Advice from Merlyn from Confucius

In the wonderfully moving sequel to The Once and Future King, The Book of Merlyn, near the end, Merlyn quotes Confucius:

"In order to propagate virtue in the world, one must first rule

one's country.

In order to rule one's country, one must first rule one's family.

In order to rule one's family, one must first regulate one's 

body by moral training.

In order to regulate one's body, one must first regulate one's 

mind.

In order to regulate one's mind, one must first be sincere in

one's intentions.

In order to be sincere in one's intentions, one must first

increase one's knowledge."

A lot of the times, living in here in Missouri really leaves me with nothing but time to write. That might sound romantic, but it's not so much. I have this tick about always having to be doing something important, something meaningful. I'm nearly always aware of it. It's something in me which wakes when I do, and probably stays up long after I've finally gone back to sleep again. Outside, the world is filled with puddles of melting snow and chilly wind. The land is bleak and bare. It is February. There is nothing going on in town and there is no where to go. Whatever you do or have must be done by you alone, or with a few friends. Often times, with jobs how they are - most everyone's schedules don't match up too well. This means you have time alone... alone with the Nuisance. That persistent feeling that you have to - must - be doing something.

So I write. I wonder if I just down enough words between gasps of intermittent boredom I can bleed out some of the impatience. I feel listless, grey like the land here. Grey, gray, grey. It's a funny word. I like using it in my stories, because again, it evokes some sort of mystique. But that's story telling for you. In the living world, grey days and times appear just so. I will be off work in about an hour and then I will drive home in my rusty white Ford Contour and probably sit back down into my usual spot on the couch and binge-watch more Netflix, or play more video games. I like and don't like doing it. I like it because it's familiar and occasionally enjoyable. I don't like it because I feel like I'm hiding from life and because of the Nuisance. Later, if I don't get side-tracked and I feel more or less up for it, I write. I always write fantasy. I've tried writing other things, but it always ends up as a fantasy. I'm not sure why. I dream about places and lands that never were. My house is usually empty since my wife often works late (she works too much).

Sometimes I catch myself thinking about how this is just where a fantasy story might begin. In the Grey Days... in the nothing and the piles of old slush.

Right now I'm writing about two Wizards and a Nameless Girl. They live in a far-away land with no name full of islands and magic. There's often so much magic there, that wonder is hard to find. But that's only a concept I've recently realized exists. In my stories there is usually a personal quest people are on. I feel like I have to figure out how to make it special. I have to figure out why it matters. It's important. But I don't know if I can figure it out. I want to rush through the story to the end... I want Christmas to hurry up and happen so I can know what I got. I feel that way about here, too. I want life to hurry up. What does that mean? Will anybody like it? Do I want people to like me? I act like there's an invisible stage I'm always on. Sometimes I get tired of my current story-lines and I wonder about other lands and lives far away.

I read somewhere that artists are miserable people. I don't know how I feel about that. It seems like it's the sort of thing an artist would say to make themselves feel better. I don't know if I trust it. But when Steph, my wife, says it we laugh and we mean our laughter. How can you just change something with only a few words? The right sentiment from the right person... the right relationship with the right gritty bonds can transform something from dubious to lovely.

I wonder if I write enough I will change. I wonder if I wait long enough, the blase will fade away. I remember remembering a better way. I wonder why I stay here. My parents are always overtly trying to pressure me back to New Mexico. I feel like moving back would be admitting defeat. I value my freedom and individuality too much to move back - even for culture, even for family, even for better opportunities. But I also think it's not just for me that I stay. I think that somehow I'm supposed to be here. As dumb as it is. As drear as it is. I don't understand why. Maybe when someone stakes their claim willfully, the strength of their resolve makes for a firmer ground for others to stand, too. I hope so. I hope there's meaning to all this. And not general meaning - not pie-in-the-sky meaning- but real meaning. Something that makes sense and can be understood.

I know I live in my head too much. Being stuck at home for 5 days is just too much. Sure I was sick but I had to do something. The Nuisance was back again, I guess. I still feel sick. But maybe I'm better now, a little bit. I want to matter. I want to save the day. There's so much saving that needs done here. I don't see no cavalry. I don't see grand miracles. I see little people in faded streets. I see needy and I can't meet all their needs. I see what's left of beautiful slowly drift apart. And I don't... I just don't understand why it must be.

