Tag: Neil Gaiman

A Crush On Fandom

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Dear Fandom,

I didn’t know you existed. Not really.

I’ve caught glimpses of you my entire life. You looked different each time, but still familiar. You were kindred.

I first recognized you on the playground. Swinging, I pretended to fly on fairy wings and saw you use the slide as a rocket launcher. In kindergarten, you came dressed as an alien dragon with tinfoil tail and pasta strainer on your head. You were humming the Star Wars theme. I would see you in third grade homeroom, doodling superhero self-portraits, and I always secretly wished you would draw me beside you, in a purple cape and silver boots.

When I was ten and saved up pocket change to run down the block to the used bookstore, you were there across the piles of Le Guin and Brooks. You’d usually make room for me on the floor of the neighborhood library as we sat side-by-side without touching, looking through the newest McCaffery and Heinlein, Pratchett and Cherryh. On rare occasions, we made eye contact, but usually our gazes stayed on the pages, too shy to smile.

In junior high, when the kids were cruel, I knew you must be out there, but I didn’t see you. I began to write because I had no one else to talk to.

In high school, I drifted away a little, pre-occupied with honors classes and yearbook duties, but I thought we exchanged a knowing glance as the class discussed Bradbury and Yeats. I definitely heard your voice carried on the Aquanet air talking about V and The Next Generation. I strained to hear you over the Talking Heads. I wish I had looked for you then.

College introduced me to “magic realism,” I didn’t recognize you as we chatted over chai about Morrison and Allende, but you reminded me how much I loved to be surprised and enchanted in otherworldly ways.

It was love at first sight when you showed me your Tolkien and handed me my first Sandman. Afterwards you introduced me to Stars Our Destination on Clarke, and arms aching with books, my world broke open. My heart broke open, and I remembered the magic of those stories and the joy I felt in writing. I decided not to become a lawyer, but a writer.

In graduate school, I tried to learn craft and looked for you in discussions about Joyce. I found you cradling Faulkner, and I respected you when you talked about the mythology of Marquez, the allegory of Rushdie, and the re-visioning of Angela Carter.

I never knew I’d find you at a drumming circle or in the Goth bar, but there you were, and we discussed Gaiman and Straub, Wolfe and George R.R. Martin. We waxed philosophical about Babylon 5 and Deep Space 9, X-Men and Star Trek Nemesis. We became friends. We cheered while watching BSG. We discussed Stevenson, Sedia, and Scalzi. We rallied around the return of The Doctor. We waited patiently (mostly) for A Dance With Dragons. We remembered Clarke, McCaffrey, Bradbury, Sendak, and too many others who’ve died. We became family.

My first book was published, and you read it. I could not believe it became an Amazon bestseller in Winter 2011, and I knew you were among the readers because I recognized your reviews; you praised the mythology, dreams, and “fantastic” elements. You liked the magic I put into it.  It reached the Top 10.

When I worked with the Chicago Literary Hall of Fame to create the Fuller Awards, I knew it had to be Gene Wolfe who was honored first. I invited beloved writers and editors who also adored Gene’s writing, and they came. You came. I had never seen so many of you in one place.

Then there was Chicon 7.

It was my first Worldcon ever and my first real Con. I had been to Academic conferences and literary expos, but they are a different animal altogether because you are not always there, not so many of you in one place.

So many of us in one place.

I came to Chicon 7 to sell and sign my book and debut the first chapter of our graphic novel. I stood behind the table in the Dealers Room for five days and watched as people passed by.  You were there: alien dragon and rocketman, Superwoman and Sandman, Vulcan and Hobbit. You held hands, or walked quietly alone. Sometimes you stopped to talk, other times you nodded and kept walking. You wore Whovian scarves and steampunk goggles, and we nodded with recognition. You signed books and prints. You discussed the naming of characters and the qualities of villainesses. You paraded in costumes and received awards with grace and joy. You made me proud to be a part of it all.

2012 Hugo award winners at Chicon7. Photo by David Dyer-Bennet

I never knew it could be like that—so many creators and lovers of science fiction and fantasy in one place. I never knew you had been doing this for 70 years.

Learning to Be Dangerous Panel. Photo by Jonathan Crowe.

After one panel, when you discussed how some writers try to dodge the “ghetto” of Science Fiction and Fantasy, I wanted to rush home and finish my next novel because I want in. I’m not trying to dodge anything. Quite the opposite, I wish to be a part of that continuum, those brilliant imaginative storytellers and the people who adore what is created.

