Robert Jacoby's Blog, page 13
October 12, 2013
Contemporary Illustrations for Famous Novels
Found this in my many wanderings and thought it was interesting:
Contemporary Illustrations for Famous Novels
http://flavorwire.com/419840/contempo...
Contemporary Illustrations for Famous Novels
http://flavorwire.com/419840/contempo...
October 7, 2013
Review of John Fowles' The Magus
Fowles couldn't find his way out of his own labyrinth
This novel begins with much promise: a disaffected young Englishman, Nicholas Urfe, runs away from a relationship to the (fictional) Greek island of Phraxos, and soon after his arrival he is bored, despondant, and suicidal. Not to worry, though, Nicholas soon wanders onto the property of one Maurice Conchis (“concious”; wink and a nod), who is as mysterious and wealthy as they come. Almost immediately the mind games begin, and Nicholas (and we) cannot be sure what is real and not real, and, more importantly, what it all means. Why we’re here.
Because that’s the essence of this novel: man’s search for meaning, particularly after suffering the horrors of World War 2. That context is important because the novel takes place in 1953, when the world, and particularly Europe, was still recovering. This theme plays throughout the book. Also important is metaphor—mask, theatre, mythical figures, literature. And the mind of man. What it means to be alive and human.
Like other reviewers have written, I, too, was pulled along by the intriguing story, the excellent writing, and the (mostly) fine pacing. It helps that the story takes place in a beautiful Greek setting. Fowles knows how to make you want to step into a scene on the page and join the characters for sandwiches and champagne on the seaside. I was pulled along one episode after another.
But after 500 pages or so, it began to feel like I’d been out on a hike too long, and I was wandering aimlessly. The scenery was beautiful and surprising, but what was I seeing? Why was I here? What did it all mean?
I was getting the feeling that there was nothing coming, and it felt like I was being strung along like the main character, Nicholas Urfe: I wanted to keep coming back to the mansion with him just to find out, just to see, what they would try next. But I didn’t know why.
The problem with the themes and figures and nods to classical literature is that they become an onslaught. A Christ figure should mean something because it’s a Christ figure. References to classical literature should mean something because they are reference points, pointing back to the story you’re in. In The Magus, I think Fowles simply pulled out all the stops. So thrown at us is Shakespeare, Greek gods, Jung, Tarot figures, modern artists, “blue films”. Everybody gets tossed into the pool because, Fowles is clear, God has been tossed out: as one prime character states near the end to explain to Nicholas why he’s been through what he’s been through: “Because there is no God, and it is not a game.”
So: there is no God, and what we’re left with is a wildly wealthy old man who has nothing better to do with his time and energy and money and talents than to seek out other people to help him find individuals to suck into his personal godgame to play with to … Wear funny robes and masks? Act out real life? Teach a lesson, perhaps? That all is “by hazard”?
It’s absurd to me. Because it’s not by chance. The fact is, we live in a fine-tuned universe, and it’s fine-tuned for life. And people wont’ behave like this except by script. But I suppose that’s part of the point.
In the end I was very disappointed and pissed. This is Mr. Fowles first book, so I'll forgive him that. What I won't overlook is his juvenile approach to life and love and what it means “to be” and male/female relationships. Mr. Fowles thinks he's replaced God, but with what? A group of wealthy people who layer lies upon lies for ... in the end, what exactly? We're never told. And we’re never told because, it seems to me, we cannot be told, because there is no reason for it (contrary to what Fowles claims). Because this isn't what drives real people. In the end his characters seem to be props for Fowles’ personal philosophy, and that’s a character-killing place to be.
This is an intriguing idea for a novel that could have been cut easily by 200 pages and lost nothing because, in the end, not much is there except a wild stew of myths and stumblings down one dead-end of the maze to another. (Reading this, you see exactly where such works as "The Game", "Lost", and "Shutter Island" came from.) It’s some fine writing in parts, but to get to the end of this long maze as Fowles has finished it was frustrating, not satisfying.
