashwell. It's often mischaracterized, so if you google the words "shabby chic," you may get pages of pastel horrors, which is not at all what the style is about. At its core the style is about accepting the faded, the shabby, the incomplete. Ashwell lives in Los Angeles, and she focuses on pale woods, walls, linens. Those sorts of things look right in the California light, but not in Massachusetts. The "Mission" comes from the fact that I love Mission Style, with its solid woods and dark colors – its greens and ochers. But true Mission Style is incredibly expensive, and it can also be cold. In magazines, Mission Style rooms often look as though they are museums, as though one could not live in them. So I combined the two ideas into Shabby Mission: a style informed by Mission Style, but also by the lived-in aesthetic of Shabby Chic.

My aesthetic, if you want to call it that, is based on the natural world around me. I love the colors in forests, gardens. Like the hostas that are blooming behind the shed.

Or this pile of split wood in a corner of the back yard.  I love greens and browns.

Across the street were these mismatched but rather charming mailboxes.

Down the road to the park was this garden, in full bloom.  This is the sort of garden I like, spilling over its wall.

In the middle of the garden was this birdhouse. I like that it's built of wood, and I like the Black-Eyed Susans beneath it.

The park is surrounded by forest, and by the forest path was this large plant.  I'm not sure what it is.

And look at these gorgeous ferns. I love the way green layers on green in the forest. That's something I try to do in my decorating.

So now, on to the decorating itself. I brought home some Queen Anne's Lace and put it in a vase on the dining room table, next to a bowl full of acorns.

In the dining room is this shelf, with books and my favorite green pottery.  Do you see what I mean by Shabby Mission?  It's Mission Style, but not the expensive stuff.

I like chandeliers. This one is in the dining room. I also like curtains that let in light, like the lace curtains here. Those were made out of table clothes that I cut in two. The painting is of a road through the forest, by my grandmother.

This shelf is for supplies of various sorts, in green file boxes. The painting on top is of me, painted by my grandmother. I really should hang it up, shouldn't I?

This is the small shelf I bought at the antiques store, with books (including a lot of Ruskin).  Next to it is a basket with blankets.  I keep baskets filled with blankets in several rooms.  You never know when you might need a blanket, and they just look cosy.

These are pillows on the futon, which serves as a sofa.  I realized at one point that I decorate as though I were living in a forest: in browns and greens.  (I sewed the smaller pillow to the right from a William Morris fabric.)

Remember this small shelf?  It was a thrift store find.  On top is a pottery bowl from the same thrift store, filled with acorns.  Right now, this is where I'm keeping the books I need for my non-dissertation research.

And finally, this is what my floor looks like at the moment.  Things are actually more shabby than I would like, with piles of papers and books everywhere.  I prefer things to be worn but neat.  Here is the basket I keep in my room for blankets. It's actually larger than it looks: I took this picture from a strange angle.

That's all for now. I still have work to do tonight. But I thought I would write at post on my preferred decorating style. I'm doing so much writing nowadays that it's actually difficult to sit down at the end of the day and write about writing. You may be getting more posts like this one for the next few weeks! But I think that in the end, these posts are also about creating the writing life. After all, I write much better in rooms decorated like forests.

Thinking about Style

Status report: I am very tired. I spent most of today proofreading. I had to do some proofreading for The Thorn and the Blossom, and then I had to do some proofreading for my next Folkroots column, which is coming out in the August issue of Realms of Fantasy. It's called "A Brief History of Monsters," and I think you're going to like it. And then the Folkroots column for the October issue will be the Narnia column: "The Myth and Magic of Narnia." So I've been working all day, and tonight I need to catch up on dissertation work.

Because I've been proofreading, I've been thinking quite a lot about style, and how important it is. Which is a good place to mention something I was asked to mention at Readercon. Ready? This is a treat for those of you in the area:

On Saturday, September 10th, there will be a writing workshop with Jeff Ford at the Freeport Community Library. Here's the relevant information.

Writing Workshop with Jeffrey Ford

"Tapping the Subconscious"

This one-day course will help fiction writers to recognize and utilize their most formidable assets – dreams, the subconscious, and visualization. Students will practice techniques that help to unlock creative potential specifically related to writing fiction. The practicalities of craft and revision in relation to a subconscious approach to writing will also be discussed. There will be a series of written exercises that will lead to students writing a piece of fiction, which will be critiqued by the instructor and fellow students in a workshop setting.

Saturday, September 10th, 2011

10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Freeport Community Library

10 Library Drive

Freeport, Maine

Fee: $125. Email jeffpmaine@gmail.com to register. Payment is due no later than Sep. 3, 2011.

