Possessed by possession?

At the moment I’m reading Possession. A gift from my sweety, I originally confused it for Atonement! Which I’m dreading reading, seeing they made a movie with Keira Knightly. I just haven’t liked her acting since who knows when.

Possession, however, is a very good book. Long, yes, but not unrewarding. It’s about two main scholars who’re into previous generation writers, and piecing their lives back together. ONLY there’s a few hints that the two writers were in some way linked, romantically, and it’s up to the main characters to find out.

The format of the book includes a lot of letters, from characters to one another, both in present time, as well as current characters reading older characters letters. This also includes entire written passages featured as the older characters works.

This means a lot of reading, which is just reading, to get through the lengthier passages. And this isn’t bad, per se. If you just want a read that’ll be good and long, then you can’t go wrong. It draws a big comparison to Pale Fire, by Vladamir Nabakov, but Pale Fire was unforgivable. It’s follows the similar method of a modern day writer, analysing to hell the works of a past writer, but Pale Fire is quite different because the explanation half of the book becomes quite thick and full. (It’s actually a brilliant read, but if Possession is a good thick read, Pale Fire is concrete breakfast.)

I’m only halfway through Possession at the moment, so I wont say any more than I’m enjoying it more than I thought I would. I also bought Sherlock Holmes the other day. Not on the list, no, but some purely recreational reading is needed every now and then.

I figured I’d start at the start, so it’s Hound of the Baskervilles for me. At very first, I wasn’t going to buy the book, but within the first page I was already delighted by the honey-fun style of writing, so I had to buy it.

I also purchased To the Lighthouse recently, at the bargain bargain price of $9.95! Five cents cheaper than $10, I cannot believe it!

Reading, beer and today.

Let me set the scene. It's a grey day outside, chilled but my jacket warms me. Mother and sisters watching the TV, seated deep into warm cushions or heated bu the fire's glow. I'm one beer into lunch and Sound of Music is on the TV.

So it's perfect sitting down with a book, or writing. I chose writing, can you tell? Writing about reading though. Normally, when I read, it's on the train or bus to wherever I'm headed. Usually uni, though now uni is finished for me, hopefully forever (cheers, ta). That means now I get to count less on reading whilst in transit, and have to find time to read instead.

Years ago I'd read before I read to bed, the current novel of choice beside my pillow. Now, with technology, I have my laptop and phone to contend with. I can call my significant other, or cruise the internet for videos of things I'm interested in, or even read 101books.net, which I suggest you do too.

The in-home combatants don't really matter, considering it's Foxtel. If it's not Mythbusters I'm not too easily distracted. So with all the above to take into consideration, you'll find I read quite a lot but feel like I never read much, and write in-my-head a lot more than I write down here, or in my book.

I will admit that almost every time having a drink is a mistake. It makes the mind swim too much, even one, so that writing is harder to discipline.

Anyway onto the books! I am currently reading Possession, while I have just finished MONEY by Martin Amis. I'll go over Money first, because it's an amazing read.

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So, 1984. Wait, what? No seriously, I need to start with 1984 first. It is THE book I suggest to everyone, ever, when they ask What's the next book I should read? Or if I could only have read one book in my life, that'd be it. George Orwell writes far too well and too realistically for this to be taken anyway but seriously, and I have never read a book that made me sympathise with the main character, Winston Smith, so well. I mean utterly. Completely. I hadn't felt like I was holding a characters hand in any particular scene until I read 1984, and we got to the end of 1984. It's the best book I'm ever going to read, and that includes my own if I ever get them published. Now to money.

MONEY, by Martin Amis, is the same, but for money. It takes us by the hand and whips us along with John Self, our simple-named main character. He's a writer, and porn director, who's been enlisted to shoot what promises to be a good movie, that'll really make his name, and get everyone MONEY. The entire book is about money, how it works, what it makes you do, how you can get more, how everyone wants, no one has it, and everyone who does spends it like it's a toy, in a manner that the rest simply can't.

