distance and fiction
Mattis Fishman (mattis@argos.argoscomp.com)
Mon, 09 Aug 1999 17:12:25 -0400 (EDT)
Hello Jim,
You know, I believe I "owe" you an email. I have a distinct
recollection that you responded to my exposition on Mr. Byrd's
concept of every drop of ink is distilled from our own blood
(or something to that effect), yet in what was probably an overreaction,
I deleted my entire bananafish inbox, sweeping your comment out into
the bit bucket. I am pretty sure that introduced a beautiful concept
of your own (whether "advertantly" or in-) when you wrote that you are
very conscious of the distance between your work and yourself.
Perhaps it never struck me before that the only way to create a piece
of fiction, poetry, art, etc (I can afford to spend a few spaces,
unlike poor Steven's poetryartfictionmusic) is to recognize it (and here
I would say "within oneself", but it sounds too profound) and then
create sufficient distance between the idea, the perception, the seed if
you will, to enable it to become recognizable independently, almost
as the new moon is only visible only after it has left its alignment
with the sun. As though the idea is out of our hands, and we are only
its creators in the sense that we provide a background or negative-space
into which it may extend. I have to say that I don't have the least
idea what I'm talking about, or how one can see the creative process
working in this way, yet the possibility is intriguing.
Have fun.
Mattis