Inkwell: Authors and Artists

    
I have been wondering for a while how you feel about
people/interviewers that ask you what your sexual preference is or what
religion you are. Does it bother you?  I mean, my SO just wrote a play
dealing with child abuse, but that doesn't mean he was abused as a
child. I suppose I am wondering how relevant you feel those questions
are?  That and are there areas about your life you refuse to answer
questions about?
  

    
Email from Jouni:

Hi Neil. Hi everybody.

Saw the snapshot in Slush Factory. So you had a haircut then. Is it too
late to suggest what you should do with the hair?

I think you should donate it to science. That way every nation could clone
it's own Neil to write cool stories, and more importantly, to translate
your works.

I mean I've read your stories in english and in finnish and... I dunno...
there's just something missing in (some of) the translations. Generally
they are OK, but that's all... they are just OK.

Jouni (who has read some quite lame translations, but also few good ones)

PS. How's the pumpkin (pumpkins?)

PPS. What's the latest with American Gods & Death-script?

PPPS. Does anybody know where I could get Warning: Contains Language -CD?
  

    
Jouni -- a quick answer to the last question: you can get
WARNING:CONTAINS LANGUAGE -- two CDs of stories by me, with music by
Dave McKean and a song by the Flash Girls -- from DreamHaven.
www.dreamhavenbooks.com -- they have a few left, but only a few. I
think when we reissue it it'll be as a set of single CDs... and I need
to record a few more...
  

    
And you can listen to an interview with me at the Hour 25 Radio show
at

http://www.hour25.org/
  

    
Mary Roane begins in this e-mail:

Hi, y'all!
 
Len--Sorry it's taken me so long to get back--I haven't seen the show,
but I've got an e-mail out to a buddy of mine at the Goodman to see what
the buzz is.  I'll let you know when I hear from him.  It's sad, but I
don't actually see much theatre here-it's expensive & I work about 60
hours a week, so it's hard to schedule anything.  Saw 8 shows in 6 days
in NYC last May, though.  When I go on vacation I'm dangerous!
 
Shira--I've sort of been trying to stay out of this whole discussion,
because religion is an intensely personal thing.  But I am having a hard
time keeping my trap shut, because I'm a church musician and I've
questioned a lot of stuff, too, so I hope this is of some help. I was
christened Catholic, and then we moved close to the other side of the
family, who were Baptists.  Catholics are pretty scarce on the ground in
Mississippi-O.K., where I was they were rarer than hen's teeth, so I went
to church with the Baptist side of the family, when I went.  This was
from the time I was about 8 years old until I was 18 & went off to
college.  I got asked *a lot* what I was, what I believed, etc.  (Now I
realize that, to you, the differences are miniscule, but trust me, to the
Baptists, they are NOT).  And after a lot of thinking & worrying & being
put on the spot, I decided.......... not to decide right away.  I just
figured that I wasn't ever gonna *know* anyway, and that with the amount
of life experience that I had in a small town in Mississippi, I couldn't
make an informed decision.  So I learned as much about different
religions as I could & tried to apply the bigger pictures to my life
experience-not the question of "Is alcohol evil?", but "How do I feel
about a God who condemns people for having fun?"  You know?  It turns out
that one of the things that is precious to me is a sense of connection to
my ancestors-Irish peasants who were persecuted for their beliefs.  And
so I'm Catholic.  And no, I don't believe everything that Mother Church
teaches.  But buried under a lot of odd stuff is a worldview (probably
stolen from the Celts ) that I can live with.  And I love &  respect my
Protestant friends & family-I prefer to focus on our similarities rather
than our differences.  But I had to come to this on my own.  I received
some good advice, but in the end true belief is something that you come
to by yourself.  Because it's yours in a way few things in life can be. 
And you know who I envy?  You.  Because you belong to an ancient,
beautiful tradition that connects you to a group of people with bonds of
language, social custom, music, food, religious practice....the list goes
on & on.  And I think that is immensely cool.  I will never have bonds
like that to connect me to my fellow humans.  Nobody said it was an all
or nothing proposition--I think Neil is right on the money.  It's pretty
hard to decide not to be Jewish, precisely because, like no other
religion or nationality, it has so many facets.  And that is something to
be celebrated. 
 
