MISTAKING WRITERS FOR OTHER WRITERS: A REPORT FROM A FUGITIVE.

Really, truly, when I think of that bit about mistaking writers for other writers, if I think of the topic at all, I realise I’ve misplaced a story. I believe, with the rabid fury of a thousand frothing suns, that one writer wrote a tale penned by another scribbler. Simple as that.
   Then something awkward happens: a loose detail floats over the horizon, staining the otherwise unsullied sky. Now the sky is sullied by the fury of a thousand waxing moons. Wait a bit. This book was written a few years after the author’s death. How can this be?!
   It could be that the storyteller’s last manuscript sat forgotten by daylight, beneath a massive pile of socks in a holiday home untouched by time. Only now are we dimly hearing of this belated publication.
   Or maybe there was a bitter family dispute over the eventual release of the last great work/collection of notes for a story/a fragment little better than a receipt for dry-cleaning.
   Maybe, though, just maybe, I’ve mismatched the author to the wrong bit of scribble. And now I am on a (hopefully) short trail to find who wrote what, when, and possibly where. Complicated as that.
   Generally, I don’t think of the mystery writer Josephine Tey being mistaken for the children’s author Eleanor Farjeon. It’s never on my bingo card in any year, and won’t show up behind door number one on the advent calendar of strangeness. Or any other door.
   Except…
   I was staring into the middle distance of the internet, and squinting at a so-called picture of Eleanor Farjeon. My response was surprising.
   That’s Josephine Tey.
   Firstly, I was astonished that I knew this. Somewhere along the line, the strands of the interwebs were muddled in the weaving of it. And, from some polluted stream, from one slightly awkward source, I suppose a miniature industry of mistaken identity poured forth.
   Eleanor Farjeon wrote Morning has Broken. This religious ditty went to church in a shotgun wedding with an old Scottish tune by the name of Bunessan. You may know it as a pop hit by the singer/songwriter Yusuf. (Additional noodling provided by Rick Wakeman.)
   What else to say of children’s author Eleanor? She won a few literary awards in her day, and had one named after her. And she’s not the mystery author Josephine Tey. Did these two women write in the same area? No. Not even remotely.
   Misattribution. Who wrote this one? Maybe Ray Bradbury wrote that story. Or I thought he did. And it was someone else. Or I believed someone else wrote Ray Bradbury’s story. But, then, watching the end of DARK STAR by John Carpenter, I fucking KNEW I’d read that bit of the story before. And it was absotively posolutely by Ray Bradbury.
   Turned out to be the case. Well. Damn.
   So, yes, there’s plenty of scope for confusion. William Shakespeare’s War of the Worlds, or Much Ado About Martians, for example. Could’ve sworn he wrote that. He didn’t pen a word. Christopher Marlowe was the author.
   Marlowe famously faked his own death, polished all of Shakespeare’s plays, entered into a Faustian pact with the devil, became immortal, and passed his own stories off as those of H.G. Wells.
   Legit. As legit as an award for Legitness provided by the International Committee of Legititude™, based in Luxembourg. That is a lie. The organisation flies a Panamanian flag when operating at sea. A fiction was told there, surely.
   No worse than supposing that Lord Byron was in fact a vampire. Tom Holland appears to be the source of that story. Spider-Man wrote about Lord Byron the vampire? Fuck it. Yes, yes, he did. No, no, he didn’t. It’s an easy mistake to make. Is the writer Tom Holland not the same person as the actor Tom Holland? Oh. Okay then.
   Was Christopher Lee, the historian, also in fact a vampire?
   There is no real or unreal evidence of this. My source is that I made it up. Anyway, I invented my source. Even that bit is fabricated.
   Also, concerning Lord Byron, there is no proof that he was a werewolf, a herewolf, a therewolf, a mummified corpse, or a creature from the black/blue/dried-up lagoon. Was he the Invisible Man? I just don’t see it.
   That’s The Invisible Man written by Christopher Marlowe, naturally.