If you've been reading this blog for a while, you'll know that Jeff is one of my favorite writers in the field, and that he's a wonderful prose stylist. I hope he won't mind my mentioning what I always find incongruous – that such a tough-looking guy would write such elegant prose. I envy anyone going to that workshop because I want to go too, and see what Jeff has to say about writing from the subconscious. But of course I can't. By the way, if you want to read some of Jeff's prose, here's a story called "After Moreau" that was published in Clarkesworld. It's actually not typical of Jeff's style, but it does show his range. I mean, look at the difference between how it begins:

"I, Hippopotamus Man, can say without question that Moreau was a total asshole. Wells at least got that part right, but the rest of the story he told all wrong. He makes it seem like the Doctor was about trying to turn beasts into humans. The writer must have heard about it third-hand from some guy who knew a guy who knew something about the guy who escaped the island by raft. In fact, we were people first before we were kidnapped and brought to the island. I was living in a little town, Daysue City, on the coast in California. Sleepy doesn't half describe it. I owned the local hardware store, had a wife and two kids. One night I took my dog for a walk down by the sea, and as we passed along the trail through the woods, I was jumped from behind and hit on the head. I woke in a cage in the hold of a ship."

And how Jeff begins his novel The Portrait of Mrs. Charbuque:

"Much to my unease, Mrs. Reed positioned herself, all evening, beneath or immediately to either side of her new portrait. She had, for this occasion, worn the same black gown and diamond necklace I had requested she wear when posing for me. Given the situation, comparisons between God's work and my own were unavoidable. I daresay the Almighty's original was found somewhat wanting in the face of my painterly revision. Whereas, in His unquestionable wisdom, He had gone for the grandiose in the formation of her nose and saw fit to leave a prominent gap between the front teeth, I had closed ranks and reduced to beautiful normalcy those aspects of her features that made her her."

Quite different, isn't it? That's called range, don't you know.

I've finished The Magician's Book, and what I'm reading before I go to sleep each night is Stephen King's book on writing, called On Writing. I sort of skimmed the first part, which was about King's life, because to be perfectly honest, I've never really liked King's style. It's perfectly serviceable, but you know, I'm a Virginia Woolf, Isak Dinesen kind of girl. My favorite writing style is clean, lyrical. King's is looser than what I like to read: for me, it lacks internal tension and structure. He mentioned in the preface to the book that popular fiction writers are never asked about their use of language, and I think there's a reason for that.

But last night I read something in his book that I want to quote here, which is the following:

"You can approach the act of writing with nervousness, excitement, hopefulness, or even despair – the sense that you can never completely put on the page what's in your mind and heart. You can come to the act with your fists clenched and your eyes narrowed, ready to kick ass and take down names. You can some to it because you want a girl to marry you or because you want to change the world. Come to it any way but lightly. Let me say it again: you must not come lightly to the blank page."

And you know, I agree with that. Absolutely and completely.

That's all I have for you tonight. I'm very tired nowadays, just trying to get all the work done. I hope it does all get done, eventually. I'm certainly trying.

I miss being able to spend time with friends, having an actual life. Well, that will come. I hope.

Back to Work

Status report: Yesterday, I tried to get back to work, but I was so tired that I spent most of the day sleeping. I was still recovering from Readercon. Today, I did get back to work. I had to. I don't want to get too far behind.

First, I went to the Boston Public Library to check some quotations. They were from a book called The Aborigines of Tasmania by H. Ling Roth, published in 1890. That's the sort of book you can't check out of the library. I sat at a table and compared the quotations in my chapter to the original, to make sure they were right. I had gotten them from the later edition, and sure enough, some of them had changed between editions, so I corrected them and made sure I was citing to the right pages. That's the tedious but necessary sort of work that you sometimes have to do, in any sort of academic writing. I do it as well with my Folkroots column: make sure everything is right.

Here is my chapter on the library table:

And here is The Aborigines of Tasmanina, 1890 edition:

And here is the Boston Public Library:

Afterward, I walked around Copley Square for a little while and took some pictures. If you've never seen downtown Boston, this is what it looks like. There was a farmer's market being set up, but it wasn't open yet. I saw gooseberries and currants, which you can't get anywhere, not even at Whole Foods.

And then I went to the Boston University Library to drop off the books I had read for Readercon panels, and to pick up a book for my next Folkroots column. (I think the next column is going to be on magical plants.) While walking through the library, I saw a case with all sorts of material from Samuel R. Delaney. In the first one, in the lower left hand corner, you can see a picture of him from 1961, looking particularly hot. (Is it insulting to say that about a brilliant author? Somehow, I don't think he would be insulted.)

It was fascinating to see the typewritten manuscripts, the old editions of his work. And to be perfectly honest, it made me wonder if I would ever write something worth putting in a case, worth archiving. I rather hope so.

This is probably the right place to say that over the weekend, while I was at Readercon, I read some rather nice things about works of mine. Do you remember that my story "The Mad Scientist's Daughter" was a Locus Award finalist? Well, it didn't win, but according to my July Locus, it came in second after Neil Gaiman's story. That's a pretty good place to be! Also, Rich Horton wrote a lovely review of "Pug," which is in the July issue of Asimov's. Rich wrote,

"'Pug' by Theodora Goss is set in the background of one of the most famous novels of all time (readily enough recognized that I'll not mention which one). The eponymous dog (who seems perhaps to have escaped from another novel by the same author) has a unique characteristic: he can travel to other worlds. Eventually the heroine of this story, a rather colorless and sickly girl, follows him, which perhaps gives her a life otherwise denied her. The story nicely elaborates on the circumstances of its heroine, and is just fun to read for Goss's prose, and for the pleasure of unpicking the relationship with its source material."