The biggest similarity between the two books is Big Brother and money. Both have a simple and utter control over the story, the world, the main characters. There's nothing they can seem to do that gets them out of the water, into greener pastures. Even when you think they're on top of things, there's still that sniff of trouble, worry in the air.

I wont go further into it because I don't want to ruin the plots, or twists, or amazements, or moments, or revelations that both books have, but saying that Money even comes close to comparing with 1984 is quite a big thing, coming from a fan like me. Certain books you know you'll reread once you're done with them, and this is easily one of them. John Self shares his everything with you, much like Henry Miller in Tropic, and the same trap is set that must be lived through.

There's a definite difference between a character that shares a lot with you, and one that shares everything with you. The former kind of book doesn't really get its point across, because it never makes the right connection. It's stilted and you don't feel quite so close to the action, the heart and mind of the main character.

It's worth it to note that Martin Amis puts himself in the novel. Quite a bit. It's not a small bit, but quite a large part, where he ends up talking with John Self and helping him to figure some things out. Normally when a writer puts themself in the book. The only other comparison I can think of is Clockwork Orange, where Burgess shows up in the book, as does the book A Clockwork Orange, but not as he himself and with no real secret knowledge of things that are going on. In Money, Amis shows us and is quite quick to help John Self suss out the kind of things that are going on, being hired as a writer himself to help with the movie's script. I don't know any other writer who's put themself so much into the book that they couldn't be taken out for fear of severe damage.

So it's certainly unique, and certainly engaging, and certainly "looking over your shoulder" style reading, so it's my favourite of the books I've read thus far, from the List. This doesn't include the original 9 books that I had read before I ever found the list. I'll talk about those books next, because it's always interesting to see which books people had read before the list, much like it's interesting to see how they pick their next book from the list and whether they go off what other's have said, or just off the title.

Myself? I try and go off title alone.

Fahrenheit 451

This book is not on the list - Fahrenheit 451 - but it's author - the great Ray Bradbury - passed on the 7th June. Like it or not, it's the one book I agree could've been on the List but wasn't. The other book is rather obviously Brave New World. I say obviously because my favourite genre is always going to be the eutopian/dystopian future. I've got my own idea for a script of that sort, which I actually submitted for a university assignment.

Regardless - a great writer is dead, and all of us book lovers, writers, critics, have to feel that sort of thing. The course thoughts usually swerve straight towards jokes that could be made (think of when Steve Irwin died, how quick did South Park put him in an episode with a Stingray still in his chest?). Something bad about books, burning, and all that.

The serious people will talk about how revolutionary his book was, particularly Fahrenheit 451. There's a future world, were books are banned. Books burn at the temperature 451 degrees, and houses are fire proof. So in this future world, when you're found with books your front door is knocked down, they come inside with the firetruck and burn the house clear of books, rather than down.

A remarkable thing about the book is how Bradbury wrote it. He used typewriters that were paid for by the hour or half hour, for maybe a penny. He spent a week working for hours at a time, and after his writing he owned a tidy sum of money on using the typewriters, but he was completely enthralled by the story, had to write it, and let it burn out of him onto the paper and through his fingers. It's quite an apt parallel to how the story tells itself - quick, brash, but with a good impact and for a proper end.

There was a movie made of the book too, which got mixed reviews. Some people don't like the 1984 movie that was made, and it set up a hard time for any future dystopian novel future book/movie translations. Fahrenheit wasn't any different, with a lot of fans saying it was tripe, and obviously the writer had nothing to do with it. They changed the world and storyline too much. The problem? Ray Bradbury was apparently there for the whole thing, giving the OK on all and any changes they made!

Depending on how true that is, it's quite funny. I hear people make the same claim about Disney's recent movie version of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but I will never believe Douglas Adams would've penned that script, NOR that he would've let the movie go to screen looking like that. Disney undervalued the long-time dedicated fanbase of the book series, and tried far too hard - and annoyingly - to appeal to the mass audiences out there.

