SLASH? REALLY?

I noticed in the L.A. Times today --
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et-slash-20120524,0,5498162.story
 -- a rock star who calls himself Slash.

Really? Slash? 

So, in honor of that, I am going to add another name to my roster.

What  shall I call myself? Dash? Crash? Flash? Splash? How about Flush? As in Royal Flush?

OK, from now on, just call me Flush.

Just don't push the handle.

-- Roger

a.k.a. Flush, a.k.a. Royal Flush, a.k.a. Eternal Zen Master

Copyright © 2012, Roger R. Angle

WHERE IS THE STORY?

I'm rewriting an old unfinished novel called THE PAINTED SUN.

What I usually do, when I start a novel, is begin with the voice of a narrator in my head, or an image, or a character, without knowing where I am going. It's a matter of exploration, following the characters, letting the voice lead the way. But sometimes, too often, no story emerges.

With "The Painted Sun," I started with a man in real life, a guy who lived across the way in back, on the next street. I could see him from my deck, over the tops of two garages. He looked about 60, and was lean and muscular, unusually fit for a man his age. No fat on him.

Gray hair, a thick mat of curly hair on his chest. He would come out onto his second-floor balcony and look around, shirt off, like a man who was under house arrest, or waiting for something, or someone. He wore well-cut gray slacks. Not a bum.

He never seemed to go anywhere, and I never saw anyone come to visit him. So of course my fantasy was that he was a retired hit-man waiting for his next job.

I didn't want to meet him, didn't want to know anything about his real life. It would spoil my fantasy.

So anyway, as novels do, this character evolved into an old horse trainer from Kansas, who was looking for his daughter who had run away ten years ago, when she was 16.

I followed the character and I guess you could say he led me astray. He comes to L.A. and meets a young woman who moves in next door. Her boyfriend beats her up and my guy rescues her and leaves the boyfriend with a broken arm.

What did this have to do with the daughter? Well, nothing. An interesting beginning, but leading nowhere. There was no story. He finds out the daughter went to Mexico with a rich racehorse owner who lives on a big ranch. Here I used a true story, told me by a friend, about an American girl who lives a racy and risky life on a big rancho.

But this novel of mine wasn't working. I wrote about 200 pages and found myself down a dead-end street with no action in sight. No consequences. No causal chain. No theme. What was this novel about? Who the hell knew?

I still like the main characters, so I'm trying to stir up a new pot of stew and see if I can create a situation or story problem or dilemma that will come alive again and lead me somewhere interesting.

I have some ideas, and I have the feeling these characters are out there somewhere, and they are breathing, and waiting, chomping at the bit, waiting for the story to come along and sweep them away. Waiting for their next job.

Kind of like that old man on the balcony.

Wish me luck.

-- Roger

Copyright © 2012, Roger R. Angle

LIFE AS SAMURAI TRAINING

One of my favorite quotes:

SAMURAI TRAINING

“Somewhere there is a samurai warrior who is young and smart and strong. He trains every day. He gets up early, he eats right, he works on his technique, and he cuts bamboo trees with his sword until he can slice pieces in mid-air. One day, you will meet him in battle. Do you really want to be unprepared?” -- Unknown

That touches my heart, for some reason, I don't know why. Perhaps it has something to do with a person's attitude toward life. In my experience, you are either up and at 'em, or you are dead inside, and might as well be dead outside, too.

-- Roger

Copyright © 2012, Roger R. Angle

'BLOOD MERIDIAN' - TOO TRUE, TOO VIOLENT

I recently finished reading Cormac McCarthy's "Blood Meridian" for the third or fourth time, and it was completely different this time.

I had always assumed that it was totally fiction, a fantasy of violence, bloodshed and depravity that showed what lies deeply buried in our psyche, in our unconscious mind.

It never occurred to me that it might be true, heaven forbid, but it is. As I read through the book itself, I also read "Notes On 'Blood Meridian'."

My God. Glanton and his gang really did most of these horrible things. Endless depravity and cruelty for no reason. In one scene, to take a small example, a man is trying to sell two puppies, and the Judge buys them, then throws into a violent, swirling river.

As the puppies surface in a calm pool below a dam, another member of Glanton's gang pulls out his pistol and shoots them, for no other reason than sport.

Children get murdered, for no reason. The buffalo get slaughtered, by the millions, and the meat left to rot on the plains.

How inhuman it all is. Disgusting.

It's one thing to assume this is all fantasy, and another to realize that most of this stuff really happened.

There is a grim kind of gallows humor to much of it, but finally it sinks into a cauldron of bloodshed.

I don't think I'll ever be able to read it again.

And I take back my recommendation.

Don't read it, unless you have a very strong stomach.

Or read it as a fantasy. I wish it wasn't true.

-- Roger

Copyright © 2012, Roger R. Angle

'BLOOD MERIDIAN' AGAIN AND AGAIN

I am reading Cormac McCarthy's "Blood Meridian" again, for the third or fourth time. It is an amazing experience.