   I myself am often mistaken for the Venezuelan rocket scientist of the same name. It’s a light burden. Any questions that come my way concerning rocket science and the laws of physics are quickly farmed out to my scientific advisor: Doctor Google.
   Doctor Google himself made a Faustian pact with the devil to acquire that sort of knowledge. There is no direct record of Doctor Faustus making a similar Googley pact to gain control of the interwebs.
   Unless you count that play, The Tragical Search History of Doctor Faustus. There’s some evidence that the work was scribbled on the back of a hard drive by one Will Shaxberde, believed to be a French literary critic down on his luck, in need of funds, and lacking wine. Except that he wasn’t officially French. Just for reasons of beef tax.
   Often, facts are at our fingertips just as those facts slip from our grasp and bounce down the stairs into a million fragments. Honestly, though, it might as well be a hundred fragments for all the difference it makes to us.
   I was once told that I knew that song by the guy who was singing about the thing…
   An attempt to get me to provide the name of the singer, the song, and the subject matter. I DEFINITELY KNEW THE SONG. Gradually, based on the sliver of a crumb of an atom of a detail, I worked out the name of the song. And it was coincidence that I knew it.
   YOU DEFINITELY KNOW IT. THE ONE ABOUT THE THING THAT THE GUY SINGS AND THERE ARE WORDS WITH MUSIC AND STUFF. IT’S REALLY CATCHY. YOU KNOW. THAT ONE.
   You know it. It was that one-hit wonder. It keeps popping up on the radio. And on the radio’s successor. Internet radio. But you definitely know it. That song, about the thing. By the guy. Who sings about that thing, very specifically without any detail handed over to tell you what the fuck anyone is talking about whenever they raise a topic in so vague a manner.
   I typed that while listening to the song. It was featured on the interwebs. All I had to do was type the guy’s name and there he was. You definitely know, anyway.
   All I had to do, when staring at a so-called picture of Eleanor Farjeon, was to type the name of another author. And the same photo popped up. A picture of Josephine Tey. OR IS IT?! Maybe the photo of Josephine Tey is really the picture of Eleanor Farjeon, has been all along, and the whole thing was messed up since BEFORE the beginning.
   Despite the actors Anthony Quayle and Anthony Quinn looking nothing like one another, they are often mistaken for each other. That must be very confusing when they appear in the same movie together.
   I was about to include a photo showing both of them together in a movie. But they are both on the right in the picture I selected, and the temptation to type Anthony is pictured on the right is really too much. I must let the weak joke die where it stands.
   Checking stuff is difficult. You face the Dictionary Problem. What is that? To know what you are looking for in a dictionary, first you must know what you are looking for. And if you know already, then maybe you don’t need to look it up.
   When I saw the picture of “Eleanor Farjeon” I just knew she was Josephine Tey. So I went looking for Josephine Tey. And there she was, in several images, looking like herself in all of them.
   It’s a conspiracy. She replaced herself. Like, y’know, that big unsinkable ship. The one that hit the iceberg. Or did it?
   RMS Titanic was replaced in a last-ditch effort to pull the world’s supply of wool over everyone’s eyes in order to…
   (Checks notes in ever-rising levels of disbelief.)
   …swindle an insurance company.
   According to Robin Gardiner, the sister ship Olympic went to the bottom of the ocean instead and the real Titanic was in service until scrapped. The most remarkable thing about Gardiner’s career is the legit profile of the White Star Line he somehow managed to write. That appears, at least, to have been written by someone who was rational.
   Doesn’t explain The Great Titanic Rock ’n’ Roll Insurance Swindle vibe that emerges from his other writings. You see, if you measure the width of the sprocket found on the ocean floor, and you compare that against the detailed blueprints stored in the secret filing cabinet, you’ll realise it’s all a load of nonsense.
   Never Mind the Bollocks. Here’s the Fruit Pastilles.