It worked in a way. Us steadfast fans promised our mates it'd be great, we all went and were severely disappointed, never to return. We liked seeing our favourite characters on the big screen, but apart from that, PLURH. Friends who weren't swept up in the original wave were lucky, and didn't see it. For all their effort, they certainly don't have the support to get a second movie out of it, especially after having Arthur and Trillian get together in the final scene of the movie.

There is 6 books in the Hitchhiker's Guide series, and do you know how often Arthur and Trillian meet up? Hook up? Get together? Apart from Randomly, NEVER. Not to say they shouldn't, and we didn't dream of it at times, but that's just too stupid to suddenly give the Hitchhiker's Guide fandom what it's always been OK without, actually. I'm reminded briefly of Fry's attempts to get Leela in Futurama, but I'm digressing waaay to much here. Apologies.

There are several books you should all read, because there's nothing better than a "what if" scenario that is fleshed out good -and proper- and holds a biiig mirror up to current society, asking it "What do you see?"

So:
1984 - this utter classic and my number 1 book of forever introduces the idea of Big Brother, and Winston Smith is our hero who's set against the government-run world. A movie adaptation exists.
Brave New World - this number 2 is a great look at a more science-fictiony world, where everyone is conditioned from pre-birth through infanthood to really know their place and stick it out, regardless, as hardwired as your genes. John is a "savage", someone from outside the main city of our story, were reproduction happens normally. Fate crushed the two worlds together, and it's Johns reaction to a sterile, laugh-at-you-for-your-natural-ways world that drives the story along to it's conclusion, asking us if we really want to live in a world of genetic perfection to a point of designer made GENERATIONS. No movie adaptation exists, though it should.
Clockwork Orange - believe it or not, we're just trendy and in the heighth of fashion here - young Alex D'Large and his droogs are future babies, from a world were things have turned the darkest corner. I like to think of Clockwork Orange as a story that takes "Boys will be boys" and pushes it to it's limit. It raises a good many questions about the rights or correctional methods and how far you can push the "change" before it becomes a compulsion rather than a want. Poor Alex is indeed brainwashed, and he no longer desires to attack whoever he likes, steal and rape and pillage in general, feeling sick whenever the opportunity presents itself. But we're then shown that a man who doesn't get to choose to be good ceases to be a man, and is not good at all. He doesn't choose good, he simply avoids evil because it makes him ill. This is not redemption, nor lasting. A movie adaptation, a very famous one, exists, and it's ending is quite controversial, seeing it lops off the last chapter entirely, which distinctly alters the books ending and in the end it's meaning. I for one prefer the shorter version entirely, but I respect the book seperately from the movie, and acknowledge that they're both different pieces of media, even if they're from the same seed.
Fahrenheit 451 - I've given a brief description of this up above. Out of all the pieces mentioned here, only 1984 and Clockwork Orange are on The List, but it doesn't make the other entries any less significant. The List is good at highlighting "best ofs", certainly, but if you're into those books there's a great chance you'd be into the entire genre, which is where this extra research will bear you some real fruit. A movie adaptation exists, that I haven't watched and have been warned against. It just makes it seem more tempting, ironically.
AD4M & 3VE - Not actually published yet, it's my own dystopian/eutopian novel. Is it cheeky putting my own work here? Sure why not, but hey if I'm not gonna push my own stuff who is? At the moment it exists as a script which I am preening for inclusion in my portfolio.
The basic premise is revolution, as we see a typical robots versus human society, where both have an equal existence if you glimpse at it. Look harder, and there's plenty that points to an unfair standing of all society. No movie adaptation exists yet.
THX1138 - This one is NOT a novel, but is George Lucas' own go at the eutopia/dystopia society media. It's interesting how it starts, but is quite obviously self-gratifying seeing THX 1138 is George Lucas' own sound system production company. It begins with tones of varying "this is the future" sort of worlds, where emotions are forbidden and everyone's doped up on some significant drug, like soma. The main character, also named THX 1138, has a wife who's off her meds for some reason, and she convinces him to not take his meds. Undrugged, they enjoy touching, emotion, I'm sure some sex. This alerts the authorities who just go ape and begin persuing them. This is where the movie devolves into one big chase scene, that goes forever until THX manages to escape to the top levels of the world. Sans wife, roll credits. That's it, that's the movie. It's very good for a look at world-building, because George is good at that, but seems bad at everything else. We've all seen Star Wars 1, 2 and 3. They're not really worthy of the shadow of 4, 5 and 6, are they?
Regardless THX1138 seems like it wanted to be a novel much more than a movie, and seeing it was never written it feels only half done. Like all good movies, it does involved bosoms of some sort (No really. 1984, Clockwork Orange and THX1138 all have them).

