oh wonderful! She sounds great! My primary school teacher was only really keen on us reading the bible, it felt like...though the bible fuelled my imagination too!
I’m so glad you’re enjoying TDIR. The Grey King really leans into the moral ambiguity and not being afraid to upset young readers. I loved it and dreamed my whole life of living in the misty Welsh mountains. TDIR series is a huge influence in my work - I seem to be getting darker and deeper with every book! - and as you say, reading unlocks things in your own stories. I had a major experience of that for The Grimmelings while reading The Owl Service - it showed me a whole character that was hiding just out of sight and expanded the story and the emotional depth. Susan Cooper said something to me similar to your “The echoes and conversations between books provide an alchemy I can never analyse fully, but I find it fertile.” She said “everybody’s book is a long exploratory corridor, full of unconscious echoes…” She also writes in her book Dreams & Wishes about how she drew on aspects of the King Arthur stories and the Welsh Mabinogion, but that she didn’t consciously put aspects of them into the story, she just took what she needed when she needed it: “I didn’t go to the legend. The legend is there at the back of the imagination, in that room where the imagination goes to draw on something. The part of you that’s writing the story at a certain point reaches out and says, I want that bit.” Isn’t that lovely? I love the idea of all the things we’ve read or experienced just sitting there in a room, waiting for our imagination to go and retrieve them at just the right moment.
I also the idea of your new book and my book being exploratory corridors with the echoes of Cooper, who echoes those who went before her. It makes me feel like as children’s writers today we are part of something that stretches back over time.
Oh dear. I seem to have written an essay in your comments. This is stuff I’ve been thinking about for a long time but I’ve never felt ready to write down what those books mean to me. Maybe it’s time! (Though it would take me away from the book I currently need to write 1k words a day to finish - hmmmm) I do like how the pace of things slows down at this time of year, to let the thinking time in. It’s getting light at 5.30am here and not dark until 9pm so it’s a different kind of thinking than might appear in the winter - I’ve been getting up super early to avoid the chaos of my household and it’s not a time I’m accustomed to. X
I love the idea of a chapter that's hiding just out of sight! I get this often - something that was lurking in the misty darkness that comes out into the light, into focus, with the right stimulus! And Cooper's idea of unconscious echoes, yes. I sometimes say my brain is a fabric of quotes, and my books are an extension of my brain...but also it's a process of making those quotes, those associations conscious - pulling them out into the light and inspecting them.
Absolutely love that idea of a room where you go to visit your imagination!
PLEASE ALWAYS WRITE ESSAYS IN THE COMMENTS, this is brilliant! I appreciate the tension between book writing and Writing Thoughts About Books! Funny that we're doing our thinking at opposite times of year, lightwise.
Yes people don’t believe me when I say that character wasn’t even in the first draft - he’s so vital to the story. I’ve copied my essay comment into a word doc so I can use it in my future essay about book thoughts! I spent most of today writing my annual ‘my reading year’ post - I think you put me in the right frame of mind for it! 1600 words and still growing. What’s that you say? Did I work on my novel today? Ummm hmmm 👀
Forever grateful to Miss McDonald my primary school teacher who read us TDIR and also Weirdstone of Brisingamen, gave me a love of books forever ❤️
oh wonderful! She sounds great! My primary school teacher was only really keen on us reading the bible, it felt like...though the bible fuelled my imagination too!
I’m so glad you’re enjoying TDIR. The Grey King really leans into the moral ambiguity and not being afraid to upset young readers. I loved it and dreamed my whole life of living in the misty Welsh mountains. TDIR series is a huge influence in my work - I seem to be getting darker and deeper with every book! - and as you say, reading unlocks things in your own stories. I had a major experience of that for The Grimmelings while reading The Owl Service - it showed me a whole character that was hiding just out of sight and expanded the story and the emotional depth. Susan Cooper said something to me similar to your “The echoes and conversations between books provide an alchemy I can never analyse fully, but I find it fertile.” She said “everybody’s book is a long exploratory corridor, full of unconscious echoes…” She also writes in her book Dreams & Wishes about how she drew on aspects of the King Arthur stories and the Welsh Mabinogion, but that she didn’t consciously put aspects of them into the story, she just took what she needed when she needed it: “I didn’t go to the legend. The legend is there at the back of the imagination, in that room where the imagination goes to draw on something. The part of you that’s writing the story at a certain point reaches out and says, I want that bit.” Isn’t that lovely? I love the idea of all the things we’ve read or experienced just sitting there in a room, waiting for our imagination to go and retrieve them at just the right moment.
I also the idea of your new book and my book being exploratory corridors with the echoes of Cooper, who echoes those who went before her. It makes me feel like as children’s writers today we are part of something that stretches back over time.
Oh dear. I seem to have written an essay in your comments. This is stuff I’ve been thinking about for a long time but I’ve never felt ready to write down what those books mean to me. Maybe it’s time! (Though it would take me away from the book I currently need to write 1k words a day to finish - hmmmm) I do like how the pace of things slows down at this time of year, to let the thinking time in. It’s getting light at 5.30am here and not dark until 9pm so it’s a different kind of thinking than might appear in the winter - I’ve been getting up super early to avoid the chaos of my household and it’s not a time I’m accustomed to. X
I love the idea of a chapter that's hiding just out of sight! I get this often - something that was lurking in the misty darkness that comes out into the light, into focus, with the right stimulus! And Cooper's idea of unconscious echoes, yes. I sometimes say my brain is a fabric of quotes, and my books are an extension of my brain...but also it's a process of making those quotes, those associations conscious - pulling them out into the light and inspecting them.
Absolutely love that idea of a room where you go to visit your imagination!
PLEASE ALWAYS WRITE ESSAYS IN THE COMMENTS, this is brilliant! I appreciate the tension between book writing and Writing Thoughts About Books! Funny that we're doing our thinking at opposite times of year, lightwise.
Yes people don’t believe me when I say that character wasn’t even in the first draft - he’s so vital to the story. I’ve copied my essay comment into a word doc so I can use it in my future essay about book thoughts! I spent most of today writing my annual ‘my reading year’ post - I think you put me in the right frame of mind for it! 1600 words and still growing. What’s that you say? Did I work on my novel today? Ummm hmmm 👀
Novels are merely one mode of writing. All writing contributes to the grand story, the meta-story!