He also includes it as one of his recommended stories for the month.

And finally, and this is important and a bit overwhelming, at Readercon I bought a copy of Gary Wolfe's Evaporating Genres. There's a chapter called "Twenty-First-Century Stories" co-written with Amelia Beamer, and it focuses on five writers: M. Rickert, Elizabeth Hand, Kelly Link, Jeffrey Ford – and me. That is amazing company to be in, and it's amazing to be included in such an important critical consideration of what is happening in literature right now. Wolfe and Beamer write (yes, I'm using their last names, because we're being scholarly now),

"Writers like Ford, Rickert, Goss, Link, and Hand – all early- to mid-career writers – are developing a new, twenty-first-century paradigm, a fiction beyond postmodernism, a fiction for the unstoryable, or as yet unstoried, new century. Choosing broadly from the narrative toolbox, such tales are often metafictional, with self-aware and emotionally powerful storyteller voices. Unlike the often coolly ironic surfaces of much postmodern fiction, they are often funny or heartbreaking, although they are comfortable with mystery and irresolution – which is not to say that they have no plot or story; unlike some postmodern or contemporary mainstream fiction, these narratives tend to have plots and characters, not just style and voice."

And you know what? Grandiose as it may sound, getting beyond postmodernism is something I'm actually trying to do. I feel as though I'm trying to find a new path, influenced by the writers Wolfe and Beamer are kind enough to include me among.

The thing about praise, for me, is that it always spurs me on to work harder, try more. And once this dissertation is done, that's exactly what I'm going to do. Just wait.

Readercon Moments

I'm afraid I only have two more Readercon pictures for you, and one of those is of me, so it doesn't really count. But this particular Readercon was so incredibly busy that I really didn't have time to take pictures. I'll tell you about it in a moment. Here's the first picture:

Yes, it's the third Readercon outfit, a brown corduroy dress that I bought (you guessed it) at a thrift store. I think it's a J. Crew? I always cut out tags because I hate labels. Honestly, I think my most interesting outfits are thrift store finds, because I will happily spend $5 on something like a brown corduroy dress, while if I'm spending actual money ($20 or more), it's going to be on something basic, like a pair of jeans or a navy cardigan. Anyway, I felt very well dressed for Readercon, sort of like a modern Jane Morris. If Jane were alive now, I think she would wear this brown corduroy dress. Which makes me think that the way I dress should be called something like Modern Pre-Raphaelite. (The way I decorate should be called Shabby Mission, but that's a separate blog post.)

The second picture I took is from the Shirley Jackson awards. Neil Gaiman stopped by for the awards, and this is him making one of his two acceptance speeches. If you look to the lower left, you can see the back of Amanda Palmer's head. (She used to be the lead singer of the Dresden Dolls, which made one of my favorite videos: "Coin-Operated Boy.") In the middle of the ceremony, someone came to give him a con badge. He laughed and showed it to her. It said "Mr. Amanda F. Palmer," which made me smile.

There are two other moments I remember from the awards ceremony. Neil Clarke picked up the award for Peter Watts. In the acceptance speech, he mentioned that the U.S. government had not allowed Peter into the country for the ceremony. Shame on you, U.S. government. Also, Laird Barron won two Shirley Jackson awards. Congratulations, Laird!

So you'll understand why I took barely any pictures, I'm going to give you a sense of what my Readercon was like, but I'm too tired to write a linear narrative, so I'm going to give you a series of moments. Anyway, that's how I experienced Readercon.

The funniest happened in the ladies' room. The day before, one of my favorite editors had asked me what I'm writing for her latest anthology. I had promised her a story, but hadn't yet decided what to write. That night, I remembered a story I had wanted to write that might just work – but I thought, no, it's too quirky. Well, the next day we were both washing our hands in the ladies' room, and I pitched the idea to her, right there. I said, "Is this too quirky? Tell me what you think." She told me she liked the idea, and to write the story and send it to her. So, you want to know what a professional writer's life looks like? That's it. (And you thought it was going to be all grand.)

I walked around with the mock-up of The Thorn and the Blossom, showing it to friends, letting some of them know that the publisher would be sending them copies for blurbs. I also had a chance to show it to reviewers and let them know it would be coming later this year.  I was so pleased that everyone loved the design.  I can't wait to show it to you.

I ran into Jim Freund, who hosts the Hour of the Wolf radio program on WBAI (99.5 FM) in New York City. I told him I was coming down early next month, and we talked about doing an interview. If that happens, I'll let you know when I'll be on the radio! He also arranges the New York Review of Science Fiction readings, and we talked about my coming down for a reading when the book comes out. Again, if that happens, I'll let you know!

What else? I talked to my favorite small presses. One editor was considering a witch anthology and asked if I'd written anything on witches. Well, I have, so I promised I would send her a copy of "Lessons with Miss Gray," which is about a group of girls who see an advertisement for lessons in witchcraft, and the trouble that comes from it.  You never know what can happen while you're walking past the small press tables.  I always tell students, go talk to the small presses and find out what they're working on. They always have the most interesting projects.