This novel begins with much promise: a disaffected young Englishman, Nicholas Urfe, runs away from a relationship to the (fictional) Greek island of Phraxos, and soon after his arrival he is bored, despondant, and suicidal. Not to worry, though, Nicholas soon wanders onto the property of one Maurice Conchis (“concious”; wink and a nod), who is as mysterious and wealthy as they come. Almost immediately the mind games begin, and Nicholas (and we) cannot be sure what is real and not real, and, more importantly, what it all means. Why we’re here.
Because that’s the essence of this novel: man’s search for meaning, particularly after suffering the horrors of World War 2. That context is important because the novel takes place in 1953, when the world, and particularly Europe, was still recovering. This theme plays throughout the book. Also important is metaphor—mask, theatre, mythical figures, literature. And the mind of man. What it means to be alive and human.
Like other reviewers have written, I, too, was pulled along by the intriguing story, the excellent writing, and the (mostly) fine pacing. It helps that the story takes place in a beautiful Greek setting. Fowles knows how to make you want to step into a scene on the page and join the characters for sandwiches and champagne on the seaside. I was pulled along one episode after another.
But after 500 pages or so, it began to feel like I’d been out on a hike too long, and I was wandering aimlessly. The scenery was beautiful and surprising, but what was I seeing? Why was I here? What did it all mean?
I was getting the feeling that there was nothing coming, and it felt like I was being strung along like the main character, Nicholas Urfe: I wanted to keep coming back to the mansion with him just to find out, just to see, what they would try next. But I didn’t know why.
The problem with the themes and figures and nods to classical literature is that they become an onslaught. A Christ figure should mean something because it’s a Christ figure. References to classical literature should mean something because they are reference points, pointing back to the story you’re in. In The Magus, I think Fowles simply pulled out all the stops. So thrown at us is Shakespeare, Greek gods, Jung, Tarot figures, modern artists, “blue films”. Everybody gets tossed into the pool because, Fowles is clear, God has been tossed out: as one prime character states near the end to explain to Nicholas why he’s been through what he’s been through: “Because there is no God, and it is not a game.”
So: there is no God, and what we’re left with is a wildly wealthy old man who has nothing better to do with his time and energy and money and talents than to seek out other people to help him find individuals to suck into his personal godgame to play with to … Wear funny robes and masks? Act out real life? Teach a lesson, perhaps? That all is “by hazard”?
It’s absurd to me. Because it’s not by chance. The fact is, we live in a fine-tuned universe, and it’s fine-tuned for life. And people wont’ behave like this except by script. But I suppose that’s part of the point.
In the end I was very disappointed and pissed. This is Mr. Fowles first book, so I'll forgive him that. What I won't overlook is his juvenile approach to life and love and what it means “to be” and male/female relationships. Mr. Fowles thinks he's replaced God, but with what? A group of wealthy people who layer lies upon lies for ... in the end, what exactly? We're never told. And we’re never told because, it seems to me, we cannot be told, because there is no reason for it (contrary to what Fowles claims). Because this isn't what drives real people. In the end his characters seem to be props for Fowles’ personal philosophy, and that’s a character-killing place to be.
This is an intriguing idea for a novel that could have been cut easily by 200 pages and lost nothing because, in the end, not much is there except a wild stew of myths and stumblings down one dead-end of the maze to another. (Reading this, you see exactly where such works as "The Game", "Lost", and "Shutter Island" came from.) It’s some fine writing in parts, but to get to the end of this long maze as Fowles has finished it was frustrating, not satisfying.
September 28, 2013
Thoughts about Writing and Reading "There are Reasons Noah Packed No Clothes"
It's coming up on the one-year anniversary of publication of my debut novel There are Reasons Noah Packed No Clothes. I wanted to share some thoughts about what it's meant to me:
Few of us can imagine the anguish that precedes a suicide attempt and the wreckage involved in recovering from a failed suicide attempt. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, suicide is the third leading cause of death in young people (15- to 24-year-olds) and the second-leading cause of death in college-age students. Suicide attempts occur up to 20 times more frequently than completed suicides. Suicide is the ultimate loss of self (the ultimate self-cancellation of self).