BLOGGING ABOUT ANYTHING: A REPORT FROM A FUGITIVE.

Well, maybe not about quantum physics and the effect of that topic on a cup of coffee.
   Broadly, though, yes, I'll blog about anything. Just take a gander at all those blog post labels, in that handy sidebar widget.
   Lafcadio Hearn shares blog time with Langston Hughes, Mary Shelley, Levi Strauss, and The War of the Worlds.
   Handy, if your Frankensteinian creation wears jeans during a Martian invasion that goes down during the Harlem Renaissance - all couched in terms of a bleak Japanese ghost story.

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That's what I'd call a monster monster mash-up.

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Last week I blogged about my one area of expertise - not being an expert in anything. Yes, I am somewhat inexpert in the area of being an expert at not being an expert. Maybe that qualifies me, or negates the whole thing. Possibly all three at the same time. I'd have said both, but I preferred to make an inexpert statement.
   Quantum physics, in action. No more talk of physics. That's all I'll say on the anti-matter.

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Anyway, for those who came in late...

   Last blog post, I railed against being called an expert. It's not a term I'm keen on applying to writing. There's always more to learn. Now, I'll turn my baleful attention on the blog itself.

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Should a writing blog be about the writing? If you want to drop character profiles on your audience, yes.
   Maybe you'd rather write about writing. How you do what you do. Where you do it. When. With a list of music going, in the background.
   In writing blog posts, some of us are forced to dredge up our knowledge of formatting, which isn't exactly writing - it pops a head around the corner every now and then.
   The question comes up. What is a writing blog really meant to be about? Whatever the hell you want it to be. I've posted fiction here. Formatting tips. A bit of legalese, now and again.
   I've mentioned dead writers. Live ones. Foodstuffs. Scientific lack-of-progress. Hell, I've blogged about stuff that's so obscure I'm half-sure it appeared only in dreams. Just not in mine.
   Last week's effort was the 250th blog post published here. I resisted the craving to go all anniversary-ish on people. Those review-of-the-year magazines never interested me. Tell me what the fuck you wanted to write about in December, damn it. Don't cover January-to-November all over again.

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For a time, I blogged well in advance. And I recommend you try blogging in advance. Set those puppies up on a conveyor-belt and automate the shit out of the delivery.
   No more. For me, no. I'm looking for spontaneity again. If that means blogging about whatever-the-hell, then I'll blog it. Though...

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I know what this blog is not. It's not about interviews with my characters, or character profiles, or recipes based on the worlds I created. I just don't feel like doing that stuff.

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Maybe I'll blog about coffee. Not right now, for I must away and brew some.

   

ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE.

We’ll get to the zombies shortly. First, the tale of a photography session. I took my digital camera to a hospital and snapped pictures of buildings being demolished. Just to create atmospheric snaps I could use for story ideas. Maybe I’d sew a narrative from random photos of boarded-up structures.

   Taking pictures in hospital grounds, I neared the very end of my digital shooting session. That’s always the way of it if someone comes along to tell you that you can’t take photos. I’m at the end of the business, my overt raid is finished, and the damage is done.

   Strangers hailed me. I was collared by a couple who thought that I was a menace to society. Perhaps the man brought the woman along so that I wouldn’t beat him up. They worked in a part of the complex that was still inhabited.

   Cue my death at the hands of mad scientists. Er, no.

   Risk-assessment people. They asked me what I was doing there. Assessing my risk to them and their special project. We ran through various comedic stages of non-identifying tomfoolery. I am not obliged, by law, to carry identity papers of any kind. Given who I am, I feel it is wise to.

   Except. For the first time in over a decade, I wasn’t carrying a scrap of identification. Panic set in. I didn’t lie about who I was. Reaching for my passport, I felt like a prize plum. Not there. Nothing was there. I had a whole load of zero evidence to show who I was. Was I on a covert mission so covert even I hadn’t been fully-briefed?!

   WTF, RLL. Left the brain behind, too.

   Had I arrived by car? The interrogation was no subtler than that. (Why, so you can eyeball the CCTV footage and cross-ref with a number plate to see if I am who I just claimed to be? If I’d wanted to lie to you, I’d have been John Brown.)