And that's my skinny on that. Thank you, Ray Bradbury, for your contribution to the world of fiction, the warning against the bookless future (which we seem to be heading towards...) and for writing.

To point, or not to point?

Quick, what's the moral/point of 1984? Don't give the government total control! And what about Lord of the Flies? Human nature is degenerate, and truly capable of darkness! What about "Are you there, God? It's me, Margaret"? That life is a constant question of identity, even at such a young, developing age, good!

Now what about Lolita? Umm... Don't date young girls? No, well. That's obvious. Don't travel all around America? No, not really... Alright well how about Money, by Martin Amis? Well, obviously don't get into the movie business. No, that's what Hollywood's for. Don't be John Self? Don't think so. Well what about Tropic of Capricorn? Actually that IS just a fantastically long ramble...

It would appear, upon second glance at some of these books, that they don't have a point. Not a central theme to tie the entire thing together. You sit down, read the book and have a great time, am inspired by the writing, the characters. And when you think about it, summing up the point is just pointing at something the characters did, and realising that's not an event--that's a point. A bit like Alice in Wonderland, she has an episodic time without any real story being told.

Quick aside on Alice. She's one of my favourite heroins in all of literature, and always will be. The characters are wonderfully different and written, and the events are all silly and nonsensical, and don't lend themself very well to real-world movies (no really, just watch Burton's attempt). Alice in Wonderland is great for character, how it's written, and nothing else.

That's the point I'm making here. You can have a great book without any particular point. Vladamir Nabakov said (writer of Lolita and Pale Fire) that he didn't have any moral intended for the book -- he just wanted to write. He set out learning English (he grew up russian, da) and then wanted to write a fantastically lyrical book, which he did. There wasn't any point he was trying to make, so we must assume then that the success is simply a great big "Look at me, and my writing!" Normally I'd say that's egotistical. If you really set out to just write a book to show off how well you could write, that's trite.

But with Nabakov, and Miller and Amis I am well and truly happy they have. You could include Naked Lunch in that lot, very easily. William Burrough's book was the first one I truly had some difficulty reading. Graphic to a horrid point, yet you get the idea -- the life of a drug addled anyone is going to be NUTS. Not only that, but it's a real part of society and needs addressing. Before that, it needs to be observed. So perhaps Naked Lunch does have more of a point to make then the other books, but it's still essentially a man's record of a crazy time he's had, and it is laid out before the reader, to make of it what they will.

Peter David, a comic book writer, spoke about the three main categories a book's story may follow. A person versus Nature (One flew over the cuckoos nest, Falconer). A persons versus someone/group else (1984). And finally, a person versus themself, such as our above listed books. In each story we see the struggle of a character against themself. Always wanting to be better their situation. Struggling to not just give in and do what everyone else is doing, what they think they should do.