We Catholics, too have a long tradition of rejecting our religion.  And
Neil is right again-it just moves you from one box to another one.  They
call us "lapsed" or "practicing"(because we haven't ever gotten it right)
instead of "observant" or "cultural".   But we're still identified as
Catholic.... And you ARE NOT a terrible person.  You seem to me to be a
very bright person who is questioning what you've been taught.  Welcome
to being a grown-up.
 
And in my church choir, we have just about everything represented.  Some
people view it as another gig, some have converted to Catholicism.  And
most of them have a gig somewhere for High Holy Days!  (And my friend
Jeff, an ex-cellist, wants to know if it's the Max Bruch Kol Nidre that
you played?)
 
 
Neil--I prefer to think that the reason for those websites that you are
listed on is so that a good friend of mine can play his favorite game. 
He's Jewish & he calls the game "Spot the Jew".  He gets the biggest kick
out of identifying "fellow tribesmen".  It makes him proud......he & his
folks will call each other long distance with a particularly surprising
discovery.  And he was tickled pink when he discovered that you were of
the tribe.
This whole discussion has left me thinking about Richard in "One Life,
Furnished in Early Moorcock".  I had the strongest reaction to his
wondering why he had to decide, why he couldn't just go on believing
everything.  Exactly!
 
I've often wondered , like Amanda, how you feel about discussing this
stuff.   And I, too, wondered if you were Catholic at first-the guilt
must have looked so familiar! :-)  
 
Writing this, I'm also frustrated that talking about religion is so
hard.  It seems like there is an underlying assumption in our culture
that if you ask a question, it's so you can feel superior at the answer,
rather than just wanting an answer.  Too many hard-liners out
there........and I think they've dominated the conversation for too long.
 
Sorry this is turning into "War & Peace" (or is that "American Gods" ? 
:-p)  See what happens when you folk get me thinking? 
  

    
And continues in this one:

Why do I always forget my hair comment until I've sent off the wretched
e-mail?
 
I loved it long.
 
But it's cool, now, too.
 
And yes, I regret to inform you, Mr.. Gaiman, you are the only human
being alive who can get red-eye while wearing sunglasses in a photo. 
 
Congratulations.
  

    
Jouni -- the hair's in a bag currently. I have a plan for what to do
with it, in about 6 months. We'll see if it comes off.

Translation has so much to do with the translator -- I've always felt
very lucky that my French translator, Patrick Marcel, is so good: when
I won the Julia Verlanger Award for NEVERWHERE in France I figured it
was Patrick that did it. Then again, there are a few translations where
it's pretty obvious, even to me, that somewhere in the translation
everything interesting has been removed from the text.

The pumpkin season is done.

I'm writing Death right now. American Gods -- I'll do the second draft
in November.

Mary -- I'd really not mind about the JEW WATCH type web sites, if
they were less keen on a) proving no Jews were ever gassed and b)
gassing any they can get their hands on.

I'm glad you liked the hair.

And here's a quote from chapter 17 of AMERICAN GODS:

"None of this can actually be happening: if it makes you more
comfortable, you might think of it as metaphor. Religions are, by
definition, metaphors, after all: God is a dream, a hope, a woman, an
ironist, a father, a city, a house of many rooms, a watchmaker who left
his prize chronometer in the desert, someone who loves you – even,
against all evidence, a celestial being whose only interest is to make
sure your football team, army, business, or marriage thrives, prospers
and triumphs over all opposition. 

"Religions are places to stand and look and act, places from which to
view the world. So, none of this is happening. Such things would not
occur in this day and age. Never a word of it is literally true,
although it all happened, and the next thing that happened, happened
like this:"
  

    
Wow.
  

    
Re Amanda Slack-Smith:  Ditto.