The beauty of what I saw, the magic of fandom, is that fans don’t just close a book and put it on the shelf. Fans engage with the text. Whether it’s a comic, novel, or film, they continue the conversation. This allows the stories to have a special type of longevity, and it creates a community that cares enough about those ideas, characters, places, and philosophies to want to create panels, plays, costumes, zines, awards, and more.

Photo by David Dyer-Bennet.

The beauty is in that co-creation and conversation. What author, what artist, would not wish to be a part of that?

I do.

I love so many of the stories and the authors who createed them. In recent years, some of them have become friends, and their friendship is a treasure, but this week I have a crush on fandom. Or would that be a Con-crush? I don’t know the lingo, the Con history and traditions. When I wasn’t behind the Wolfsword Press table, I felt a bit lost. It seemed that everyone else knew where to go and what to expect, but I’ll learn because even though Chicon 7 was exhausting and exhilarating, what I experienced broke me open again in the best possible way.

A new friend from this Worldcon weekend is writer and editor Stephen H. Segal, who gave me a copy of his book Geek Wisdom: The Sacred Teachings of Nerd Culture on the last day of the Con. It was the perfect gift to end the weekend, and I’d like to quote from his introduction:

“Hence Geek Wisdom: the first compendium of sacred teachings from the wide-ranging “holy scriptures” of geekdom, that weird mass of pop culture and high art ranging from blockbuster movies to esoteric novels to cult classic T-shirt slogans. Star Wars. The Princess Bride. Albert Einstein. Stan Lee. From such sources we’ve gathered (and moved thoughtful upon) the deepest, purest, most profound ideas and sayings to be found. The ones that cut right to the heart of life in the twenty-first century. The ones we quote as if they’ve come from the Bible, or from Shakespeare. The ones that, increasingly, have emerged from the underground to form the cellular structure of a true culture cannon.

Our culture canon. And thus does the geek inherit the earth.”

Geek Wisdom. It definitely defines a large part of my life. Segal’s book highlights some of the best building blocks of that culture. That foundation is part of the reason more than 5,000 people gathered in Chicago for Chicon 7. It’s who we are and what we did this past weekend—build upon what has come before and stretch beyond comfortable boundaries to create anew.

After coming home and crashing, after laundry and unpacking, I am going to write tonight. I have so many stories. I can’t wait to share them with you, and I want to see what you come up with as well. I want to talk with you, because we have a common nerd culture, we have a history, and I look forward to our future.

Until we meet again.

Love,

Valya

Spending time with friends at Chicon (with Madeline Matz and Gene Wolfe). Photo by Teri Goulding

The Things We Hold On To

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I have been fortunate to meet and get to know quite a few writers who have had a profound influence on me and my work. I’m grateful for each and every exchange. (I once received a phone call from poet Louise Glück that left me shaken in the parking lot of the grocery story because I was so taken by surprise to hear her voice.)

I believe in telling the people in my life whom I love and admire how much they mean to me, and I also believe in telling the writers and artists I admire how much their work means to me. Kyle Cassidy has written repeatedly about this in his blog, and I agree with him.

When I am on the receiving end of an email or tweet about my work, I am so appreciative and touched. So much of the time we write alone. To hear from the “audience” is a rare gift.

Photograph: Sophie Bassouls/Sygma/Corbis

I sent Ray Bradbury a fan letter back in 2010. I wanted to thank him for his stories, for the joy and inspiration, for the thrills and magic.  After talking with a friend and fellow-Bradbury fan, I included a copy of my much-loved and tattered copy of Dandelion Wine. I was reluctant to part with it, but excited at the possibility that he might sign it.

The problem was that I forgot to include my self-addressed stamped envelope. I didn’t realize this until I returned from the post office and saw it sitting on my table. I quickly drafted another letter and stuffed the envelope inside.

He never returned my copy. I suppose it was tossed aside due to its lack of SASE. However, a few weeks later, I did receive this:

Although sad to be missing my beloved Dandelion Wine, I was pleased to know that he had read my letter. I hadn’t read his story, “Juggernaut” at the time, and sought it out immediately. (You can read it here.)

I was a little upset when I saw the envelope, however. I thought that my youngest daughter (three-years-old at the time) had scribbled all over it. I nearly threw it in the trash. I’m not sure why I kept it.

I put it aside in the “to be framed someday” pile. I still haven’t gotten around to that large pile, and after Ray died, I went back to it. I looked more closely at the paper, which must have come from his printer. I liked the thought that it came from his working space, from the place where he created his amazing stories.

