It was quite a big deal. Just about all of his friends were there as well as a bunch of family. It was amazing to see all of these people in the one room. These were people I had grown up with, but whom I hadn’t seen for years upon years.
As I looked around the room, I couldn’t help thinking about all the memories that were brought back seeing all of those familiar faces, not to mention the ubiquitous slide-show of family photos that now seems to be a standard fixture at all events of this nature. Recollections of lazy summer evenings, dinners and long-gone holidays were all brought back.
But there were a few faces in particular that had special significance for me today. My mum used to teach at the school I went to so among the friends present were a bunch of teachers. And not just any kind of teachers – these were my former English teachers.
So, of course, this meant that I got to casually sidle up to them and calmly mention that, “as it happens, I’m now a published author.” I have to say that it felt kind of cool (in a daggy sort of way). As long as they don’t actually go and buy the books. That would be terrible. No doubt I’d get an email the next day with the text of the books and lots of red crosses all over it. And we just couldn’t have that.
Definitely best to mention it in passing, and then quickly move on before they can ask for more information, so I can bask in the pleasure of thinking that maybe I didn’t turn out too bad after all.
Of friends, memories, and old English teachers
There’s always next year
For those not in the know, Collingwood is the biggest and most strongly-supported football club in Australia – which means of course that they’re also the club that is most disliked by everybody else. But there’s one thing that Collingwood is better at than any other team and that is losing Grand Finals. No other club has made it such an art form. No other club has found so many creative ways to steal defeat from the jaws of victory (with the possible exception of St Kilda – but that’s a whole other blog post).
So there they were, actually managing to go against tradition and come out on top last year. Admittedly, they did try their hardest not to – they actually managed to draw the game last year after being in a winning position, but came back for the replay the next week and won (admittedly, they were playing against the aforementioned St Kilda).
And so last Saturday, they fronted up again after reaching the heights of success last year. Of course they didn’t win. Not for lack of trying, but they came up against a ruthless machine called the Geelong Football Club – one of the greatest teams ever. What they discovered was they were no longer the best, and it was going to take a lot of work to get back up there again.
Seeing my football team being brought back to earth made me think about the experience I’d just had with my book sales. As I mentioned in my post last week, I had the most amazing run of sales a couple of weeks ago and found myself high up the Amazon “ladder”. But it didn’t last too long, and things have definitely slowed down now.
And, like the mighty ‘Pies, I’m not just going to sit back and accept it. I want to climb back up the Amazon charts, and I’m going to work really hard to get there. Because the eternal cry of the Collingwood supporter might be “there’s always next year” but I don’t want to wait that long.
I’m going to finish this up by posting some highlights from the Grand Final replay last year – the one that we actually one. I hope you enjoy it. I know I will.
A brief spell in the clouds
Strange synchronicities
While I was working on basically cleaning up the text in preparation for getting it out to readers and then editors, I couldn’t help noticing some strange synchronicities between the supposedly fanciful stuff I was writing and what is currently happening to me in my all too real (at least as far as I can tell) life.
The basic theme of Magnus Opum is perception. How the various characters see each other is pretty much the main thing that drives the story. And different chapters look at different ways that characters understand (and misunderstand) each other based on their perceptions and then act accordingly.
What really struck me as I was going through the text was how much these ideas resonate in real life. We really are driven by our perceptions. And quite often we make all sorts of assumptions and react in fairly illogical ways based on them. Reading a chapter in which two characters have a completely different understanding of what seem like a fairly simple set of instructions, I couldn’t help thinking about some recent situations where I’d been given a set of instructions, I’d thought I was following them, then discovered not only that I wasn’t but that the person who’d instructed me thought that I was quite deliberately choosing to get them wrong. This person had a fixed perception of me and couldn’t see past the assumptions they’d made based on that perception. And this perception was so strong that I was not in any way able to convince the person otherwise (unlike the characters in my book who actually do sort it out – I really love a happy ending).
It’s funny because Magnus Opum was never intended as something quite so serious and deep. It’s really a fun story, a bit of a romp if I can paraphrase a review from one of my previous releases. But I feel like I’ve hit on something quite rich and I’m confident that it gives the story quite a bit of strength.
I’m really looking forward to getting it out.
It’s time to play the music. It’s time to light the lights
In my opinion, the Muppet Show is one of the greatest artistic achievements of the 20th Century. It’s clever. It’s wonderfully funny. And it has heart. A few months ago, I posted on the idea of how something could be “joyously dumb” and yet smart as well. Well I reckon that could sum up the Muppet Show. The jokes are often dreadfully corny, and yet there’s something amazingly clever about the way the whole thing is constructed that works so well.
As a writer, I can see how the show brings together so many elements with such great success. The basic concept is great – a bunch of puppets putting on a vaudeville-style show to a bunch of other puppets in the audience – with all the backstage drama that entails. The writing itself is sharp – the pacing is snappy and the jokes fly. But the most amazing thing about it, the main element that makes it work so wonderfully, is the amazing range of characters.
Most live-action shows would kill for a group of characters as strong, as clearly-defined, as engaging and as entertaining as those on the Muppet Show. Just think of a few of them: Kermit, Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear, Animal, the Swedish Chef, Beaker… The list just goes on and on. Each one clearly recognisable. Each one playing their part. It must have been a writer’s dream to create dialogue and situations for them
And once all of those elements are put together, something undefinably great was created. Maybe not directly satirical but incredibly subversive in the best possible way.
I watch old episodes with a real sense of wonder. And my lasting hope is that the writing I produce can have the same effect, even though I’m working in a different medium. If I could produce something half as entertaining, half as funny, half as clever, half as subversive, and with half the heart of a typical Muppet Show episode, I’d be happy.
I just want to finish off by sharing a clip which seems to me to sum up the spirit of the show. It’s a Muppet tribute to Ingmar Bergman – a piece of high art in the greatest “joyously dumb” tradition. And just look at the expression on Sam the Eagle’s face as things start to go haywire. Most live actors would struggle for that level of expressiveness.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mqv_qYBgEk0
I hear that there’s shortly to be a revival of the Muppet Show. I really hope they can do justice to the original.