Re-- Jew stuff--

I didn't want to write too much about this subject, since Shira's
choice is so personal, and, being a practicing Jew (in a way), I'm not
extacly partisan.  But the I thought that maybe that's why I should
post. Still conflicted, but posting anyway.

Shira-- everything that Neil said is true-- esp. the part about how
"moving from one box to the other" is a Jewish tradition.  Look at some
of the people who did it--Marx, Freud, Emma Goldman, Albert
Einstein... maybe you too.. an impressive crew.  

The way I see it, any religion/culture that can crank out that crew
has to have something good going on.  Even considering that they turned
their backs on practice, they still inherited a tradition of
intellectual inquiry and social commitment and compassion.  And
imagination... and spirituality-- and humor.

If, as I just read, "Religions are places to stand and look and act,
places from which to view the world," then Judaism provides a
fascinating and varied view.

There's exciting and stimulating stuff going on in Judaism all the
time-- and especially now.  Pick up a Klezmatics cd (my fave is
"Possessed.")  Read Angels in America by Tony Kushner, or "Ellis
Island" by Mark Helprin.  Or Lilith magazine.

Like I said before, everything that Neil said is true-- but I think
it's incomplete.  Judaism isn't only something to hold onto because
it's in danger.  It's also something to move towards, to explore
because it's so rich in provocative ideas.

And it's yours... it had a hand in shaping you.  Don't be so quick to
turn away from it before you really plumb its depths.  You have the
intelligence-- and the independence of thought-- to make it your own.
  

    

Jen e-mails:

Well, this weekend in chicago is looking to be more and more interesting... 
_All_ other plans besides the reading have fallen through.  I will see no 
friends, will be too broke to do anything and will probably get horribly lost 
at least twice while in the city.  On the plus side, I've never actually been 
_in_ Chicago before, so I can look at new bookstores which of course makes up 
for everything.  Anyone here got any recommendations in the vicinity of the 
theatre?  Our hotel isn't too far from there so it's going to be my reference 
point.  

Interesting talk about religions.  I no longer consider myself even 
Christian, but I will always see myself as a Small Town Catholic.  I grew up 
in one of those little parishes where they still celebrate holy days most 
other catholics have never even heard of.  I don't think I'll ever broach 
this subject with my own parents however.  They were miffed enough that I 
became the godmother to an _Episcopalian_.  :-)  Not sure why I jumped in on 
this, probably mainly to avoid homework.

Neil - interesting Shatner impression in the interview.  :-)

Jen.
  

    
Hasn't the hair already come off?

Oh.  You mean.
  

    
Jen -- that's not my Shatner impression. That's my William Hurt
reading Hearts in Atlantis impression. But cranking it up to a 10 for
effect over the telephone it turns pretty damn Shatnerian. My Shatner
impression is pretty good, because it's the story of When We Were
Guests In Argentina Together.


Martha -- yes, I mean Not auctioning the hair on e-bay, which was
something Chris Oarr was all ready to do. But I diverted him by
offering the folder with the shooting scripts & chapter 1 in
handwriting of Neverwhere in it to auction, as a sacrificial thingie,
and he's gone off to do it.

Meanwhile, I have hair.

Len -- I didn't say that Judaism was something to hold onto because it
was in danger. 

Just that when the scary-serious anti-jewish people start putting your
name up on their websites it brings it home that, whether you like it
or not, whether or not one considers oneself jewish has as little to do
with anything than it would have done for my families in poland or
germany a little over fifty years ago. (I remember when I was a few
years younger than Shira doing my family tree as a school project, and
discovering how many branches of it truncated in Auschwitz or Belsen or
Dachau.)
  

    
On various lighter notes: Working on the Death: The High Cost of
Living script today. Also, against all odds rescued ANOTHER bat from a
sheet of window fly-paper. At least I've now got it down to a science.
Take off fly-paper; go outside with box filled with newspaper and
bottle of citrus solvent; squirt solvent onto fly paper, let grumpy
lemon-scented bat fall into box, place box on garage woodpile. 

And we are having a plague of ladybirds. Um, ladybugs. The south side
of the house was literally covered with them today, and several hundred
have somehow made it inside, and are covering the ceilings and
whirring past even as I type this.
  

