Film, Dear

I think I'll talk a bit about these two ideas brought up in the discussion--

The Dear... bits: I'm not sure I want to resolve the speaker of these, exactly. I'm trying--here and elsewhere in my work--to preserve little bits of irreducible mystery/complexity. So I don't want to just go ahead and say well this is who's speaking, or whatever, partially because I may or may not be right (now that the book's published, it's not exactly mine anymore--it's yours), and because it doesn't resolve perfectly in the book itself, so I want to entertain the negative space that can encompass a couple contradictory readings. I can, however, speak to my intentions, and I see the voice as being either the mother (who is herself a mystery--probably dead, though possibly gone to Canada, and her postcards on the website serve, I hope, to complicate this--and maybe that's a metaphor regardless, Canadian as dead (at least to these characters--I should say I have nothing against Canada, since where I'm from we're practically Canadian, we get their TV, their sports, much of their culture, but the space North of the border is this big Other up there--white space, the unknown, my own personal Congo/Heart of Darkness or whatever). The voice of the mother (though again it's possibly some even weirder thing speaking, a sort of greek chorus in the book, or the place, or the town, or the Paulding Light, which is real, by the way (you can see a bizarro low-budget film in the style of the Blair Witch Project at: <http://pauldinglight.com/>)) (and sorry for my nested parentheses, which might be a big ridiculous, but I like them) is one of the few times in the book where there's real solace offered to Yr Protagonist, or to the other characters. I wanted the book to be cradled, in a fashion, by this stuff outside of and bigger than the book, these radio waves, this intricate network of etheric whatever, by love or by family, themselves irreducibly complex. As a side note on irreducible complexity, I like this idea even though it's been co-opted by the Intelligent Design crusaders, which is sort of sad. I don't want to echo that...

Regarding film, I do think that this could translate well. Not to a blockbuster sort of thing, obviously, but there's a lot of the visual happening. I think of films like A Simple Plan or The Sweet Hereafter, in their way, or something like Tales from the Gimli Hospital, though I find the style of that film a bit hard to take in the end. If I had the skillz to attack the project, I would totally go after it. Though I don't have quite that level of hubris. I would score it with music by Low, who get a nod in the acknowledgments--that's the soundtrack to this work in my mind. I would love to be able to do some more fun multimedia thing with it, but that's even a couple orders more complicated than the idea of just doing two-dimensional design, or just of writing fiction to begin with, which is in itself insanely complicated when you look at it closely enough.

One of the things I really like about hearing people talk about my work is finding these other texts that have somehow eluded my spotty reading habits, things that should be essential reading for me. So thanks for this.

Comments

[Dan Wickett]

I somehow never connected that voice with the mother - I heard it as some sort of strangely otherworldly entity.

I'd love to see this as a film - reading it had me searching for my copy of Jim Jarmusch's Stranger Than Paradise to revisit the scenes where they trio drives to Lake Erie in the middle of winter.

[Sam]

"A Simple Plan" and "The Sweet Hereafter" -- two great "snow country" classics. Re Egoyan, I think an OE film would allow him to continue to explore the territory he covered in his biopic of Brian "Spinner" Spencer.

Interesting that the music of the film would be different than the music of the characters (New Order, Black Sabbath, Cowboy Junkies, AC/DC, Journey, Bon Jovi, Van Halen, Alice Cooper). And what's with Dwight Yoakam, who appears only in the cast of characters?

[AnderMonson]

Ha--true that poor Dwight doesn't get much time in the "main" text of the book, but he is part of the mythology of the place. When I think of the place I think Low, and country music. Which, perhaps combined, equals Mojave 3 or Bonnie "Prince" Billy. Most folks up there listen to a lot of country music, and I always had a love-hate relationship with Dwight, as my dad was a big fan, and I didn't have much time for him at that point in my life (not that I really do now, but I am more interested in that strand of country). It's true, too, that the actual bands name-checked in the narrative could fly pretty nicely as a soundtrack. I actually put together a soundtrack for the book (which is detailed, I think, on the website, but which I'd be happy to send a couple copies out, if you were interested). Might be nice to jack that up with some of the other music therein, but most of that other music, while in keeping with the characters and their places in the world and in the story, hasn't stayed with me like Low has. The exception to that rule is New Order, who have had a pretty consistent career, and I'm including the new album, from which the single, "Krafty," is a five-star song on my iTunes. Not that I want to go all superfan and musicgeek here, exactly, but in my weaker moments that is where I go.

[AnderMonson]

Jarmusch--yeah. I loved watching NIGHT ON EARTH for the Finland scenes. Also the obvious connections of FARGO and TWIN PEAKS. There is certainly a little bit of Lynch working its way through OE. I remember that the oldest story in the book, "Teeth," written about a decade ago, prompted a response from a reader who thought it would work nicely as film.

[Kassia]

Low -- interesting soundtrack choice, but it makes sense. Funny how books and stories often come with soundtracks. I'm always interested to hear the sound behind the book. It gives it another texture.

Dan -- we have more than a few copies of Stranger Than Paradise hanging around here. You in the market for the laserdisc version?

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