On one level, the novel is a wild hairy adventure story like no other. I reminds me of "Moby Dick" by Herman Melville, in scope, in effect, and in its multiple layers.

On another level, it is a journey into the unconscious, and it reminds me of paintings by Hieronymus Bosch, the German painter. "Blood Meridian" is a phantasmagoria of violence. I doubt if anyone has nightmares as vivid or as horrific.

At one point, one of the characters describes this band of killers as men of good heart. My God, how bloodthirsty they are. How could they be of good heart?

Their leader, John Glanton, is a brave man, a decisive and competent leader, admirable in some ways. Yet you've never met a more enthusiastic butcher of men. And women. In some ways, he is heroic, in others a devil revelling in hell.

Michael Herr, in a cover blurb, says the novel is about "regeneration through violence." I don't know if I'd put it that way. But there is a sense of redemption about all this, and I don't quite know why or how that works.

The novel is Biblical in scope, in tone, and in its use of language. It is a hot steamy cauldron of meaning and image and language, horrid and profound and wonderful.

Its technique is almost all narrative. That is, we are told the story, and the events are related mostly rather than rendered. It is an unusual mode. But it works well. We are lulled to sleep in this dream. It won't remind you of any crappy bestseller I have ever tried to read.

There is tremendous energy and invention in the language and seemingly in the events, although "Notes On 'Blood Meridian'" by John Sepich claims that "Blood Meridian" is an historical novel, taken largely from "My Confessions" by the decorated Union Army General Samuel Chamberlain, and from other historical sources.

Sepich says that the exploits of Glanton and his band are presented "with remarkable fidelity." In other words, Cormac McCarthy seems to have used history as a template or an outline, a basis for his creation. Perhaps in much the same way Melville used his experiences on whaling ships as a basis for his novel.

"Blood Meridian" is, in my opinion and that of others, the greatest American novel written by a living writer. It ranks right up there with Faulkner and Melville. Perhaps even Shakespeare.

I recommend it highly.

-- Roger

Copyright © 2012, Roger R. Angle

CURSED NO MORE

I made a big deal in December about not finding motivation for my work.

Well, that is over now. Recently, I have been not only highly motivated but almost obsessed. That is how you have to be to get any real writing done, at least for me.

I've been working like a fiend on my current novel, "The Prince of Newport," and on a long short story, "Alien Love," and on a memoir, which I am writing under a pen name, for legal reasons. More on all those later. I have five current projects and almost a dozen others in the works. Wish me luck.

Anyway, I made a big stink about not wanting to do it. Now I don't want to do anything else.

And that, for a writer, is a good problem to have.

-- Roger

Copyright © 2012, Roger R. Angle

LIT CRIT: BLOOM OR BUST

The other day, I had a hankering to read some intelligent literary criticism. Maybe gain some insight into my favorite writers, to enhance the quality of my favorite pastime, reading.

So I got from the L.A. Public Library a book by the noted and widely published critic Harold Bloom: "How To Read And Why." OK, sounds instructive. Perhaps a bit arrogant. But we can forgive that, can't we?

So I waded through as much of it as I could. Turns out, it's mostly bloviating, the over-done expansion of one's own opinions.

Let me give you one example: He says that "Crime And Punishment" by Dostoevsky, "remains the best of all murder stories...."

Yeah, right. That might be true if it wasn't so damn BORING.

I got about 90 pages into this famous Russian novel, as I recall from many years ago, and, after the killing of the old lady, a distant cousin of Raskolnikov comes riding into town on a train. What possible relevance could this have? None that I could see. The story comes to a screeching halt.

The book is a chore and a snooze, in my opinion. Reminds me of "Lolita," the book that made Vladimir Nabokov famous and rich, not a bad thing for a writer. Trouble is, most of it is boring, too. There is a long travelog that is soporific at best. And the seduction scene has the wind taken out of it by the way the girl actually seduces the old lecher. He wants her and he wants her, and she was easy all along. What a let-down.

Oh, but far be it from me to even have opinions here, since I am not a famous literary critic. Of course, my lowly status means nothing to me, as it probably means little or nothing to others who feel they have a right to their own opinions.

I do agree with Harold Bloom that "As I Lay Dying" is Faulkner's greatest novel and that "Blood Meridian," by Cormac McCarthy, is the best novel published in America since WWII.

I also agree with him that the main characteristic of great literature is originality. That is what is so bad about modern thriller and mystery novels: There are two or three hundred talentless hacks writing and rewriting the same two or three books, over and over again, ad nauseam.

At least the big Bloomer and I have some agreements. But I have to keep looking to find a literary critic to enjoy. Next on my list: Philip Stevick, with whom I used to correspond. I loved his work and found it enriching. We'll see how he holds up after all these years. More on that TK (to come, in news jargon). Note: Well, I did find a couple of his books at the library, and they were a snooze, too, sorry to say. Too academic for me.

-- Roger

Copyright © 2012, Roger R. Angle