I’d say it’s what separates us, not from the beasts, but the bestial. Creating the future, renewing a learned past - these are reasons to strive. Writing for and with love, taking and framing an image, stretching new melodic skins onto old skeletons of song… it’s how we manage to fly. It’s how we stay you and me, not us and them.
Unlike Osk, who seemed to establish his own tactical task force wherever we lived, scooping up neighbourhood feline troublemakers as sidekicks (including the memorable ginger behemoth Watson, with whom he used to scope the street from the safety of the shed roof), Jelly has the intelligence gathering skills of a sponge cake.
Anyway, somewhere in between my 'and then you should've done this' and 'why didn't you say x and y, rather than z', and 'for the love of monkeys and the general public's eyesight, you didn't honestly wear that heinous shirt did you', something he was saying about the dating extravaganza we were picking to pieces finally penetrated my cloud of self-congratulatory cumulo-waffle.
"Most people don't talk about how dates are progressing as a tender process, do they?" he asked.
"What?"
"She said I was 'part way through the tender process' and that she was judging me on my submission. I'd like to think there was irony involved, and I think at the time I may have given an admittedly weak "haha, yesssss, quite". Looking back, I'd have to conclude, computer says no on the presence of Fabulon or other aids to achieving crisply pressed linen."
Despite looking really, really fabbo in breeches, Lizzy realises that Darcy is in fact very arsey and isn't likely to change his spots anytime soon. She decides marriage would be a trap and a half and instead scandalises Longbourn by going on the stage and becoming the best known actress of her time. Mrs Bennet loses the plot entirely and simultaneously the power of speech (yay). Darcy marries Caroline Bingley and is miserable but his family is happy so bad luck.
Jane and Bingley can still get married because they're both drips.
““...looking at the million book spines, I can imagine a million alternate endings. It turned out the butler did it all, or I ended up marrying Mr. Darcy, or we went and watched a girl ride the merry-go-round in Central Park, or we beat on against the current in our little boats, or Atticus Finch was there when we woke up in the morning.””
— Rebecca Makkai, The Borrower
I was reading a new book the other night and really enjoying it - OK, it was fairly trashy, but who cares? It was fun, it didn't involve an awful of of brain power and it was slightly naughty. If I'd had some chocolate and a glass of wine, I would have been in hog's heaven. As it was, I had to settle for just the glass of wine, but beggars can't be tipsy choosers.
I was zooming through the pages (or rather zooming through the iPad flips) when I got to the end.
And it SUCKED.
It was a complete cop-out. The iPad went thump on the sofa - if it had been a real book it would have possibly gone sailing off the balcony and started a brief new life as a seagull yacht. The ending ruined the entire book for me, and put me in a stinky mood for at least three hours (well, a stinkier mood... no chocolate, remember?)
It made me think though about all of the iconic novels I had read. Ernest Hemingway wrote 47 different endings to A Farewell To Arms. Forty. Seven. What if Catherine hadn't carked it? And then there's Gone With The Wind - what if Rhett had given a damn?
I know that there are a lot of 'variation' books out and about - especially in Jane Austen land - but they usually are a 'now on with our story' or have the same ending, just a different storyline to get there. So being me, I have decided to give five classic capers my own 'what if' and see whether I have hits on my hands - or just get hit.
Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows:
Harry dies. Properly. Snape doesn't - we all know he got a pretty raw deal the whole way through and he needs a break. Hermione decides Ron is far too ginger for her and runs off with Malfoy, because let's face it, he's pretty damn hot and she had a secret thing for bad boys. They found an evil magic empire which is so successful it turns the British economy around, the Muggle Royal Family gets evicted and King Mal and Queen H are installed to wild applause.
Pride And Prejudice:
Despite looking really, really fabbo in breeches, Lizzy realises that Darcy is in fact very arsey and isn't likely to change his spots anytime soon. She decides marriage would be a trap and a half and instead scandalises Longbourn by going on the stage and becoming the best known actress of her time. Mrs Bennet loses the plot entirely and simultaneously the power of speech (yay). Darcy marries Caroline Bingley and is miserable but his family is happy so bad luck.
Jane and Bingley can still get married because they're both drips.