I also talked to a friend of mine who puts together ebooks about doing ebook versions of In the Forest of Forgetting, as well as some of the individual stories in the collection. I don't have time to do that now, but we're going to sit down at the World Fantasy Convention and talk about how to make it happen. It will involve my coordinating with the original publisher, the artist, and the ebook creator, which will be fun. It's exactly the sort of project I like working on.  I'll let you know when those will be available, but it will be later this year or early next year.

That's just a small sample of what happened during Readercon. There are other things I don't remember, and some things I remember but can't talk about because they have to do with projects that will happen in the future. But if you're wondering why you should go to conventions, that's why: because more business gets done more quickly at conventions than anywhere else.

Plus, I got to talk to so many of my friends. I'm going to miss you guys . . . (Until I see you all at World Fantasy in October!)

Readercon Pictures

Readercon has been so incredibly busy that I haven't had time to take many pictures. And I'm so tired tonight that I'm not going to try to post about how the convention is going. I'm just going to post those pictures and try to write a Readercon report tomorrow.

But I will tell you that my wonderful editor took me to lunch, and then we discussed the final edits to The Thorn and the Blossom (AKA the Secret Project, but now that the title has been on Amazon for a while, I think I can use it, right?). And he showed me a mock-up of the book. It's going to be unbelievably beautiful. I can't wait for you to see it.

This was me, ready for Readercon on Friday morning.  The convention is only about ten minutes away, so all I needed to do was drive there.  On Friday, I went for bohemian.  This skirt was from a thrift store.

Friday was a blur of panels and readings, so I only took a picture of the Meet the Prose party. In our registration packets, we all get stickers with one sentence we've chosen from our writing. The sentence I chose was from the YA novel: "Mary Jekyll rang the bell of 221 B Baker Street." And then we walk around the room, trading sentences. Mine were gone in the first fifteen minutes, but I got sentences from favorite writers and critics like John Crowley, Elizabeth Hand, John Clute, Ellen Kushner, Delia Sherman, and John Kessel.

Saturday, I had more time.  I wasn't going for preppy, but that may be what I ended up with.  This skirt was also from a thrift store.  And so, come to think of it, was the bag.  I always carry a bag for a notebook, pens, and bottled water.  Essential con supplies.

I had a chance to walk around the dealers' room and talk to my favorite small presses, like Tachyon, which is publishing Kafkaesque (with my story "The Rapid Advance of Sorrow").

Here are Stephen, Nivair, and Tempest, standing by the Clarkesworld table.  Three of my favorite people!

And here is the Clarkesworld table.  Clarkesworld published a paired essay and story of mine called "Writing My Mother's Ghosts" and "Her Mother's Ghosts."

And the Prime Books table.  Prime published my short story collection, In the Forest of Forgetting.

And here is Small Beer Press, which long ago published my first collection, a chapbook called "The Rose in Twelve Petals and Other Stories."  But I'm afraid that sold out (within the first few months, I think.)

On Saturday I had two readings.  The first was the Rhysling reading.  My poem "Ravens" was a Rhysling finalist (but did not win). We had a very good crowd for the reading.  It's always nice to see poetry getting attention.

The second reading was the Wold Newton reading, where we all read to the music of Brian Slattery.  This is Matthew Cheney reading.  I climbed down off the platform to take a quick photograph.

And that's all I'm going to include tonight. One more day of the convention. I'm so tired, but I'm also having wonderful time. It's always sad when Readercon ends and all of my friends go back to their own parts of the country. Fortunately, many of them are in New York, and I'll be able to see them in August.

I'll try to write more tomorrow. Right now, I'm going to sleep!

Naked Cities Reading

It's late and I'm tired, but I want to post the pictures from the Naked Cities reading. These were made with my new camera! The one I bought only a month ago! And finally figured out how to use (sort of).  First, here's the book.

I won't write much in this post, because I need to get at least some sleep before Readercon starts tomorrow. But here I am, using my new camera to take a picture of myself for the first time. Pretty good, I think. All ready to go to the reading (car to T to Porter Square).

None of these pictures are with flash, because I didn't want to flash in people's faces. So they're a bit yellow. Here is Ellen Datlow, the Editor and Fearless Leader, sitting by the table. I thought I'd gotten a picture of Ellen standing up and introducing everyone, but I guess not. I'm still learning how to use the camera.

Here is Kit Reed reading, unfortunately a bit hidden by the microphone.  It was an odd microphone.  I always prefer reading without one, but the room was too large.

Here is Jeff Ford reading a story about a spider who lives in a boy's head. It was intensely creepy and beautifully written.  Jeff's stories always are beautifully written.  He's one of the few people whose prose I actually envy.

Matt Kressel read from a story about a strange and beautiful city. It was the sort of story I would have chosen for Interfictions.  All of these stories were about cities, as you can probably tell from the title.

John Crowley is, as I've mentioned, one of my literary idols. He signed my book with a fountain pen. (I always feel awkward around my literary idols. It's the same with Samuel Delaney and John Clute. They're always so gracious, and I'm always so worried about taking up their time.)

Ellen Kushner read from a Riverside story, which is always fun. I read Swordspoint years ago, shortly after I first met her. In a way, Ellen was writing urban fantasy before there was such a publishing category.

