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prose by Superhumble Underwear
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Werther and The Failed Novelists
Failed Novelist.
Werther looked out of his bedroom window at the London sky. “It is as if January’s wearing thin,” he said though it was the beginning of April.
Selena was outside chopping logs. The sun had just poked out again. She stared at the sky thinking about how apocalyptic the sky was at late. Snow, sun, hail, sun, rain, wind, sun. It was a feeble sort of half-hearted sun, not quite convincing because not quite convinced. It was midday, she was at her parents’ house in Wales. She didn’t need to chop wood because there were plenty of logs that had been pre-chopped, but the action of pounding something with an axe soothed her. She finished chopping and resumed her usual calm, pensive smile. The others weren’t up yet.
She went indoors and put the kettle on. She had to fight her way to a mug at the bottom of the kitchen sink, “what a mess.” Images of the stains and breakages inflicted on her parents’ house had strobed as she cut the logs, but she was philosophical now. As she chopped, she wondered why she ever proposed to do this failed writers’ retreat in the first place, but then she thought, “it has changed things, it has let me think.”
She heard plodding on the stairs, she recognised the footsteps. They were decidedly Russian.
“Good morning,” she said, “How long have you been up?”
“Three hours, I was making a drawing on my computer.”
“Any dreams?”
“Yes, it was quite strange, actually.”
Valentine hunted about the kitchen and decided on an orange.
“I was sucked into some sort of a – vortex! Yes. And there was a woman in a costume, and her ears poking out, and she kept saying that I knew I was right, I knew I was right, and she knew I would write. And then there was this giant – lion - that ran after me in this swirling vortex and I pulled out a double-edged sword that suddenly appeared near me and jabbed the lion in the eye just as it was about to pounce.”
“Eventful!”
“Yes. I suppose so.”
He went to make himself some tea.
“Did you dream?”
“Not really. Nothing I remember.”
They sat in silence. They both stared at the freak rain shower that had started up outside. It was scattering the sky with clouds, turning the green hills and forests into giant opal-tinted leaves. The reservoir in the valley bellow absorbed the water. Suddenly, Selena said,
“I hope Milo got back alright.”
Valentine nodded then realised that Selena was still staring into the distance, so he added,
“I hope he was not swallowed up by the luminous algae of the fishing reservoir!”
Selena giggled.
“Oh no. Dogs have survival instincts.”
Sean popped through the living room door.
“’Morning. Excellent, there’s tea.” And he poured some wat¬¬¬er.
“Any dreams?” asked Valentine.
“Yes, actually. I wrote it down.”
“When did you do that?” said Selena.
“This morning. I got up at seven and wasn’t sure what to do so I went outside and made some rubbings of rocks. Then I came across this strange medallion made of terracotta, with some kind of Celtic swirls on it. I made a rubbing of that too.”
He showed the others the rubbing of swirls and the rabbit and the moon.
“What do you think it is?” Selena asked.
“No idea. It was really clean, it looked sort of new.”
“What was the dream?”
“Oh yeah. I dreamt we were all up on that hill, you know 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 NEXT |
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Notes:
The Failed Novelists.
Franco Moretti's theories on what makes successful detective stories.
Obsessively reading Christie and Conan Doyle.
Making fun of Moretti and anything remotely meta. Oh dear. Now that's meta meta. That is awful, I feel shame and guilt right now, a bit like a poncy person.
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Posted: 6th May 2008
Words: 3452
Viewed: 921 times
Comments: 1
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