Sunday, April 11, 2004
I find it kind of funny,
I find it kind of sad,
The dreams in which I'm dying
Are the best I've ever had...
Yesterday, two hours that I should have spent working on "The Daughter of the Four of Pentacles" were spent, instead, on the tedious task of correcting the "corrections" to "The Drowned Geologist" made by some dolt at Del Rey. We found a total of 69 changes (to an 18-page story) that were made to my ms. prior to publication, without my consent or even the common courtesy of the news that the changes were being made. Hopefully, more people will read the trade paperback edition of Shadows Over Baker Street than read the pricier hardback, so more readers will encounter my story in the form I meant it to be read rather than that created by the aforementioned dolt. And I really, really want to use stronger language than "dolt," just so you know.
We did the proofreading out of doors, on a blanket in the front yard, which was nice for a change. I miss working outdoors. We came in when clouds and wind threatened rain (which they failed to deliver). I've had this laptop for more than two years and that's the very first time I've ever worked with it outside. Afterwards, I did some of the reading I had to do, but my mood had been so wrecked by finally learning just how extensive the changes to "The Drowned Geologist" were that I was in no mood to write anything. I read through what I did on Friday and tidied it some, but that's all I was up to. I don't do this shit so other people can rearrange the words to conform to the whimsy of MS Word's spellchecker and the fucking Chicago Manual of Style (see? stronger language).
I received the following bit of verse, by the Russian poet Osip Mandelshtam, from Chris Allen. It's been following me around for several days now:
What anguish—to search for a lost word,
To lift sick eyelids
And gather night grasses for an alien tribe.
I've yet to find the poem from which these lines come (Chris?), so I'm uncertain of their original context and intent, but they seem a fine enough commentary on the day-to-day process of writing as I experience it.
Some days I should avoid the blog. I think this is one of them. Ah, well. Too late now.
My request for a copy of the ARC for the Subterranean Press edition of Low Red Moon netted me ten copies (from Subterranean Press), and I'm thinking we'll be putting them up on eBay. More on this later. I'm going to go hurt myself now.
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