And finally, Caitlín R. Kiernan read. I have to say, all of the stories were wonderful, at least what I heard of them. (Each reading was only five minutes, and I rather liked that.  They were literary hors d'oeuvres.) I can't wait to read the anthology.

And there was a great crowd! If you look closely, you can see Sonya Taaffe, Kaaron Warren, John Joseph Adams, and other wonderful writers and editors. Many people took time off from Readercon to come to the reading.

That's it from me tonight. I'm going to sleep so I can wake up and go to Readercon bright and early tomorrow. But on Facebook, someone commented that when I take pictures of myself in the mirror, I never look up. So here you go. I do sometimes look up, just in case you were wondering.

My Readercon Readings

Status report: Yesterday and today, I'm preparing for Readercon. That means I'm not working on the dissertation, but I may be able to take Sunday off from the convention and work on it then. The goal is still to have the entire dissertation revised and put together by the end of the month, before I go to New York and Asheville.

Tonight, I'll be going to the Naked Cities reading at Porter Square Books to see Ellen Datlow, Jeff Ford, Kit Reed, Matthew Kressel, John Crowley, Ellen Kushner, and Caitlín R. Kiernan read from their stories. One of the nice things about living in Boston is that you can go to readings like that on a regular basis. Everyone's in town for Readercon, which makes it easy to gather what is a rather amazing group. I can't wait to see them all. (And I've never seen John Crowley read before. He's one of my favorite writers, one of the few writers I'll read just about anything by, so I'm really looking forward to hearing him.)

But about my own readings.

As you know, I'm participating in four readings at Readercon. (Four! How did that happen?)

And I have a bit of an announcement, which is this:

At my own reading (my own half-hour slot reading), I'm going to be reading from the Secret Project. As you may already know if you clicked the link, the Secret Project is a book called The Thorn and the Blossom, which is coming out in January from Quirk Books. That's all I can tell you about it right now. But I asked my editor and got permission to share more information at the Readercon reading. So if you come to my reading, you'll be the very first to hear about the book, and of course to hear part of it. I can't wait to read from it for the first time.

Here's my reading schedule for Readercon:

Friday:

1:30 p.m. My Reading!

I'll be reading from The Thorn and the Blossom.

4:00 p.m. Mythic Delirium/Goblin Fruit Reading

I'll be reading "The Gentleman."

Saturday:

3:00 p.m. Rhysling Award Poetry Slan

I'll be reading "Ravens."

7:00 p.m. Wold Newton Reading Extravaganza

I'll be reading a section from The Rose in Twelve Petals called "The Hound" to the music of Brain Slattery.

The Rose in Twelve Petals was published back in 2001, a decade ago. It was my first published story. You can find it in my short story collection, but if you haven't read it (and most of you probably haven't), I thought I would at least give you the section I'm reading here. It's a retelling of the Sleeping Beauty story from various perspectives. This is one of them:

The Hound

In a hundred years, only one creature comes to the palace: a hound whose coat is matted with dust. Along his back the hair has come out in tufts, exposing a mass of sores. He lopes unevenly: on one of his forepaws, the inner toes have been crushed.

He has run from a city reduced to stone skeletons and drifting piles of ash, dodging tanks, mortar fire, the rifles of farmers desperate for food. For weeks now, he has been loping along the dusty roads. When rain comes, he has curled himself under a tree. Afterward, he has drunk from puddles, then loped along again with mud drying in the hollows of his paws. Sometimes he has left the road and tried to catch rabbits in the fields, but his damaged paw prevents him from running quickly enough. He has smelled them in their burrows beneath the summer grasses, beneath the poppies and cornflowers, tantalizing, inaccessible.

This morning he has smelled something different, pungent, like spoiled meat: the smell of enchantment. He has left the road and entered the forest, finding his way through a tangle of briars. He has come to the village, loped up its cobbled streets and through the gates of the palace. His claws click on its stone floor.

What does he smell? A fragrance, drifting, indistinct, remembered from when he was a pup: bacon. There, through that doorway. He lopes into the Great Hall, where breakfast waits in chafing dishes. The eggs are still firm, their yolks plump and yellow, their whites delicately fried. Sausages sit in their own grease. The toast is crisp.

He leaves a streak of egg yolk and sausage grease on the tablecloth, which has remained pristine for half a century, and falls asleep in the Queen Dowager's drawing room, in a square of sunlight that has not faded the baroque carpet.

He lives happily ever after. Someone has to. As summer passes, he wanders through the palace gardens, digging in the flower beds and trying to catch the sleeping fish that float in the ornamental pools. One day he urinates on the side of the tower, from which the dark smell emanates, to show his disapproval. When he is hungry he eats from the side of beef hanging in the larder, the sausage and eggs remaining on the breakfast table, or the mice sleeping beneath the harpsichord. In autumn, he chases the leaves falling red and yellow over the lawns and manages to pull a lobster from the kitchen tank, although his teeth can barely crack its hard shell. He never figures out how to extract the canary from its cage. When winter comes, the stone floor sends an ache through his damaged paw, and he sleeps in the King's bed, under velvet covers.

