On writing again

2 November

Last night I sat and watched the first two of Andrew Marr’s series on paperback writers, and I loved it. It sets out a series of rules that crime writers should stick to if they wanted their readers to come back for more. All well and good until Raymond Chandler comes along and decided that British crime writing was too tame. After that it seems the framework falls away and it was open season on sex and violence in books. Even then, it was far tamer than things are today.

The second programme is about fantasy writing with Game of Thrones, Hobbit, The lord of the Rings and Narnia series taking centre stage. Rowling gets a mention in passing, Pratchett gets more of mention because I think, the guy who helped him to type up his books, is still around to be interviewed. Le Guinn is also mention along the way along with one or two other writers. Again there are rules to follow but it seems that the idea is to take and twist today’s world into something that is a parody. Most people will already know that C.S. Lewis’s Narnia series is an allegory of the Christian belief in the death and resurrection of Christ. However, I found them impossible to read for some reason. So Philip Pullman comes along with his series of books and rants against the Church and its doctrine being described as Dark Matter filtering down from above somewhere.

Basically all these are about who holds the power, who doesn’t and who fights to wrest that power for themselves. The next programme is about spy writers, so I expect more of the same from Fleming and company to feature heavily, but again there will be a set of rules to follow. I’ve read a number of spy novels and enjoyed them, but as for writing one, leave it to the pros, not my idea of fun at all. All these programmes are available through the BBC iPlayer right now if you’re interested (or even if you’re not, they’re still there), but it asks if you have TV licence these days, answer know, and you don’t get to watch them. I wonder if it somehow links to prevent you from watching and telly if you click no?

As for my writing, nowt’s getting done again but I have decided that I will look to get Shipshape finished and then move back to Arathusia and keep at that one to get it finished too. But what will follow I wonder? Who knows; right now I’m looking at getting this blog done so I can get ready to go out for a few hours. It is nice and sunny out there after all …

Today’s photo …

Lunchtime.

Today’s funny …

Two idiots decide to go duck hunting so they get up early one morning, and go off to the swamps with their red hats, duck calls, and their trusty hunting dog. Even with all conditions favorable for a good day, by day's end they headed home without a single duck!
The first idiot said "Do you think that maybe the duck calls didn't work?"
The second replied, "No, the duck calls were fine. I don't think we were throwing the dog high enough!"