Thursday, July 6, 2006

Fueled by a steady intake of chocolate chip muffins and Peplab, what some would identify as a self-contained bulimia kit, I’ve planted the beginnings of a book. I’ve always wondered what it’d be like to produce the great American novel, a work that would invite the spirit of Cliff Hillegass–yellow, striped, terse–to do its sinister work. Then again, such a qualifier may be slightly inaccurate, because these same readers probably require goddamn adhesive arrows on their escalators.

I can stop wondering, though, and here’s why. Now, we weren’t precisely alive back then, but don’t you get the impression Twain and Steinbeck made their masterworks effortlessly? Sure, some thought probably went into the process, but they didn’t agonize over it. They didn’t break out the graph paper, you know? They just did, without the pomp, given wholly to circumstance, and in a flash of insight there, in the literary manger, they laid down their one and onlies, again and again. That’s genius.

Agonizing is a kind of ritual for me. I like agonizing about the process and how the greats manage to pull their great thoughts from the swirling ether. This alone precludes me from the club, but there are other horizons to explore, namely pulpier novels. Or maybe a really good screenplay, gripping as it is dramatic. I’d be content with that. Attend well:

INT — MEDICAL FRIGATE — NIGHT
Yoda: Grave it is, strong he must feel. Surprised, you will be.

Chewbacca: ROWHRR, ROWHRRRRR.

Yoda: Tested he was, results he saw–

Chewbacca: ROWHRR DURRRRR ROWHRRRR?

Yoda: –Force Crabs, he had.

Chewbacca looks out THE WINDOW into the deep black reaches of NEBURRON V, thinking. Turns out he’s thinking his REFLECTION is another WOOKIE.

Yoda: Dumbshit, you are.