Before They Were Giants (17 page)

For all of this, though, you have to remember that I didn’t relate to this as a “sale.” From that point of view, my first “sale” happened just over 10 years ago, and
that
had the kind of impact we’re talking about, because that was what I wanted to do. “Highway 61 Revisited” was more foundational, I think, in a different way. When I sold
King Rat,
it was incredibly exciting. And almost immediately afterward I sold a short story called “Looking for Jake,” which much later became the title story to my short story collection. Though I’d sold KR earlier, it was LFJ that appeared first, in an anthology. And seeing it appear, that was the point at which I started to think: holy shit.

The thing with selling a novel is that there tends to be a long turnaround time, so you’re intensely excited when you make the sale, but then there’s another year before the motherfucker appears, by which time it’s not exactly anti-climactic—the appearance of the book is incredible—but it is a little mediated.

How has your writing changed over the years, both stylistically and in terms of your writing process?

I’ma terrible person to talk to about “process.” I know people are very interested in it, and writers get asked about it a lot, but I’m just not systematic enough to be able to answer it very much. I’m not one of those writers that writes from 9:00 to 12:00 everyday. Some days or weeks I won’t do anything on fiction. But when I
do
write fiction, which is what I like doing most, of course, I tend to do it in very intense, very long bursts. I work for two, three, four weeks, six to seven days a week, between nine and twelve hours a day, and am extremely antisocial. That’s my preferred method of working. But that’s just the actual typing stuff. There’s also the scribbling in notebooks, the thinking up ideas, etc., and that might happen on the top of a bus or whatever. Sol can only answer the question very vaguely. I’m not very rigorous about method. I
am,
though, rigorous about the method of the narrative itself. I never write anything without a very strong sense of the total shape of a narrative—a pretty coherent and careful plan of the book’s architecture. The idea of “just starting and seeing what happens” brings me out in hives with anxiety.

In answer to the question about style: I’ve become more conscious of the writing, more aware of it at a formal level. Which I think makes me a better writer, but also makes it harder, because you up your own game, and you try harder. So for example, I’m very aware of lots of the flaws of
Perdido.
It’s very undisciplined. Which, perhaps or perhaps not ironically, is part of what those people who like it like about it. That isn’t illegitimate—there can be something very winning about undisciplined writing, up to a point. But I am getting much more disciplined as I get older.

I’m also very interested in deliberately experimenting with style.
Iron Council
is written in a very different style from
Perdido
and
The Scar
—I was very consciously trying to do something with the style. I think it’s one reason that
Iron Council
is less popular with a lot of readers. I’ll also say—and I hope this doesn’t sound defensive, because people have every right to their reactions— that that’s also why for me it is without question my favorite of those three books. That experimentation at the level of prose, which I acknowledge did ask certain things of the reader that the other books didn’t necessarily do, is something I’m really proud of. And I think in general that the project of trying to experiment, do things differently, is interesting. My latest book,
The City & The City,
is very different again, and written in a voice that I hope is extremely different from any of the others published so far. Obviously, you’ve no right to expect readers necessarily to like all of the stuff you do, if you’re interested in experimenting with those changes, but I hope it makes for a more interesting trajectory overall, and even if people don’t care for one particular book so much, I hope ultimately it makes the whole thing more interesting for the reader, as well as the writer.

What advice do you have for aspiring authors?

I think it can actually be quite helpful to get critique and feedback from someone who comes from a very different writing tradition than you. A lot of my students write what I think of as mainstream “literary” fiction, and I think it’s very, very helpful for me to see what people from that tradition are working on, and very helpful for them to get feedback from someone with a rather different eye from their main readers.

I would say that for me, the advice would probably be very nuts and bolts stuff. Think about the structure of your book before you start writing it. The more you can plot in advance, the easier it will be to write the chapters as they come up, without drifting or getting baggy. If you can write a few hundred words every day, let alone a thousand or two thousand, you
will
finish the book before all that long. The trick is to not for a second let yourself know you’re writing a novel, or it’s easy to panic. You’re just trying to get a thousand words done. Just a thousand. Then another thousand. That’s all. Nothing to see here. No novel. No sirree, nothing that big.

If you plan in advance and think about the structure, you’ll have a reasonably clear idea of what chapter has to come after what has to come after what, so the writing of each of those one to five thousand words needn’t be a giant deal, because you don’t have to agonize about what to do next. You just refer to your grid/wheel/plan/outline/etc.

Any anecdotes regarding the story or your experiences as a fledgling writer?

The only one that comes to mind is talking once to M. John Harrison, the toweringly brilliant writer of the Viriconium series, which had a huge influence on me. He’s always been very hardcore about his writing—has taken it absolutely seriously, has bent his whole life toward it—and doesn’t have a lot of time for those not prepared to. We were talking one day, and I said something about, “Oh, I really, really hope I can live on writing full-time, it would be so amazing.”

And he said, “You can live on writing full-time. But you might have to be prepared to live without certain luxuries. Like a fridge.”

And he meant it. Scared the bejeezus out of me. Luckily, I never had to do without a fridge—I thought I was going to be an academic, and after my second book,
Perdido Street Station,
I was able to work full-time as a writer. But I was halfway through the Ph.D. when that happened, and I finished the Ph.D., so when everyone turns their back on me, I hope I can trundle back into academia.