But who can speak for the suicide survivor? Only a suicide survivor.
I wrote my novel There are Reasons Noah Packed No Clothes from the perspective of a young man (19-year-old Richard Issych) suffering with undiagnosed clinical depression. Richard is a suicide survivor, and the novel begins with his “second birth”; that is, he wakes up in the inpatient unit from his failed attempt at killing himself: “Void, and he in its midst, rising, consciousness materializing, blank black blanketing him, warm, so he understood he was alive, failed to kill himself.”
His distress is like that of a newborn thrust violently into a world he didn’t ask to be brought into: he cannot communicate, light hurts, the world looks and feels foreign and frightening.
***
The novel is written in the close third person point of view, through Richard’s eyes. I tried writing from different points of view, like the father and the mother. There was a scene between them, at their home, that I started early on in the writing of the book, but I soon dropped it because it was opening up the world beyond Richard. And I felt the story had to remain in his confused, claustrophobic new world in the institution.
I also tried writing from the third person omniscient view. With this view I could dip into any character’s mind to offer up their thoughts or feelings. I wrote this view in several scenes—up to the scene with Richard sitting at the table with all the young residents—but gave up because I felt the story unraveling and becoming cumbersome and, again, losing its focus. The omniscient point of view is supposed to be the most freeing for a writer, but, with this novel, I found it suffocating. And frustrating.
I had to go back and smooth everything out. I felt that it had to be about Richard only. My gut was telling me that the story had to come back to him and his foggy, limited, disjointed, and sometimes stunted worldview and follow his effort to put back together the self he had longed to destroy. So that’s what I did.
My experience with the novel was one of discovery. I was discovering elements of the story as I was writing it, I was discovering Richard as I was writing him, and it felt like I was seeing unknown parts in myself, too. I hope, as you’re reading the novel, you’ll be able to discover something of your own journey inside Richard’s journey, re-discover your own timeless truths, and clarify your own needed reasons for being.
***
People have told me the novel is a difficult read, not only for the writing style but also for the subject matter. I wanted the writing style to flow naturally out of, and because of, the subject matter. So I’d suggest reading the book from Richard’s point of view. I know this will be challenging for most people, because most people have no experience with major depression that leads to suicide. But this is partly why we read fiction, isn’t it? We read fiction to discover and experience someone else’s life and, perhaps, along the way, to come to some new understanding of our own life and our own place in the world.
So, read the novel as if you are Richard, and let the words on the page become the words in your mind become the experience for you become you as it is happening. If you can experience Richard’s story in this way, you will have a glimpse into the mind of a young person working his way back from the brink of self-destruction. And a glimpse may work its way into understanding, or even sympathy or empathy.
Few of us can imagine the anguish that precedes a suicide attempt and the wreckage involved in recovering from a failed suicide attempt. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, suicide is the third leading cause of death in young people (15- to 24-year-olds) and the second-leading cause of death in college-age students. Suicide attempts occur up to 20 times more frequently than completed suicides. Suicide is the ultimate loss of self (the ultimate self-cancellation of self).
But who can speak for the suicide survivor? Only a suicide survivor.
I wrote my novel There are Reasons Noah Packed No Clothes from the perspective of a young man (19-year-old Richard Issych) suffering with undiagnosed clinical depression. Richard is a suicide survivor, and the novel begins with his “second birth”; that is, he wakes up in the inpatient unit from his failed attempt at killing himself: “Void, and he in its midst, rising, consciousness materializing, blank black blanketing him, warm, so he understood he was alive, failed to kill himself.”
His distress is like that of a newborn thrust violently into a world he didn’t ask to be brought into: he cannot communicate, light hurts, the world looks and feels foreign and frightening.
