Procrastination feels more exciting if you do it with your left hand. Try it if you don't believe me

[metrocentric]

When my mother was taken into hospital to give birth to me, she lost a number of books. They were in her room and her landlord, thinking she had disappeared, threw away. She sometimes mentions one with particular regret - I can't give its name here as it is so obscure that if she ever Googles the title the page on which this text appears will sit high up the results list. And that would never do.

The book is now out of print. But then so many are, and the trend is increasing, publishers hacking down their catalogues. Wankerstones, having taken the whole of the former Simpson's edifice, proclaimed miles of shelves, but the selection is narrowing towards that of a branch of John Menzies at a provincial railway station. But even if they booksellers wanted to turn away from a reducing future of celebrity cookbooks and Richard and Judy's Book Club Choice, they are now hemmed in by the publishers, responding to the booksellers... Books are perishable, it seems, and have to be cleansed from the shelves the instant the publisher drops them from the ongoing catalogue. It's all a bit crap, really.

Awfully nice of my mum not to go on about the book too much, or I should have grown up with the most terrible feelings of guilt. Just thought I ought to get that out of the way.

Second hand bookshops. That's what made me realise how many books are out of print. Things I'd never find otherwise pop up in the Oxfams and so on. I'm reading the third volume of Simone de Beauvior's memoirs at the moment. But I'm not going to quote from it because it is upstairs and I am not.

A short story as a 'sketch' for a novel. Wonder how many published examples of this there are?

I keep on giving characters disabilities. It's really not healthy. Not only am I blinding people, deafening them, lopping off their limbs, but I am using their impairments as a cheap and easy device-crutch. Author: "Look, I did a metaphor! A person's sense of physical balance deteriorates concurrently with disequilibrium of their emotions!" Character: "Thanks, you bastard, I've fallen over three times today and it isn't even lunchtime."

Also, blurbs on the backs of books, summarising themes contained. "As such-and-such happens, X is forced to confront the something-or-other at the heart of her/his life." Isn't that despicable? Ghoulish manipulation. Too tempting to avoid either as reader or writer.

Am working on a job application form. True fiction, real lies, veritable falsehoods. Surely that should be enough?

Comments

[palespectre.livejournal.com]

that's such a lovely photo. i would like to be transported to that place!
the book is intriguing!

[metrocentric.livejournal.com]

It's just a little patch of earth, evidently lovingly tended, which is part of a permanent mooring arrangement for the canal boat in the background. That's what I like about the Netherlands - not profoundly exciting, but so civilised!

The book:

I keep on meaning to buy it for her, esp. now that the US$ is cheaper than peanuts compared with the £. But then, once she gets her book back, she won't need her son anymore.

[instereo.livejournal.com]

hey i just happened upon your journal and wondered where the photo on your bio was from. i live in seville, and tho i haven't seen that particular street corner, that photo sure looks seville-y to me. nice one!

[metrocentric.livejournal.com]

It's as Seville-y as they come, well spotted! It's not far from Plaza Encarnacion - walk up Sierpes and across Martin Villa and it's a couple of corners along. I keep meaning to post more of my Seville pictures but never get around to it.
I have no-one on my friends list from Andalusia, mind if I add you?

[instereo.livejournal.com]

not at all! i'm just studying here for the year. only two more months :(