I have a friend who is an artist and I've purchased six of his paintings. My favorite, a large painting of sunflowers in a field, hangs in my bedroom. The photograph of one small part of it at the left does it no justice. After he'd parted with it, he told me that he wished he'd kept it because it was a favorite of his. I offered it back to him, but he was on his way to Istanbul and refused. I gave some thought to this and concluded, at the time that as an author I'm lucky that by making my book available I don't necessarily have to part with it. I can pick it up at any time and read it and remember writing it. More recently I've discovered that it's not that simple. When a portion of the book appeared in print, it was without my knowledge or consent. The book had been published in a language I didn't know and had been taken out of its context. With the help of a translator, fluent in both English and Bahasa Indonesia, I was able to claim my copyright. The publisher apologized and we came to terms amicably.
Here I learned that anyone could make my work available at any time and, by assuming I was dead, would never bother to ask permission for publication. It could be plagiarized and misappropriated. My motives could be misunderstood. By remaining "dead" I could not defend myself. I had no control. Of course these things could happen to any author at any time. But, until I announced that I was the author and the owner of the work, I was powerless and defenseless.
Why am I blogging? Because I want an outlet to exercise some control, to defend my work as I did in my first entry. But this is not the only motive. Although I've completed the book The End of Reason, I am working on another book and plan to use this blog as a means of recording my thoughts during its development. This blog can serve as a literary diary, a way for me to examine my thoughts and my motives as I write. The name of this site is "Thought Akin to Dreaming," and it has this name because I can't remember what drove me to write The End of Reason in the first place or what I originally thought would come of it. I took notes to write the book, as I am taking notes for my next book, but I kept no record and I made no notes about writing the book itself. I "dreamed" the development of my book and I woke up after writing the book to find the dream was real. I think this is an experience shared by many writers, but I am not satisfied merely to have written a book; I need to know why. I can rationalize my various motives now, but rationalizations should not be confused with reasons. Ironically, I named the book The End of Reason, though the title was intended to imply where reason will lead or mislead you. I will never completely understand, during the ten years I intermittently worked on the book, how it came to be what it is today. But the book on which I am working today will, if I continue to use this blog, not be such a mystery and I will consciously direct it according to my specific goals, goals which I will elaborate in future posts.
Why am I blogging? If I am honest and fair with myself, there is yet one more reason. To quote George Orwell, a writer's motives are partly, perhaps even mostly, driven by "sheer egoism" and the wish "to seem clever, to be talked about, to be remembered after death, to get your own back on grown-ups who snubbed you in childhood, etc., etc." Orwell was right. I am exactly this self-absorbed. I try to balance self-absorption with self-awareness, but at some emotional level I never grew up and I think this is the "original sin" of creativity--perpetual adolescence.
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