We need Ways, not Directions. We want directions. I want directions. I want do this, this, and then this and bam - there you go. Problem solved. But we don't get that sort of permanency here. Stability. We need Ways. We need to hold on.

Poetry for your Monday

"We bled under a banner to find life as free men 

the wind still blows across those far off glens

where Scottish blood flowed to keep us all free 

What we did not know was, what will be, will be   

We can alter the future by the actions of today 

but yesterday is already set and flown away 

so set your sights on changing tomorrow 

don't dwell on the past and all of the sorrow   

The future can shine as bright as the sun 

Our web of life is still to be spun 

The silken thread that join us together 

all interlinked and entwined  with the heather   

The blood in our veins carries memories of the past 

linking us together from the first to the last 

Wherever you roam you will remember your blood line 

no matter where you are a Scottish heart will always shine   

The freedom we had is still all around 

The heart that is Scotland can never be drowned 

A voice from the past is heard in every true heart 

So stay true to yourself and live free before you depart"

-Leslie Hounsel

Wisdom from Author Ursula K Le Guin:

Ursula K Le Guin,

Multi-Award-Winning Recipient for SciFi & Fantasy writes:

    “In the years since I began to write about Earthsea I’ve changed, of course, and so have the people who read the books. All times are changing times, but ours is one of massive, rapid moral and mental transformation. Archetypes turn into millstones, large simplicities get complicated, chaos becomes elegant, and what everybody knows is true turns out to be what some people used to think.
  
It’s unsettling. For all our delight in the impermanent, the entrancing flicker of electronics, we also long for the unalterable. We cherish the old stories for their changelessness. Arthur dreams eternally in Avalon. Bilbo can go “there and back again,” and “there” is always the beloved familiar Shire. Don Quixote sets out forever to kill a windmill...
  
We may turn to fantasy seeking stability, ancient truths, immutable simplicities; but the realms of Once-upon-a-time are unstable, mutable, complex, and as much a part of human history and thought as the nations in our ever-changing atlases. And in daily life or in imagination, we don’t live as our parents or ancestors did. “Enchantment alters with age, and with the age. We know a dozen different Arthurs now, all of them true. The Shire changed irrevocably even in Bilbo’s lifetime. Don Quixote went riding out to Argentina and met Jorge Luis Borges there.”
  
To this I would add: As the virtual world of electronic communication becomes the world many of us inhabit all the time, in turning to imaginative literature we may not be seeking mere reassurance nor be impelled by mere nostalgia. To enter with heart and mind into the world of the imagination may be to head deliberately and directly toward, or back toward, engagement with the real world.
  
In one of T.S. Elliot’s poems a bird sings, “Mankind cannot bear very much reality.” I’ve always thought that bird was mistaken, or was talking only about some people. I find it amazing how much of the real world most of us can endure. Not only endure, but need, desire, crave. Reality is life. Where we suffocate is in the half-life of unreality, untruth, imitation, fakery, the almost-true that is not true. To be human is to live both within and beyond the narrow band of what-happens-now, in the vast regions of the past and the possible, the known and the imagined: our real world, our true Now.”

- from the afterword of Tales From Earthsea, by Ursula K Le Guin

Who Do You Love (Literately) ?

Writers are nothing without reading - so who literately inspires you most and why?

First and foremost, are those two fairy-tale giants, C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien for me. They loom quietly in the background of my imagination. Most of the bedrock from which I build my sandcastles are founded on one or both of these men. But it's not just their fantasy works which get my mind salivating - it's also their non-fiction works, as well. Works like On Fairy Stories (Tolkien) or The Discarded Image (Lewis) delve into the philosophy and structure of Faerie in a way unparalleled.

The next great abiding spirit is George MacDonald. If you know anything about C.S. Lewis, you'll already know about this imaginative titan of a Scottish pastor and lecturer. This is the guy who wrote the original Alice in Wonderland (yes, you read me right... Lewis Carol and George MacDonald were friends, and would often use each other's stories). If Tolkien and Lewis are giants, then MacDonald is the Great and Powerful Wizard. Seriously, his stuff transcends reality. While he's written a ton of all sorts of genre, his fantasy is hands-down the best (although his non-fiction isn't too shabby, either...).

From there, of course, the literary influence become widely scattered. But as suggested in my previous posts, it has mainly been the fantasy authors who have helped me most. Folks like Ursula LeGuin, Madeline L'Engle, Brian Jacques, J.K. Rowling, Niel Gaiman, and Susan Cooper. Non-fiction authors include Peter Berrisford Ellis, Donald Miller, Bob Goff, Edith Hamilton, and Susan Bauer.