When summer comes again, he is too old to run about the garden. He lies in the Queen Dowager's drawing room and dreams of being a pup, of warm hands and a voice that whispered "What a beautiful dog," and that magical thing called a ball. He dies, his stomach still full with the last of the poached eggs. A proper fairy tale should, perhaps, end here.

Preparing for Readercon

Status report: Today, the revised abstract was approved by my first and second readers. So that's done. Next it goes to the Director of Graduate Studies and Department Chair for signatures, and then up to the Dean for final approval. All that should happen in August. In the meantime, I will be completing revisions to the dissertation. Today I revised Chapter 3, although I still have to add a footnote. Also correct some citations, but I may not have time for that until Thursday. By the end of the week, I should have Chapters 1 and 3 completely revised, in preparation for the final set of revisions when I put the entire dissertation together.

Are these statue reports incredibly boring? They probably are, but you know what? They're helping me. So I'm going to keep doing them, as a way of reminding myself where I am, what I need to do next. Also, to be honest, the dissertation is the most important thing in my life right now, and this blog reflects what's going on in my life, so I can't help writing about it. I have a series of piles on my desk now: completed abstract, revised Chapter 1, two copies of Chapter 2 with comments from my two readers, revised Chapter 3, and the bibliography. If I can get Chapters 1 and 3 completely revised by Readercon, I can focus on Chapter 2 and the introduction for two weeks and put everything together by the end of the month.

August will be for final revisions, once my readers take one last look at the dissertation. And then by the end of the month it will go to the committee. I was originally hoping to defend in September, but this schedule pushes it back to October. Still, that's not bad, is it? It means that finally, finally, the dissertation will be done. This is the hardest thing I've done my whole life. I don't think anything I do after this will be as hard.  Certainly writing novels won't be.

But I'm sure you're tired of hearing about it, so why don't I write about Readercon? Here is my final schedule (which has changed from the previous version):

Friday:

11:00 a.m. Rudyard Kipling, Fantasist and Modernist

Dozois, Feeley, Goss, Schweitzer, Taaffe

12:00 Classic Fiction: Howl's Moving Castle

Cooney, Files, Goss, Link, Taaffe

1:30 p.m. My Reading!

(I'll tell you what I'm going to read in the next few days.)

4:00 p.m. Mythic Delirium/Goblin Fruit Reading

(I'll be reading a poem, not sure which yet.)

I will, of course, be at the Meet the Prose party on Friday night.

Saturday:

3:00 p.m. Rhysling Award Poetry Slan

(I'll be reading "Ravens," which is nominated for a Rhysling.)

7:00 p.m. Wold Newton Reading Extravaganza

(I'll be reading to the music of Brain Slattery. Still deciding on the story!)

9:00 p.m. There's No Homelike Place

Doyle, Goss, Janssen, Purdom, Warren

Sunday:

I have nothing actually scheduled for Sunday, but I'll probably be there for the Interstitial Arts Foundation Town Meeting at 10:00 a.m.

Today, I drove to the library to pick up two volumes of the science fiction and fantasy of Rudyard Kipling, just to make sure I was ready for the Kipling panel. And I have to reread Howl's Moving Castle for that panel. So I have my bedtime reading cut out for me, for the next few days. I also have two stories and a poem to choose.

In other words, I'm in the process of preparing for Readercon.

I'm going to do my best this year, and you probably won't see much difference between me at Readercon this year and other years. But I'll be tired and distracted. Just bear with me, all right? I'm in the middle of the most difficult part of the most difficult year. I keep telling myself that it will end, and that once it does, things will be better. I hope I'm right.

In the meantime, if you're coming to Readercon, I look forward to seeing you there. And come to my reading! I don't know what I'll be reading yet, but it will be something forthcoming – meaning something that no one has heard before. So you'll be the first to hear it.

The Stair in Her Hair

Status report: I revised the abstract and sent it to my first and second readers. Tonight, I need to make a few final corrections to Chapter 1, and it will be done, at least for now. I'll go over it again when I put the entire dissertation together. Tomorrow, I'll start working on Chapter 3. I should be able to finish that fairly quickly, before Readercon starts on Thursday.

But all day today I've felt – I'm not sure how to describe it. Anxious, distracted, sad? All of those, but deeper than they imply. On days like this, it doesn't make sense to write a blog post, because I don't know what to write about. Even revising my abstract took forever. I had forgotten that Readercon was this week, and I wish I had another week to prepare. It will be a sad Readercon, I think. I won't be able to focus on it the way I usually do.

Because I can't give you anything beautiful of my own today, I'm going to give you something beautiful created by other people. This is a song called "Stairs in Her Hair." It was written by Amal El-Mohtar and inspired by the painting in the video, which is "There's a Stair in Her Hair" by Rima Staines. I first heard it at Wiscon, where Amal sang it at the party for Catherynne Valente's The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland In A Ship Of Her Own Making. She wrote it to accompany Cat's story "Voice Like a Hole," which is in the new Bordertown anthology, Welcome to Bordertown. Here is the song:

Come to think of it, that does remind me of something I can write about. Yesterday, there was an interview with Steph Swainston in The Independent. She's canceling a book deal, training to become a chemistry teacher. According to the article (and I know only what the article says, not what she actually said or meant, which can be quite different), she wants to get back to "real life."