The Great Gatsby:
Jay realises what a complete git he has been by asking Daisy to say she had never loved Tom. They hoof it to Paris with Pally in tow. Tom realises Daisy was in fact incredibly boring, decides discretion is the better part of valour, and marries Jordan. She ends up murdering him with a golf club for messing around with a variety of Myrtles. Nick makes his fortune on the stock exchange and never writes another word, which is a shame but hey - he's rich and happy. He'll settle.
Gone With The Wind:
Melly doesn't cark it, and she and Ashley have lots of incredibly geeky kids, one of whom is Bill Gates' great-great-great-grandfather. Scarlett becomes a nun. Rhett becomes President. Scarlett re-thinks the convent because she likes the idea of being Mrs President. Monica Lewinsky beats her to it. Oh wait... that's a different work of fiction.
To Kill A Mockingbird:
Forget it. I'm not touching this one.
OK, so it was only four... but come on. Messing with Atticus, Jem, Dill and Scout? I'd be assassinated.
I'm thinking there are legs on a couple of these though. Maybe I have a new calling? Is there a job title called 'Wrecking Great Books Which Should Never, Ever Be Touched by Anyone, But Constantly Are?'
I am sure I can fit that on my business card somehow. I'm off...
““I also read about Heathcliff’s unexpected three-year career in Hollywood under the name Buck Stallion and his eventual return to the pages of Wuthering Heights.” ”
— Jasper Fforde, Lost In A Good Book
Being in a book.
I have been thinking about this subject for years, I think since I first started to truly comprehend the magic of written words on a page.
In other words (cough - sorry, couldn't help it), at a very tender age indeed, I was wanting to jump between the covers of The Velveteen Rabbit and make sure that goddamned Nursery Fairy made my bunny real. By holding her to ransom if necessary, or breaking her wand.
Similarly, as my reading tastes matured, I was certain, absolutely certain, that if Anne Shirley met me, we would instantly become besties and she would forget all about boring Diana, and I would of course then get to meet Gilbert Blythe.
Sigh.
I do have a point here, I'm just busy between the pages. Which I suppose is my point.
If you could jump between the covers - of a book, not a bed (rude) - which one would it be?
And I mean as yourself, not as a character. Much as I love playing Sherlock Holmes (the dreadful old misogynist), I would love to go in and be myself within The Hound of the Baskervilles, or A Study In Scarlet, and find a way of helping Holmes and Watson to the truth. Or maybe being an even bigger villain than Moriarty - depending on my mood at the time.
Which characters would you love to meet on a real life basis?
Some would be too depressing for words. Much as I love Rochester, I think that all that brow beating and gloom and doom might be a bit much on a daily basis. Plus there's the mad wife, and the corsets... meh. All a bit much.
Jane Austen on the other hand... I can imagine being friends with Lizzie Bennet. I could cheerfully smack Arsey Darcy around the head, but I do like a pair of pantaloons... and riding boots. Phwoar. Book of choice however would have to be Persuasion, because I actively, and actually, love the characters in it. I can envisage conversations with Anne Elliot, and Captain Wentworth. Although I am not sure I would last long simply not doing anything other than 'visiting' all day.
I would probably end up falling off a sea wall to stave off boredom.
I was obssessed with Game of Thrones when the books came out - I read them cover to cover and sequentially. Would I like to live within them? Realistically... hell no. It would be like living at the Fall of Rome, or under the Borgias. One would never relax. Plus there's the need to speaketh wryly at all times... no... miss that one. In theory, love it. In practice, no thank ye.
I dream about books. I worship them. The characters contained within my favourite books' covers are a part of my heart. They beat inside me. I never want this to not be the case.
However... life is not a novel. It may feel like a trashy paperback at times, or even War and Peace, but it ain't.
It's non-fiction. It is absolutely a book, but it is writing itself, and we need to live it without regrets and without fear, and with love.
It may not be the approach favoured by the authors we admire most, but who is editing this thing anyway? We are.
I am.
Admittedly, given the opportunity, I would hop inside To Kill A Mockingbird and never let Atticus Finch go... but then again, I could get stuck in 1984 with Big Brother, and then where would I be?
Write your own story.
Oh, and if you get the chance - help me encourage the Nursery Fairy.