    
Neil-- didn't mean to misrepresent you.  I can certainly see that
having one's name on a list like that would be scary and upsetting.  My
family knowledge pretty much starts with Brooklyn and the Lower East
Side... that family tree you did must have been horrible.
  

    
(btw-- had a big plate of lemon scented bat for dinner last night. 
Delicious.)
  

    
Mary e-mails the next chapter of her epic novel:

Um, wow. 
 
If y'all had any idea how.....scared? nervous? weirded out?.....I was
about posting that *novel* I wrote.....well, anyway, let me just say
thank you to everyone.  How refreshing to have an honest and respectful
discussion about religion!
 
Neil--you are still the only writer I have ever read who can leave me
literally breathless with the sheer beauty of his prose.
 
I cannot imagine what that school project must have been like.
 
If it increases your faith in mankind a little--my dad was in the Air
Force in WWII.  When I was about 8 or 9, he sat me down to watch a TV
program.  Now, he was super protective about what I was allowed to
watch-no horror movies, no sexual situations --not even M*A*S*H, because
of the innuendos.  But he made me, at that age, watch a show on PBS (I
think it might have been an episode of The World at War) that used a
great deal of actual footage of the camps.  Graphic footage.  And he told
me that that was the reason he had enlisted, even though he didn't know
it at the time.  That stopping that, and preventing it from ever
happening again was the most important thing he would ever do.  And he
was right. 
 
Amanda--ain't it hard to shake?
 
Len--what wine goes with lemon-scented bat?  :-) 
 
  

    
Randi Mason e-mails (although it's not exactly clear if he intends for the
whole thing to be posted or if the first paragraph is for inkwell-hosts
only):

Ack.  The only problem with not knowing who this goes to is that anything I
write will sound "to whom it may concern"-ish.
If there is a more specific way that you'd like these notes addressed,
please let me know?  Thanks.
 
Anyway, I do have a few questions for Neil.
 
Where, if anywhere, that you visited while doing research for _American
Gods_ did you wish you had more time in.  Where in America is home for you,
or feels like home for you?
 
You've mentioned in the interviews that you wanted to do a musical, or an
opera.  Does it have any shape in your head yet, or is it also a 'lazy'
thing you're working on.  What would elements of what's out there
theatrewise would you want in it - and what do you want it never to be
confused with in a million years? 
 
And are there any other interviews that are going to be done in the process
of the Guardian Angel tour beyond the one for WGN that your audience should
know about?
 
Thanks,
randi
 
Various PSes to other notes in this discussion: 
AFAIK, there are no archives connected to the SFRT, at least on the DM side
of things.
"Myths and Legends" (I think it was called "Saturn Returns" too) by Adam
Guettel is *lovely*.  And at some point I will be able to play "Hero and
Leander" from it without feeling the urge to put it on repeat.
"Shockheaded Peter" is supposed to be coming around to the States again; I
think it's in London now.   It was very neat, even if the children in the
audience seemed to understand it better than their parents. 
The company that performed "Shockheaded Peter" is now at the Jane Street
(home of the dear, departed "Hedwig") doing "Lifegame", an improvisational
play where they act out scenes from the life of a random audience member.
The night that Time Out New York did a piece about it, they were performing
scenes from the life of Alisa Kwitney.
IIRC, Roundabout is trying to do a Broadway production of Assassins, as well
as the revival of Follies, this season.
I pass by the Wintergarden theatre on my way to work now, so for the last
month or so I have been watching them rip out all the ings that were "Cats".
I'm failing to feel anything by relief.  Don't know why.
  

    
Randi- Shockheaded Peter was a trip-- thought about Neil's work the
whole time- esp. the Last Temptation.  Got the cd-- not quite as
magical, but fun in an abrasive kind of way.  

Mary-  that's an easy one:  isn't there a wine from Roumania called
"Vampire?"  (and if not, probably a nice Gewurtztraminer.)

150 pages into the Amber Spyglass... been waiting for years.  Still
not sure if worth the wait.
  