We all have different reasons for writing and ways of writing. But I think my perspective is also quite different from hers. I've been a teacher, although at a university, for a decade now. Teaching is no less or more real than writing. It's just – different. What I value so much about writing is what I see happening with the song above. Amal wrote it, inspired by a painting and in connection with a story. And now it's up on YouTube so I can post it here. There's so much variety and creativity in the writing life.  So many things you can do. And there's a great deal of repetition in teaching. A great deal of stress, certainly as much as writing a book a year and publicizing it. What I love about my own writing life is its creativity and variety. I get to do so many things! Write stories, essays, poems. Connect with people through readings and blog posts. I love doing those things, and they're very real to me.

I don't know what Readercon will be like for me, this year. I think it will be difficult. There will be so much to be anxious about, so much to distract me. But I'm going to try to enjoy myself. I'm going to try to remind myself that this is the most difficult time, and that it will end. And there will be something better on the other side.

Going to Walden

Status report: a terrible night. Sometimes I do all right with caffeine, so I forget the times that I don't. Yesterday afternoon, I stopped in the Japanese bakery in downtown Lexington and bought myself an espresso jelly, which is basically espresso as a cold jell with whipped cream and a coffee bean on top. It's absolutely delicious, but by midnight I realized that I was not tired at all, and by five in the morning I realized that I might as well just get up because I wasn't going to sleep. So I had breakfast. After some oatmeal and orange juice, I was finally able to get to sleep, and when I woke up I felt better. But that's the last time I'm going to have an espresso jelly, no matter how much I love it. I just can't handle the caffeine.

When I finally woke up again, I was able to work for a couple of hours, and I finished the revisions to Chapter 1. Tonight and tomorrow, I'm planning on revising the abstract, and then it's on to Chapter 2 and more work on the introduction. I think I'll be working on the introduction for the next three weeks. I initially thought I would be able to write it separately, but there's too much I need to borrow from and coordinate with the other chapters. I need to write it during the revision process. But I feel better about that process today. It's going all right.

By six o'clock I was tired of working, so I went to Walden Pond. I took some pictures, because I know that many of you have read Henry David Thoreau but have never been to Walden. So I'm going to show you what it looks like.  First, I have to tell you: the most surprising thing about Walden is that you expect it to be a sort of sanctuary, a place kept sacrosanct, and it's not.  At one end of the pond is a public beach that has been there since at least the 1940s, and wherever you walk, you can hear the distant shouts of bathers.  I haven't taken pictures of the public beach, and it's not large, but know that it's there.

First we come to a replica of Thoreau's cabin.  The place his cabin was located is actually across a road, much closer to the pond.  But I'm glad they built a replica, because it's nice to be able to visualize where he lived.  "Simplify, simplify," he said.  The cabin is indeed as simple as possible.

"As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler; solitude will not be solitude, poverty will not be poverty, nor weakness weakness."  I think there's a great deal of truth in that.  Simplifying your life allows you to redefine other parts of it as well.  Solitude, poverty, and weakness are in part (although certainly not in whole) what we say they are, what we define them to be.  I need to simplify too, Thoreau.  To redefine. And I'm trying.

I wonder how closely the furniture in the cabin matches what he actually owned?  I love everything in the cabin.  I love the colors, the shapes, the peace that seems to inhabit it.  Thoreau wrote, "I had three chairs in my house; one for solitude, two for friendship, three for society."  I would want more than three chairs, but I find the simplicity of the cabin restful. (I would also want a bathroom.)

"

"Do what you love. Know your own bone; gnaw at it, bury it, unearth it, and gnaw it still."  I feel as though that's what I'm doing, nowadays.  Although I'm tired of gnawing the dissertation bone specifically.  It's getting very dry, that bone. I'd rather gnaw on a novel.  Well, that will happen, almost soon enough.

When I realized I was going to post pictures of myself as well, I thought, I should at least have tried to look moderately presentable.  Because what you see here is Dissertation Dora, in glasses and old clothes, looking tired.  I came straight from typing to Walden.  "I say beware of all enterprises that require new clothes, and not rather a new wearer of clothes."  I don't know, I should probably have changed.

"There are moments when all anxiety and stated toil are becalmed in the infinite leisure and repose of nature." After looking at the replica cabin, let's cross the road and walk around the pond.  Somehow, when I get out into the natural world, I do feel that: the anxiety and sense of toil go away, for a little while.  Especially around water.

It should really be called Walden Lake.  As you can see, it's quite large, and wooded all around.  And all around there are paths, close to the water.  "Pursue some path, however narrow and crooked, in which you can walk with love and reverence."  The paths around the lake are relatively narrow, although I'm not sure how reverent I was feeling.  You always need to approach Thoreau with a sense of humor.

"Every man casts a shadow; not his body only, but his imperfectly mingled spirit. This is his grief. Let him turn which way he will, it falls opposite to the sun; short at noon, long at eve. Did you never see it?"  I included that quotation because here I was walking under the shadows of the trees.  I'm not sure what other applicability it has, except that whatever shadow is inside me, I carry it with me always, even to a place as peaceful as this.