<>

~ * ~

In Pierson’s Orchestra

by Kim Stanley Robinson

The dead shall live, the living die,

and Music shall untune the sky.

allway to hallway to hallway I flit, like a bat in a mine. The lights are dimmed and the halls are empty, eerie gray slots. I cast long shadows from low light to light as I move along, next to the wall. I can feel my upper arms slide wetly against my ribs, and my heart’s
allegro
thumping. A voice within me sneers: “Time for your diamond, junkie.”

Dead sober will I see him, I promise myself again. My hand shakes and I put it back in my pocket. Familiar halls now, and I slow down as if the air is getting thicker; still in color-blind greys, and the air is perhaps filled with dust, or smoke. It is past time for my next crystal. I have not slept for five days, I am continuing on the drive of my decision.

Home. VANCOUVER CONSERVATORY, the tall door announces. I turn the knob, give the door a push to get it started. It opens. I slip through, silently cross the entrance floor. Pierson’s hologramic statue stares down at me, a short ruby-red figure transparent in the dim light. I circle him warily, alive to his presence in the shadows between me and the ceiling. Hallways, again; then another door, the door: sanctum sanctorum. You remember the old animated film
Fantasia
? Suddenly I am Mickey Mouse, in Dukas’
The Sorcerer’s Apprentice,
about to interrupt the sorcerer over his cauldron. A deep bell clangs from the main hall and I jump. Midnight: time for the breaking of vows. I knock on the door, a mistake; I have the privilege of entering without knocking; but no, I have lost all that, I have revoked all that. An indistinct shout arrives from inside.

I push the door open and a slice of white light cuts into the hallway. In I go, blinking.

The Master is under the orchestra, on his back, tapping away cautiously at the dent in the tuba tubing. The dent occurred at the end of the last grand tour, when one of the workmen helping to move it onto a rollcart tripped and kicked the tuba with his steel-tipped boot.

The Master looks up, white eyebrows rising like a bird’s crest. “Eric,” he says mildly, “why did you knock?”

“Master,” I say shakily, my resolve still firm, “I can no longer be your apprentice.”

Watch that sink in, like a hot poker in snow. He edges out from under the orchestra, stands up; all slowly, so slowly. He is old. “Why is this, Eric?”

I swallow. I have a lie all prepared, I have considered it for hours and hours; it is absurd, impossible. Suddenly I decide to tell him the truth. “I am addicted to nepanathol.”

Right before my eyes his face turns deep red. “You what?” he says, then almost shouts, “I don’t understand!”

“The drug,” I explain, “I’m hooked.”

Has the shock been too much for him? He trembles. He gets it out, calm and clear. “Why?”

It is so complex. I shrug. “Master,” I say, “I’m sorry.”

With a convulsive jerk he throws the hammers in his hand, and I flinch; they hit the foam lining of the wall without a sound, then click against each other as they fall.

“You’re sorry!” he hisses, and I feel his contempt. Why does one always whisper in this room? “ You’re sorry! My God, you’d better be more than sorry! Three centuries, eight masters of the orchestra, you to be the ninth and you break the line for a drug? The greatest artistic achievement of all time—” he waves toward the orchestra, but I refuse to look at it—”you choose nepanathol above it? How could you do it? I’m an old man, I’ll die in a few years, there isn’t time to train another musician like you—and you’ll be dead before I will!” True enough, in all probability. “I will be the last Master,” he cries out, “ and the Orchestra will be silenced!”

With the thought of it he twists and sits down cross-legged on the floor, crying. I have never seen the Master cry before, never thought I would. He is not an emotional man.

“What have I done?” Echoless shrieks. “The Orchestra will end with me and they will say it’s my fault, that I was a bad Master—”

“You are the best of them,” I get out.

He turns on me. “Then why?
Why?
How could you do this?”

I would have been the ninth Master of Pierson’s Orchestra. The heir to the throne. The crown prince. Why indeed? Such a joke.

As from a distance I hear myself. “Master,” I say, “I will stop taking the drug.”

I close my eyes as I say it. For an old man’s sake I will go through the withdrawal from nep. I shake my head, surprised at myself.

He looks up at me with—what is it, craftiness? Is he manipulating me? No. It’s just contempt. “You can’t,” he mutters angrily. “It would kill you.”

“No,” I say, though I am by no means sure of this. “I haven’t been addicted long enough. A few hours; eight, maybe; then it will be over.” It will be short; that is my only comfort. A very real voice inside me is protesting loudly: “What are you
doing?”
Pain. Muscle cramps, memory confusion, memory loss. Nausea. Hallucinations. A high possibility of sensory damage, especially to the ears, sense of smell, and eyes. I do not want to go blind.

“Truly?” the old man is saying. “When will you do this?”

“Now,” I say, ignoring the voice inside. “I’ll stay here, I think,” gesturing toward the Orchestra but still not looking in its direction.

“I too will stay—”

“No. Not here. In the recording booth, or one of the practice rooms. Or go up to your chambers, and come back tomorrow.”

We look at each other then, old Richard and young Eric, and finally he nods. He walks to the tall door, pulls it open. He turns his head back. “You be careful, Eric,” he says.