    

I saw Shockheaded Peter when it came through San Francisco and thought it
was wild. Considered mentioning it earlier as something it seemed to me Neil
might enjoy.
  

    
Mary -- a good story, in all senses. And yes.

Randi (Randi is a lady, Linda, or she was the last time I signed a
book for her) 

I would have liked more time in most of the places I visited. Where
feels like home? Apart from  my house... and the two houses I stayed in
in Florida last winter... well, some of the odder places perhaps: I've
always wanted to live in The House on the Rock.

Musical/opera is still lazy... it's waiting for that one element of
"oh, of course!" which would move it from the realm of the nice to do,
to the realm of typing.

The "oh of course!" is the best thing, when it happens it makes
everything easy. Someone asked me if I'd like to write and direct a
short film when I was in NY for the Anime thing, and last night it
occured to me what it was. So today I wrote a short film -- something
that it would be an easy delight to make. The hardest part will be
finding a week to film it in...

Musical wise I'd like to do something that feels like a Dave McKean
drawing. 

I'm doing two or three interviews a day right now, Randi. Am not
keeping track of them, to be honest. The phone rings, Lorraine says
"It's Bill from Radio WXYZ in Wherever".

I got closest to seeing the Struwelpeter show in Finland.
Unfortunately, it was there the week after me.

I wonder which Follies they'll do. The 'upbeat' UK version, or the
darker US version. (Diana Rigg couldn't sing, when I saw Follies. I
like to think she had a cold that night, but she probably didn't.)

Len, I should point out that, apart from smelling of lemons, and being
disgruntled, the bat was saved. Which makes two rescued bats in
several months. I think I now have officially good bat karma. 
  

    
By the way, they've moved the Los Angeles reading from the pacific
Design Centre, which was both full and was probably not going to get
some permits in time to the Writer's Guild Theatre.

And, just a reminder. I'm doing a reading in Chicago and New York next
week, Portland and LA the following week. Tickets available on
Ticketmaster, all profits to the CBLDF. If any of you are going to be
in the area -- or if you have friends in those locations, spread the
word. The readings are honestly NOT boring. Promise.
  

    
No, they're not.

I keep meaning to look up what airfare is to Portland.  (I don't want to go
to LA for even a Neil reading.)
  

    

Oops!  My apologies, Randi.
  

    
Neil -

Thanks for the American Gods quote; it really is beautiful. Can't wait for
the book....

The discussion of religion here is pretty cool, too.  Oh, and someone told
me that Princess Mononoke was the subject of a discussion group at First
Universalist Church the other night; they began by examining individualism
versus community-mindedness, but I
'm not sure where they went after that with it.

The image of grumpy lemon-scented bats will forever fill me with delight, I
think. And yes, it definitely sounds like you have earned good bat karma by
now.

Mr. Ford says hi. (He's under the weather, alas.) And I was singing the
chorus to his song for Guy Fawkes Day (which song is, of course, your fault
and we are all very grateful for it too), and now a visiting Canadian has it
stuck in her head, she tell me. (I only sang the chorus, though; the whole
song is only sung for Ritual Purposes.)
  

    
Oh, and apropos of Shatner impressions, there is a topic here that contains
the wonderful text:

Topic  78 [inkwell.vue]:  Hyphenation 9
#195 of 197: Ari Fertig (re-fertig)      Thu Aug 31 '00 (22:41)     1 line

 hemian rhapsody was one of the best so-

Topic  78 [inkwell.vue]:  Hyphenation 9
#196 of 197: mojo-harshing specialist (mpk)      Fri Sep  1 '00 (06:54)
1 line

 nnets written by William Sha-

Topic  78 [inkwell.vue]:  Hyphenation 9
#197 of 197: David Gans (tnf)      Fri Sep  1 '00 (09:37)     1 line

 tner.

I haven't been able to bring myself to part with that, so I've been seeing
it (as "new") every time I'm done reading the latest in this topic. And now
this synchronicity.... Do tell about Shatner, sometime, please?