   No, I came in on foot. (Verifiable by CCTV. With no car to tie me to an identity, I’d have been John Smith had I wanted to lie to you.)

   What was the purpose of my visit? The truth behind my need to take pictures of buildings. I had no reason to lie. Could have fibbed. I am a writer, and making stuff up is part of my job. But why annoy these people, who are deeply concerned…

   By that stage we’d already gone through the WHO ARE YOU? phase. I had to retort by asking who they were, as I could see no identification. The old nametag was quickly fished out by the official. Playing it rather sharp, I thought.

   A lie I could have uttered…

   “Well, here I am with my new digital camera. Which I am just testing.”

   Eyelids wouldn’t have been batted, at that. Instead, I told the truth. The advantage of telling the truth is that it is damned difficult to dislodge. As a boulder, it’s a world-class rock upon which to build the foundation of any conversation.

   Maybe I should have come clean and admitted to my international superspy status. Or concocted some flummery relating to the study of rare birds. Instead of manufacturing falsehoods, I stuck to the straight and narrow path.

   “I’m writing a comic book about zombies.”

   The look on the woman’s face was priceless. Of all the answers I could have given, that one wasn’t on her list. My answer wasn’t even in the same universe as her question. Still, I’m a polite sort of anarchist. I always take these people seriously and avoid causing undue hassle if I can get away with it.

   My answer was straight-faced. I was taking snaps for use as reference photos. The artist would then populate dilapidated buildings with the ranks of the living dead. That woman’s expression! As though she’d been hit in the face with a wet fish from out of nowhere. I didn’t even have pockets big enough for a small wet fish, never mind the jumbo-sized tuna that materialised between us.

   Some people are quite cagey. A heightened state of alert, concerning strangers who pop up out of nowhere to take photos of things, leads to this sort of encounter. If challenged, be polite. Answer truthfully. Even if dealing with matters of the living dead.

   True story. If you give a bizarre answer that involves revealing you are a writer, the world finds room to accept you. It was funny, the look on her face. All I had to do was say…I’m testing the camera. I preferred the truth. It cost me, a little. For I had my cover blown. They’d discovered I was a scribbler. That discovery carries attendant perils.

   Anyway. Sooner or later I knew I’d get around to a story about the Zombie Apocalypse. This persistent idea of collapse. Everything goes. The onslaught is blood-flecked and fly-bloated. Civilisation is raised up, dashed, bile-spattered, dragged to the raging inferno, and bleached beyond recognition. The last scrap of hope floats along by an abandoned railway, as one particle in a snowstorm of iron ash.

   Where did the idea spring from? Possibly from The War of the Worlds. H.G. Wells gave us a story of cycling, alien invasion, and relentless misery. The relentless misery may be linked to the cycling, in that tale.

   Strip out the aliens and replace them with our dead selves, and the story is no less grim. The dead rise, and desire only to convert the living to the ever-swelling ranks. One army serves as food for the other. Heroes, villains, and anti-heroes battle across the landscape, looking for shelter against the raging necro-storm.

   It is all too easy to paint your own version of events atop the apocalyptic tale. Oh, this one’s about Communism. A metaphor standing in for disease. Consumerist society, reduced to the level of a shopping mall addict. It’s all about us. Versus any particular them we care to write about. A specific war. War in general. Sometimes, the story featuring a Zombie Apocalypse is even about zombies.

   Could I pen a tale featuring the undead horde? Would I wish to? Another zombie story? I haven’t actually penned an entire tale in a long time. Oh, I scribble notes. Hell, I’ll still scribble notes in pencil if a pencil is nearer than a pen.

   But I haven’t penned, or typewriterised, in aeons. Instead, I keyboardify. I set up notes for my zombie…story. Not a novel. Just a story. That was important to me. It could have been anything – featuring zombies. This was just another zombie story.

   Had I delved into radio, the story would have been just another zombie radio show. I considered writing a script in that vein. Tough medium, radio. One I like. Cheating? Short-cut? Ditching the visual. Ah, but you get to play with the sound of silence.