***
The novel is written in the close third person point of view, through Richard’s eyes. I tried writing from different points of view, like the father and the mother. There was a scene between them, at their home, that I started early on in the writing of the book, but I soon dropped it because it was opening up the world beyond Richard. And I felt the story had to remain in his confused, claustrophobic new world in the institution.
I also tried writing from the third person omniscient view. With this view I could dip into any character’s mind to offer up their thoughts or feelings. I wrote this view in several scenes—up to the scene with Richard sitting at the table with all the young residents—but gave up because I felt the story unraveling and becoming cumbersome and, again, losing its focus. The omniscient point of view is supposed to be the most freeing for a writer, but, with this novel, I found it suffocating. And frustrating.
I had to go back and smooth everything out. I felt that it had to be about Richard only. My gut was telling me that the story had to come back to him and his foggy, limited, disjointed, and sometimes stunted worldview and follow his effort to put back together the self he had longed to destroy. So that’s what I did.
My experience with the novel was one of discovery. I was discovering elements of the story as I was writing it, I was discovering Richard as I was writing him, and it felt like I was seeing unknown parts in myself, too. I hope, as you’re reading the novel, you’ll be able to discover something of your own journey inside Richard’s journey, re-discover your own timeless truths, and clarify your own needed reasons for being.
***
People have told me the novel is a difficult read, not only for the writing style but also for the subject matter. I wanted the writing style to flow naturally out of, and because of, the subject matter. So I’d suggest reading the book from Richard’s point of view. I know this will be challenging for most people, because most people have no experience with major depression that leads to suicide. But this is partly why we read fiction, isn’t it? We read fiction to discover and experience someone else’s life and, perhaps, along the way, to come to some new understanding of our own life and our own place in the world.
So, read the novel as if you are Richard, and let the words on the page become the words in your mind become the experience for you become you as it is happening. If you can experience Richard’s story in this way, you will have a glimpse into the mind of a young person working his way back from the brink of self-destruction. And a glimpse may work its way into understanding, or even sympathy or empathy.
September 16, 2013
In search of an agent for...
my next book. Nonfiction. A memoir by interview. Here is part of the query letter my co-author and I are sending out:
So, yeah, there it is.
Anyone interested in the next NYT Bestseller? ;)
Never Stop Dancing is the memoir of a young widower trying to understand the mystery of life and death and love, learning to re-assemble the pieces of a broken life for him and his two boys, and developing a path forward following the sudden and horrific loss of his life partner.
On the morning of April 29, 2010, Amy Polk did something she did nearly every day: she stepped off the curb onto M Street in South West Washington, D.C. Unlike other mornings, a left-turning truck struck her in the crosswalk, killing her instantly. That same day her husband, John, along with his two young boys, Adam, 7, and Bryan, 4, fell into a frightening and lonely world of chaos and bewilderment (Washington Post article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/... DCist Daily article: http://dcist.com/2010/05/pedestrian_f...) .
Shortly after Amy’s death I approached John with this book idea, which follows a similar format to my previous memoir-by-interview, Escaping from Reality Without Really Trying: 40 Years of High Seas Travels and Lowbrow Tales (2011).
Soon after Amy's death, John had started to document his journey at his blog, Hole in the Sun (http://www.hole-in-the-sun.com/). But we both wanted to record the deeper journey of how John’s new life was unfolding after Amy’s death, as it was unfolding. I interviewed John over the course of the first year and few months after Amy’s death. From more than 12 hours of transcribed recordings, Never Stop Dancing emerged. It is a deeply personal and intimate story, one uniquely told in time.
Already, John's story has resonated with many people: His essay Valentine Letter to My Sons was cited as a top-20 blog entry for 2011 by Alive and Mortal (http://expressive-arts.blogspot.com/), and he was interviewed for an April 1, 2013 BBC Radio 4 show because of one of his blog posts on the "digital afterlife" of lost loved ones (http://www.hole-in-the-sun.com/2013/0...).
