Reading Queue: History.
Back to normal reading, which means 3 to 6 books per month, hopefully. I seem to be inclined to read history.
This is a subject that I have been wanting to read for a very long time. I have always felt some sort of fascination with the arab people and culture.
It was the Arabs who allowed Europe to rediscover the ancient knowledge of greeks and romans. It was them who took math into a whole new era.
Yet so little is known or taught about them.
Historical Novel about Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, better known as "Caligula". Author Maria Grazia Siliato is an Italian archeologists who tries to bring Caligula back to life from a more humane and less-of-a-tyrant point of view. What drove the man to become a blood thirsty ruler? What lead to his assasination?
The emperor was surrounded by plots and plans to overthrow him. starting from his rise to power to his assassination at age 29, Caligula's history is rich in all sorts of plans within plans.
Crusades have been a passion of mine since I can remember. As a kid I remember regarding them with a certain romanticism. As I grew up and went from a naive and romantic vission of what they were to a more realistic and crude oppinion that passion grew.
One of my "dreams" is to write a historic novel that takes place in Istambul at the time of the second crusade.
This books ought to keep me entertained for a while.
Killing Drafts & Ghost Ideas
About 10 minutes ago I finished going through the draft posts on this blogs. The original number was 47, current number is 15.
Many of those posts where no more than a couple of lines long. Some I couldn't even remember what drove me to start writing them in the first place. Others would of never seen the light of day anyway, since they where pretty aggressive rants and reactions to certain experiences, cathartic words that rejoice my soul on the sheer thought of having the possibility to *maybe* (just maybe) push the "publish" button.
This seems to be a recurring fact of life with me and literature. I have started writing books (fiction) at least 3 times. On neither of those cases did I go over 100 pages. I still have those drafts, but, much to the demise of the characters frozen in time, I never found it in me to go back and continue those truncated stories.
I think the only way to be somewhat successful in writing for me is to do things Hemingway-ly. Not that I would even dream on comparing my literary skills with great Ernest (as I also wouldn't try to compare my Drinking habits), but in case you don't know, the guy really struggled to get his writing done.
Most of his original scripts have word counts all over the place. He forced himself to write at least a certain number of words every day. If I wanted (or had the time to) write the stories and non-fiction stuff I have in my mind that is the path I should follow. Guess I could call it a method.
Over time I have learned to assume that some (most?) things won't ever see the light of day. This statement is true not only for writing but also applies successfully to all things. If I had to estimate the percentage of ideas that actually become something tangible, I'd have to admit those account for less than 1% of the total.
Some ideas are plainly bad, some are non-viable, some just die because I don't pay enough attention or push hard enough. The latter category is painful. I'm haunted by some of those ideas for years. "Ghost ideas" I call them. The only exorcism is to see them realized (usually by somebody else) or refurbished into novel thoughts that actually make it into the real world.
I lack method, I lack time and I probably lack the will to transform ideas from gray matter haunting ghosts to living and breathing experiences.