Reading another essay about Ray at the time, someone mentioned the doodles he often drew to accompany his signature. Curious, I googled and found a few examples. Like this one:

and

and this one:

That’s when I realized it had not been my daughter’s scribble, but Ray’s!

Many who knew Ray Bradbury have written beautiful, heartfelt tributes:

By his biographer and friend, Sam Weller.

By his friend Neil Gaiman.

Mark Evanier, recounting his meeting with Ray as a teen.

My grandmother is dying, and because I cannot yet bring myself to write about her, I’m writing about Ray.

I like that I have this envelope and printer sheet of Ray’s, a small link to him and his work. I need to purchase that paperback of Dandelion Wine again. I’d like to reread it, but I want the same edition. I’ve grown attached to the cover.

When someone dies, we often want to keep the connection somehow, to remain tethered in some way. We do it with photographs, letter, articles of clothes. We do it with books and art, with songs and videos. We use the tools they used: a wooden spoon, a pen, a guitar pick, a thimble. We put on their perfume or drink their favorite beer. We try to remember. It’s hard to let go.

I guess I’m not just writing about Ray.

Creative Vulnerability

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I have a lot of questions.

As a child, I was one of those dreamy-eyes kids who tirelessly asked questions, then devoured books looking for answers. I loved college and grad school because they offered some answers and raised new questions, and they also provided me with a context and community to discuss and argue and dream.

Questions inspire me to write.

With The Silence of Trees, I wondered about the nature of evil. I wanted to know what made people react so differently to a horrible experience like war. There were other things too: questions about identity, roots, sacrifice, love.

There’s a word in Ukrainian, one of my favorite words: rozdoomlyna. It translates roughly to “lost in thought,” but it always feels heavier and more substantial than that, as if the thoughts themselves are concrete and engulfing like fog.

For the past week, I’ve been rozdoomlyna–mulling something over, rolling it around: the idea of creative vulnerability.

The words came out of a conversation last week at the Everleigh Club. This year I was asked to be one of the Artists in Residence at the Club. I had been one of the finalists for their Naked Girls Reading Literary Prize, and when Everleigh Club founders Franky Vivid and Michelle L’amour invited me to participate in the program, I was flattered and intrigued. We had our second meeting last week, and Franky gave a talk about the vulnerability of the artist. Ever since that lively discussion, two questions have been on my mind: What is creative vulnerability? Am I vulnerable as an artist?

My initial thought on the subject was that an artist who is vulnerable somehow gives his or her audience permission to connect. But how?

I think it’s easier to assess the vulnerability of artists who participate in the delivery of their work: the singer, actor, dancer, musician. They are present in their art, but what about the painter, whose subjects may or may not reflect a part of him or herself. What of the photographer, whose photographs may capture someone else’s vulnerability? Does that also translate into his vulnerability as an artist? What about the vulnerability of the writer?

If writing nonfiction, particularly in the first person point of view, it may be more obvious. But what about Shakespeare? Rilke? Whitman? Tolkein? How do we assess their vulnerability?

The poet seems to project an assumed vulnerability. So too the self-portrait of the painter. Is it only in the self-portrait that we can assess true creative vulnerability?

Neil Gaiman recently released a photograph taken of him with his wife, Amanda Palmer, naked in bed. (You can see the photo here.)

The photo was part of a series by Kyle Cassidy created to accompany Amanda’s song, “The Bed Song” that will only be available via her kickstarter project.

The song and the photograph seem to be wrapped up in this idea of creative vulnerability, as is Neil’s blog entry about the experience, but I wonder which one of the three is the best example?

I realize that I haven’t really come up with a definition of creative vulnerability, and I come back to questions.

Questions seem to be an important part of vulnerability.

We live in a society that does not value vulnerability. It’s often misunderstood as weakness. In school, kids were afraid to ask questions because they thought it made them look foolish somehow.  As an instructor, I knew the opposite was true. However, questions do reveal something about the person who is doing the asking. They reveal an admission to not knowing something. They reveal openness, vulnerability.

Questions are also an invitation to an exchange: of ideas, knowledge, perception, etc.

Questions reflect/suggest intimacy. You don’t usually ask questions if you don’t care about something (Apathy is the opposite of being engaged).

So I suppose that creative vulnerability is Art that invites us to connect with the piece and the artist.

An artist who is vulnerable makes us question: ourselves, our world, our fears, our relationships, our politics, our inhibitions, our assumptions. As artists , we can be creatively vulnerable by asking those questions of ourselves, attempting to answer them in our art in a way that provokes our audience to do the same.

So can I do it? Can I be more vulnerable in my work?

Can you?