Because this memoir deals head-on with issues of life, love, and death, and the nature of God and existence, we believe Never Stop Dancing is the kind of memoir that will appeal to a wide audience.
So, yeah, there it is.
Anyone interested in the next NYT Bestseller? ;)
September 7, 2013
What a writer works on when he's not writing
Lots of things. Keeping the balance. Keeping the faith. Trying to.
Keep trying to get published. There's always that. That's always a driver. But it's becoming less so the more work I have published. Funny how that works.
But I persist. I like putting my material together and sending it out and waiting to hear back from editors and agents. Right now I have query letters out for my nonfiction book, Never Stop Dancing. This is the memoir-by-interview I did with my friend who lost his wife to an automobile accident in 2010. I approached him with the idea for this book 3 months after she was killed. And that's when I started interviewing him. And then we met periodically over the next year, up until the 1-year anniversary of her death.
What trauma.
Every time I returned home from one of our interview sessions I would need to detox. Nobody knows how they would react in that most horrible of situations: losing your husband/wife, so young, so suddenly. And having two young children left to raise.
Many times over the year I worked with him I questioned myself on the project. Why did I want to do this? Who will want to read this? I persisted. I thought then and still think now that the book we've completed will be of interest to many people, to hear about John's journey through grief. (He's been blogging since Amy's death; visit him at Hole in the Sun blog)
I'm still working on poetry, too. Over the last few weeks I've worked on chapbook material (collection of 10-16+ poems) and a book (48+ pages). I think there are maybe 18 or so poems already published. I'm pleased with them all, really. I (mostly) don't let the "dogs" out, y'know? (FYI, all my poems are available on my website poetry page.)
Besides tidying up the book Never Stop Dancing and sending out query letters to agents, and working on the poetry and those books, I was working on my second novel, Dusk and Ember. I was chugging along nicely for several weeks. Then I lost steam. The all-important "Why?" and "What for?" It felt like I was writing for myself, in a vacuum.
---
I set it aside to focus on my poetry. And some Wikipedia writing and image contributions. Toying with some new article ideas for Wikipedia and for professional publication. I'm a website content manager, and my Wikipedia user page has my articles, but also check out website-governance.com, the website I built last year as part of finishing up my MIM degree at U Maryland.
---
I started back into music, too, downloading many new songs. I'm a big music buff. Some of my latest favorites include:
* Rise Rise Rise by Praything
* This Mess by Collapsing Cities
* Your Ghost by Playfellow
* If I'd Known by The Frank and Walters
* Tales of Kamanakera by American Wolf
* Freemason Waltz by Clinic
* Up on the Ride by Guillemots
* It's True by Longwave
If you like alternative rock music, try any of these. Hope you enjoy them as much as I do.
---
I stopped writing in my journal and notebook for awhile, too. I think my mind needed a rest from everything. Yesterday and this morning I wrote, and for exercise it felt good, just to write. Some words and phrases and thoughts and ideas were coming. It felt good. The words coming felt good.
Keep trying to get published. There's always that. That's always a driver. But it's becoming less so the more work I have published. Funny how that works.
But I persist. I like putting my material together and sending it out and waiting to hear back from editors and agents. Right now I have query letters out for my nonfiction book, Never Stop Dancing. This is the memoir-by-interview I did with my friend who lost his wife to an automobile accident in 2010. I approached him with the idea for this book 3 months after she was killed. And that's when I started interviewing him. And then we met periodically over the next year, up until the 1-year anniversary of her death.
What trauma.
Every time I returned home from one of our interview sessions I would need to detox. Nobody knows how they would react in that most horrible of situations: losing your husband/wife, so young, so suddenly. And having two young children left to raise.
Many times over the year I worked with him I questioned myself on the project. Why did I want to do this? Who will want to read this? I persisted. I thought then and still think now that the book we've completed will be of interest to many people, to hear about John's journey through grief. (He's been blogging since Amy's death; visit him at Hole in the Sun blog)
I'm still working on poetry, too. Over the last few weeks I've worked on chapbook material (collection of 10-16+ poems) and a book (48+ pages). I think there are maybe 18 or so poems already published. I'm pleased with them all, really. I (mostly) don't let the "dogs" out, y'know? (FYI, all my poems are available on my website poetry page.)