At one point, there is a bridge.  On one side of the bridge is a small extension of the pond with water lilies, almost a separate pond.  On the other side is the main pond, with open water.  I didn't take a photograph of the bridge because there were people on it.  "Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it."  I guess that's some consolation, isn't it?  I've been very, very busy lately.

"Great men, unknown to their generation, have their fame among the great who have preceded them, and all true worldly fame subsides from their high estimate beyond the stars."  I wonder to what extent Thoreau was thinking of himself when he wrote that?  It's obvious, from the way he pontificates, that he thought he was one of the great men of his generation.  He was right of course, but that's also why you need to approach him with a sense of humor.  You can't be entirely reverent.  This is where his cabin was located.

To the left is a large pile of stones.  People have been coming for many years and leaving stones in Thoreau's memory.  "The Artist is he who detects and applies the law from observation of the works of Genius, whether of man or Nature. The Artisan is he who merely applies the rules which others have detected."  Because he is a Romantic, he has to say things like that.  Otherwise, he'll lose his Poetic License.

Of course I left a stone.  Wouldn't you?  You'd want to be able to say you did.  "How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live."  I sat down on the pile of stones.  Honestly, I'd stand up to live if I had more time.  Right now, it's all about the writing – the dissertation writing.  But I'll start living again as soon as I can.  Really.

Of course there is the requisite Thoreau quotation, on a sign by the rock pile.  What is Thoreau to us nowadays?  A source of quotations that we think we understand out of context.  But I do want to live deliberately, to learn what life has to teach so when I come to die, I will know that I have lived: fully, completely.  I check myself sometimes.  I ask myself, am I living today?  And if I'm not, I ask myself, why not?  And what can I do to experience something – beauty, joy, grandeur?  And then sometimes I look at the moon, and sometimes I listen to music.  And sometimes I dance.

The trees around the pond are incredibly tall.  I wonder if they were as tall when Thoreau was alive?  "I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor."  I am consciously endeavoring, right?  Although I'd have to ask Thoreau what specifically he means by elevate.  I mean, Bronson Alcott tried to elevate his life by consciously endeavoring not to wear wool.  That works a lot better after the invention of acrylic fleece.

Thoreau talks a lot about solitude. "I have never found a companion that was so companionable as solitude. We are for the most part more lonely when we go abroad among men than when we stay in our chambers. A man thinking or working is always alone, let him be where he will." I have to admit, I am often more lonely in crowds than I am when actually alone. But I think Walden is the sort of place where you should bring a friend.  You need someone to whom you can make snarky comments.

"If a man walks in the woods for love of them half of each day, he is in danger of being regarded as a loafer. But if he spends his days as a speculator, shearing off those woods and making the earth bald before her time, he is deemed an industrious and enterprising citizen." I guess I have to count myself among the loafers, then.  I would like to be able to walk in woods, more frequently than I do now.  If I had a piece of land with woods, and a pond, and some space for a cabin and a garden, I wonder how often I would leave it?

We have taken a detour to see where Thoreau's cabin was located.  Now we follow the path back to the lake.  Thoreau said, "A lake is the landscape's most beautiful and expressive feature. It is Earth's eye; looking into which the beholder measures the depth of his own nature." I have to admit, I always find myself happiest around water, just as of all sounds, I most love birdsong or the chirping of crickets.  Or the hooting of an owl, in the early morning.

You can see the bathers above.  It's difficult to take a photograph of the lake without some of them getting into the frame.  As you go around the pond, there are regular intervals at which large stones have been set into the banks, as steps.  They go down to the lake, and almost each set of steps had its bathers, gathered on them.  I have always loved the idea of stone steps going down into the water, I'm not sure why. Thoreau also wrote, "The cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run." Sometimes I do think about how much of my life I'm exchanging for something.  That's why I try to buy only things that are beautiful or useful, that are worth a part of my life.

On the way back, I saw a family of ducks. I was surprised by how close the mother duck let me get to the ducklings. "Nature puts no question and answers none which we mortals ask. She has long ago taken her resolution." That's what I find so restful about nature. It is so completely itself. So completely resolved.

"In my afternoon walk I would fain forget all my morning occupations and my obligations to society."  And I kind of did, actually.  At least, after walking around at Walden, I felt much, much better about myself and my work.  Thanks, Thoreau. Honestly, sometimes you sound like a parody of yourself, but that's probably not your fault. It's probably the fault of a hundred dorm posters with sayings that are supposed to be inspirational, but by which you meant something more complex, and more politically motivated, and more revolutionary, than we realize.

"Our moments of inspiration are not lost though we have no particular poem to show for them; for those experiences have left an indelible impression, and we are ever and anon reminded of them." I'm going to remember Walden and draw from it in some way. I find that all the important things I do affect my life and my writing, which are intertwined anyway. And I'm at a point in my life when I don't really bother doing things that are not important. I don't have the inclination or time.

But going to Walden is one of the important things. Like a pilgrimage. With, don't forget, a sense of humor.