Vivacious Vivian
I’ve been carrying Vivian around a lot lately. Today she went to a coffee shop. She had a croissant, a bowl of fruit and a cup of coffee of which she only drank one third. Vivian went to a coffee shop because I like coffee shops. I wrote about Vivian today while sitting in a coffee shop. I never drink more than a third of my cup of coffee.
Who denounces the autobiographical way of narrative? What writer can claim that his plot and characters are independent of the writer’s lived experiences? My concern, however, is that my characters can’t seem to get away from being pale and frail and ailing in coffee shops. And ultimately they resolve their problems by throwing things, whether it be a cup of water at somebody or a rock at a window. This kind of unrefined behaviour is seemingly incoherent with their café-dwelling poetic-monologuing attributes.
In the minutes leading up to my writing here, mild panic gripped my chest. I read somewhere that John Updike admits to being overwhelmed by a ‘religious fear’ every time he approaches his writing desk. John Cheever ties himself to a chair in the basement in order to stay productive. I will not go that far, but I do ask a question: Does it make sense that I love writing so much that I fear it? Will this fear ever go away? I fear fear, for fear takes me close to depression, and I felt it, just now, for a split second in which I was compressed by floating cubes of air.
O Vivian, have I many places to take you. Why must I name you Vivian? Life! You are to live vivaciously. You are to be characterized by vivid verbs. I will put you through hell but you will triumph ultimately, hopefully, without throwing things. But I must say I like the way you hold that stone in your hand, screeching unspoken words from the depth of your watery eyes.
Who denounces the autobiographical way of narrative? What writer can claim that his plot and characters are independent of the writer’s lived experiences? My concern, however, is that my characters can’t seem to get away from being pale and frail and ailing in coffee shops. And ultimately they resolve their problems by throwing things, whether it be a cup of water at somebody or a rock at a window. This kind of unrefined behaviour is seemingly incoherent with their café-dwelling poetic-monologuing attributes.
In the minutes leading up to my writing here, mild panic gripped my chest. I read somewhere that John Updike admits to being overwhelmed by a ‘religious fear’ every time he approaches his writing desk. John Cheever ties himself to a chair in the basement in order to stay productive. I will not go that far, but I do ask a question: Does it make sense that I love writing so much that I fear it? Will this fear ever go away? I fear fear, for fear takes me close to depression, and I felt it, just now, for a split second in which I was compressed by floating cubes of air.
O Vivian, have I many places to take you. Why must I name you Vivian? Life! You are to live vivaciously. You are to be characterized by vivid verbs. I will put you through hell but you will triumph ultimately, hopefully, without throwing things. But I must say I like the way you hold that stone in your hand, screeching unspoken words from the depth of your watery eyes.
posted by Adam C at
6:52 PM
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