Besides tidying up the book Never Stop Dancing and sending out query letters to agents, and working on the poetry and those books, I was working on my second novel, Dusk and Ember. I was chugging along nicely for several weeks. Then I lost steam. The all-important "Why?" and "What for?" It felt like I was writing for myself, in a vacuum.
---
I set it aside to focus on my poetry. And some Wikipedia writing and image contributions. Toying with some new article ideas for Wikipedia and for professional publication. I'm a website content manager, and my Wikipedia user page has my articles, but also check out website-governance.com, the website I built last year as part of finishing up my MIM degree at U Maryland.
---
I started back into music, too, downloading many new songs. I'm a big music buff. Some of my latest favorites include:
* Rise Rise Rise by Praything
* This Mess by Collapsing Cities
* Your Ghost by Playfellow
* If I'd Known by The Frank and Walters
* Tales of Kamanakera by American Wolf
* Freemason Waltz by Clinic
* Up on the Ride by Guillemots
* It's True by Longwave
If you like alternative rock music, try any of these. Hope you enjoy them as much as I do.
---
I stopped writing in my journal and notebook for awhile, too. I think my mind needed a rest from everything. Yesterday and this morning I wrote, and for exercise it felt good, just to write. Some words and phrases and thoughts and ideas were coming. It felt good. The words coming felt good.
August 27, 2013
Funny from Miley Cyrus' routine at the VMA show
Daft Punk reacts to Miley Cyrus' VMA Performance
August 9, 2013
3 new poems in Poetry Pacific
Very nice. Three new poems published in Poetry Pacific:
Becoming and Coming
Our love is suns' fusions thick
Of the Universe and My Insects
Read all 3 here. Enjoy!
Becoming and Coming
Our love is suns' fusions thick
Of the Universe and My Insects
Read all 3 here. Enjoy!
July 18, 2013
More poems forthcoming
I had to set aside work on my second novel. It was closing in on me. So I picked up batches of poems, brushed them off, and sent them out to some fine journals. The result so far:
Forthcoming in Poetica Magazine
After the Flood
The dead know more than you allow
Forthcoming in Poetry Pacific
Becoming and Coming
Our love is suns' fusions thick
Of the Universe and My Insects
Forthcoming in Poetica Magazine
After the Flood
The dead know more than you allow
Forthcoming in Poetry Pacific
Becoming and Coming
Our love is suns' fusions thick
Of the Universe and My Insects
June 24, 2013
Interview and book giveaway at Pride in Madness blog
Check out my interview and signed paperback giveaway over at Pride in Madness blog. She asks some great questions about my debut novel, There are Reasons Noah Packed No Clothes. The giveaway is open until July 6. See the rules there on her blog.
Thanks, Kristen!
Thanks, Kristen!
June 16, 2013
My guest post over at Pride in Madness blog
Check out my guest post over at Pride in Madness blog. Blog owner Kristen Bellows was kind enough to provide the space for me to talk about the stigma of mental illness and how it relates to my novel There are Reasons Noah Packed No Clothes.
This was a challenging and rewarding post to write. It really made me think about why I wrote my book, and what I think readers might gain from it. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. :)
In a couple days she'll post our interview, where I dig a bit deeper into some particulars of my book (my motivation for writing it, how I dealt with the difficult subject matter, my favorite character, and more), along with a giveaway of a signed copy. Stay tuned!
This was a challenging and rewarding post to write. It really made me think about why I wrote my book, and what I think readers might gain from it. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. :)
In a couple days she'll post our interview, where I dig a bit deeper into some particulars of my book (my motivation for writing it, how I dealt with the difficult subject matter, my favorite character, and more), along with a giveaway of a signed copy. Stay tuned!