Then there's poetry: Robert Frost (*drools). Luis Borges. Homer. Whoever it was who wrote Beowulf.

My point is, here, long list not withstanding, is that who you read and why you read them is vital to the formation of your imagination and writing abilities. Spend time walking with the masters - not just those who are purportedly to be be excellent from others, but with those whom you truly love. You truly enjoy spending quality time with. They're just like relationships. Spend time around people and you can't help but become familiar... And through friendship you can wind up sharing something so unique, only you and that other person, at that given moment in history, could create.

Write (and read) on!

Ryan  

Please give lively, steadily-building applause for... The Grey Isle Tale's cover!

Hot off the Italian presses from our good friend, Laura Faraci, comes the newest cover design for Ryan P. Freeman's upcoming novella, The Grey Isle Tale!

The Grey Isle Tale will be available soon via Amazon for ebooks and print-on-demand orders.

Why I Write

I don't care if anyone doesn't read this.
Well, that's a bit of a lie - just a touch, though.
Why do I write? Why do I want to write?

Part of it comes from pride. The idea, thought, notion of being able to claim the title and be called a writer - or even better - an Author calls me. Beckons me. It's easy to want these things when they're already done, or when you say you're working on some creative project. But as for the actual doing, that's hard.

When I was little, the library in my elementary school was magic. I actually had trouble learning how to read well, and so libraries were a bit of a mystery for me back then. Oh sure, I loved being read to, or adventuring through the innumerable picture book tales... but I was embarrassed about not being able to read like everyone else. It frustrated me - and publicly shamed me in front of my other classmates and friends. I was in first and second grade, so it was kinda a big deal (and it still is, I think).

I owe an undying debt of gratitude to Mrs. Yorth, my second grade teacher, for taking the extra time, after school, to help me to learn how to read. My school, River Grove Elementary, also put me into a specialized reading class. Looking back on it all, I feel like I had my own Marvel origin story in that class... I don't really know what they did to me, but once I got out I was reading at a high school level - and soon after, at a college level.

I remember the day some time not long after I was out of that special class, I walked into the library. To this very day, I can't remember why I walked in there... because I'd usually pass it by... maybe it was a Scholastic book fair or something, and I was drawn in by the bright pictures... who knows... But I remember walking in to a place where only a second before had been like an empty room full of absolutely nothing... and then suddenly it had been transformed without flash or bang. I was now standing in a vast treasure trove - unexplored and all mine. I could look at endless row after endless row and know what I was looking at. I could read any book I choose (or not). I think this ability is lost on most people. The simple wonder - the marvel - of being able to do as you please, when you please... I also experienced this wonder with words, as I suffered from severe stuttering during that time in my life, too.

To get into the computer lab, full of all those glowing green-screen Macintosh computers, we had to stand in line along this library back row... which just happened to be where most of the fantasy was shelved. Since my last name begins with 'F' I was sort of jumbled somewhere in the middle of the line. So as we waited for the Powers-That-Were to do whatever it is that they did back in the early 90's, I would stare at the fantasy titles and wonder. It's funny. Usually I kind of don't like how I am generally shorter than other people, again thanks to my bout with childhood leukemia... the same disease which stunted my growth, had also been involved with scarring my vocal chords, as well as affecting my critical thinking... So when it comes to book shelves, the first thing I generally see is anything about midway up or slightly lower. I see the buried authors first. I remember seeing the Susan Cooper's (The Dark is Rising series); I saw the Peter S. Beagle's (The Last Unicorn); and the Patricia C Wrede's (The Dealing With Dragons series).

People will find your books. They will. My self-pride about writing and authorhood is just full of itself. The right people will find your work at the right time, and in the right place. You will probably never hear about it. You will most likely never know about it. But good stories have a curious way of transcending time and space. They slip out into the world and nestle into strange hands in unimaginable places. I should know - I was one of those readers. To this very day, there are still lost bookish treasures I'm still desperately hunting for - still gems which gleam in the darkness of obscurity, waiting once more to be reclaimed.

Good books are treasures. They are invitations sent out into the lost parts of the vast world. They are keys to secret kingdoms with hidden gates tucked away in unlikely places (like the threshold of an elementary school computer lab...).

So write on - who knows what will come of your next good book.

- Ryan