I think that this style of story really frees up the contraints of a writer, allowing them to indeed focus much more on character, happenstance and writing well. If you have a point to make, then very well -- make it so well, so believable and loud that the world can't help but notice (Grapes of Wrath, 1984, I'm looking at your). If you're going to avoid making a specific point, then give us a bloody good look at something we wouldn't experience in our life. So the crazed drugged decades of Burrough's life, pre-Naked Lunch -- I thank you. John Self's hazardous life styled around making a movie, Martin Amis I thank you. Henry Miller and your crazy, self-styled bouts of fantastic imagery and head-trips -- I think I thank you the most.

For in reader we can find entertainment, and we don't need to learn anything specific or revolutionary from it. We can just have a very nice piece of writing, one that takes us away from our lot in life and gives us someone else's shoes to wear, and properly.

There is a balance here, between choosing a point, and choosing to write well. Writing without a point, as I said above, seems stupid to me, or highly pretentious. To manage this style of book without being pretentious is incredibly hard, but I think opening the honesty barrel and tipping it onto the page is the only way.

The best example I can give you of this is also the most likely to offend book, Tropic of Capricorn. Consider the fact that every second word begins with c and is four letters. Miller never apologises, never begins to apologise, and had his book banned just about everywhere before it was printed. This is the kind of honesty and connection you need with the reader, before they'll consider your work not pretentious, but actually truth, your truth, that they are then thankful for the sharing of.

So taking all the above into consideration, I'm feeling a little bit better about the lack of any single clear theme running through my own book.

Thank you for reading.

What's this new set up?

Well this website has just changed it's layout, that's what the title is in reference to.

Today was great. I woke up at Amy's, saw her off at uni then went and bought some books. It took a while, but in the process I had to sit on the floor and produce my laptop. I do this often. I'm in the heart of Sydney, where all the swanky wankers come to eat/dine/read/prove they are whatever they hope they look like, and I sit on the floor like a hippy.

I had to check the titles of books that were on the list, That Infamous List, to see if the store didn't have them. I also needed a bathroom, so made a detour for that and found the kids section, playing Sooty. I watched Sooty until I remembered my need for a bathroom. Dymocks wouldn't help me there.

So I found one at the foodcourt, and, bowels satisfied, went back to shopping. I found a few, but got UNDER THE VOLCANO and PASSAGE TO INDIA. I base my buying on what a new book sounds like, and it's vague and hardly read blurb on the back. Passage to India sounds like travel, and Under the volcano is about a man drinking himself to death. There is always something fantastic to learn in that process, whether in a book or real life.

For instance at the moment this neighbour of Amy's is really up the creek, and has the hardest time coming to terms with it. He wont see Doctors, no treatment will be taken, but if there's a crash down the street, he's off ON FOOT to see it. Or to Blacktown (don't know what for) he's able to do that. But if it's Doctors? Nah, needs a lift off someone with a car. Appointment to get a knee job? Nah, government coming to fix something that day (true story, though used as a convenient excuse).

The man's desire to not tell himself "You are about to die" extends to the point at which he'll live out the life of a fit person, who CAN do without those check ups. Interesting.

I cleaned up my room/workspace today. Cleared the crap cluttering my collection of cardboard guarded books. Threw out some old card games I enjoy (Magic the Gathering, for those wondering). Reshelfed my books, so the middle row is long and standing and definately all "the List".

For the new readers out there, "the List" will always refer to the Time Magazine's 100 Best novels, from 1923 to 2005. (1923 was when they started printing. 2005 was the year they posted the list.) I had read 9 books on the list, and vowed to read them all, as a practice in persistence, as well as a fine way to educate myself on the practice of writing. What better way?

I have also finished university just recently, which has inspired the cleaning and prepping. I am getting ready to resume writing, dusting off my 2008-started novel which has been 50% written. Not even up to rewriting yet!

Here's a link to the List:
http://entertainment.time.com/2005/10/16/all-time-100-novels/#all

And yes, I have read many of the books. I'll post my list (read, owned but not started, still to buy) tomorrow.

And thank you for reading.