   The plan was not radio-based, however. I resolved to concoct a tale that was almost entirely visual. This apocalyptic zombie fable would be just another zombie comic. You still get to play with silence, in the world of comics. Though the reader, looking at picture frames minus speech, will rattle through your craftily-manufactured saga far more quickly than you’d care to hear.

   Story description in the service of the artist. That’s what a comic book script is. All that writing, going through the mincer, being converted into pictures. Rendering descriptive passages seen and unseen at a glance. The author surrenders the authorial voice of descriptive text to the concept of cool art, becoming even more invisible as an author.

   On the topic of cover I can’t speak for other writers, nor would I wish to. This scribbler cleaves to the notion that it’s uncool to blow a writer’s cover. Never invite an author to a dinner-party and expect that author to be the life and soul. The author prefers to sit at the table and absorb everything instead.

   Preparation. Décor. Guests. Language, body- and otherwise. Anecdotes. Accents. The wallpaper. Possibly the meal. No, the author isn’t there to entertain. Or to explain where ideas come from. Talking shop at dinner is unseemly. (Unless it’s an all-author event, in which case…say on.)

   In tricky situations it is best to deflect, demur, obfuscate, calumnify, occlude, and change the effing subject. If they know that you are there to absorb the particles in their veins, you won’t be able to. It’s like eating food that’s watching.

   I’m a carnivorous vegetarian – meaning, I eat meat that’s a far cry from its living state. Just don’t tell me where it came from or how it was transformed into dinner. If you spill, I’ll have to eat nothing but grass. Don’t tell me how that made it to table either.

   Yes, I’m skirting around the topic of the zombie. How cannibalistic does the zombie have to be? What are the rules? Speed appears to be a factor. Slow zombies are easy to avoid – in good light, on level terrain. You could take out a whole field full of the poor bastards. With enough ammo.

   Ammo matters. Remember, folks. Short, controlled, bursts only if you really must. Stick with single shot. Rely on peripheral vision. Just in case there are any sneaky fudgers down in the long grass off to the side of the main action.

   Fast zombies…are we really going to have the discussion concerning ankle-strength in revivified corpses? It’s a losing game, that chat. We get into difficulty over zombie mobility in the first place. Nature of death, and undeath. Uncoagulated blood. Decomposition and the utility of ball-and-socket joints. Perception.

   Slow zombies versus fast ones. Cannibalistic zombies versus angry zombies who just flail at you. Smart zombies. With guns. Zombie heroes. Disease-based corpses. Occult-driven undead. Crowds of the bloody, or bloodless, things.

   I felt like fading into the background, and letting pictures tell my story. Be the author at that dinner-party as a guest, announced only as a guest or friend of a friend. Not revealed as an author. Let the pictures do the talking. It wasn’t to be.

   So I became the narrator, in text. Throwing images at the audience. Wondering what sort of choices I’d make in stitching body-parts into a tale. Fast zombies or slow? Slow. Heavy on the numbers? Not exactly. I plumped for the idea that zombies are EVERYWHERE – but, to the characters in my tale, everything is rendered at a more personal level. You can only run from a crowd of slavering ghouls so many times before that’s all there is to the plot.

   Gunplay and lots of it? No. It’ll be the old kitchen drawer to the head ploy, in my Zombie Apocalypse. And though I’d like to see humour appear throughout, I won’t plan on playing the whole thing for laughs.

   My influences, regarding this undead epic, are literary over cinematic. Will that make a difference to the casual reader? No. You should know by now that SOURCES OF INSPIRATION ARE MEANINGLESS™.

   Is my zombie tale an old story, resurrected from the vaults? Reanimated, and sent shuffling into the daylight? Well, I don’t deny that the work represents unfinished business. But it isn’t unfinished business predating my audience. It’s, gasp, relatively new.

   So do I write the zombie-fest or not? With slow zombies. The only fast zombies in my world are the ones who go skydiving.

NEXT BLOG: INTRODUCING THE UNBLOGGABLE.