apology + oz
Aug. 11th, 2009 08:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
maculategiraffeI've been in a bit of a state these last few days-- real-life pileup plus emotional shit-- and I'm really really behind not just on LJ life but on all aspects of online life, I have piled up unread e-mails and messages, & if you've e-mailed me urgently you might want to call me instead if you have my number, or send me another e-mail or message or whatever if you think I've missed it. I'm ok now, working on catching up, I will soon, I think.
(On a nearly unrelated note, I have reread almost all the Oz books over the past few days-- they can be very soothing in times of nervous hysteria-- and now that I'm up again I'm completely fascinated by Baum's "to the reader" forewords and what an amazing picture they paint of the contemporaneous Oz-books fandom, in all its "the root word is fanatical" glory. Because after a while, every book ends with Ozma or somebody being like "So, we are now doing a magical thing that will ensure that no books can ever be written about Oz EVER AGAIN, so yeah, farewell forever to the outside world, and to that nice Mister Baum, and stuff" and then every new book's foreword is like "So, um, I just received twelve million letters begging me to write just one more Oz book, and like, some of them were from kids in iron lungs, and, um, so, what I realized, is that even though Oz is indeed invisible and inaccessible forever, the wireless telegraph has now been invented, and Dorothy has just totally sent me this entire book in wireless telegraph form,* but then the Cowardly Lion accidentally spilled some pickled-pixie juice on the entire Oznian telegraph system** so no more after this srsly." And then later there are actual crossovers, like apparently a ton of his readers wrote him letters saying "You know those characters of yours, Trot and Captain Bill, who were in that book you wrote that was boring because it was not about Oz? Well, I just had a great idea about how THEY SHOULD GO TO OZ!" and he's like "So, even though the past four books have all ended with increasingly compelling reasons why NOBODY IS EVER GOING TO OZ OR HEARING FROM IT EVER AGAIN, here's a book in which Trot and Captain Bill go to Oz. I hope you little anklebiters have been saving your allowance. Love, Uncle Frank." It's kind of amazing how often he thanks "my dear little friends" for "all the wonderful ideas you have sent me for new Oz stories"-- this is like immediately after the invention of electricity, and you've got a thriving fandom full of tireless little fanficcers communicating via Pony Express, and the author going, "Cool idea-- I'll stick it in the next book. Thanks, kids! Nice prose, too-- sorry I had to puerile it up a little, but that's kinda my thing, you know? Man, too bad you guys aren't going to be around for the invention of the internet-- you'd be total BNFs.")
...anyway. Yes. I am working on catching up, and after a worryingly long time*** of not writing at all (except about particularly tenacious nightmares), I've got the next chapter of Maiden almost ready to go, I think. I'm sorry for the gumminess of my wireless signal lately.
*I am actually not making this up. It's in the foreword to The Patchwork Girl of Oz.
**Okay, that part I am making up. I think the wireless signals do somehow get magically scrambled though.
***For me this is anything over a week.
(On a nearly unrelated note, I have reread almost all the Oz books over the past few days-- they can be very soothing in times of nervous hysteria-- and now that I'm up again I'm completely fascinated by Baum's "to the reader" forewords and what an amazing picture they paint of the contemporaneous Oz-books fandom, in all its "the root word is fanatical" glory. Because after a while, every book ends with Ozma or somebody being like "So, we are now doing a magical thing that will ensure that no books can ever be written about Oz EVER AGAIN, so yeah, farewell forever to the outside world, and to that nice Mister Baum, and stuff" and then every new book's foreword is like "So, um, I just received twelve million letters begging me to write just one more Oz book, and like, some of them were from kids in iron lungs, and, um, so, what I realized, is that even though Oz is indeed invisible and inaccessible forever, the wireless telegraph has now been invented, and Dorothy has just totally sent me this entire book in wireless telegraph form,* but then the Cowardly Lion accidentally spilled some pickled-pixie juice on the entire Oznian telegraph system** so no more after this srsly." And then later there are actual crossovers, like apparently a ton of his readers wrote him letters saying "You know those characters of yours, Trot and Captain Bill, who were in that book you wrote that was boring because it was not about Oz? Well, I just had a great idea about how THEY SHOULD GO TO OZ!" and he's like "So, even though the past four books have all ended with increasingly compelling reasons why NOBODY IS EVER GOING TO OZ OR HEARING FROM IT EVER AGAIN, here's a book in which Trot and Captain Bill go to Oz. I hope you little anklebiters have been saving your allowance. Love, Uncle Frank." It's kind of amazing how often he thanks "my dear little friends" for "all the wonderful ideas you have sent me for new Oz stories"-- this is like immediately after the invention of electricity, and you've got a thriving fandom full of tireless little fanficcers communicating via Pony Express, and the author going, "Cool idea-- I'll stick it in the next book. Thanks, kids! Nice prose, too-- sorry I had to puerile it up a little, but that's kinda my thing, you know? Man, too bad you guys aren't going to be around for the invention of the internet-- you'd be total BNFs.")
...anyway. Yes. I am working on catching up, and after a worryingly long time*** of not writing at all (except about particularly tenacious nightmares), I've got the next chapter of Maiden almost ready to go, I think. I'm sorry for the gumminess of my wireless signal lately.
*I am actually not making this up. It's in the foreword to The Patchwork Girl of Oz.
**Okay, that part I am making up. I think the wireless signals do somehow get magically scrambled though.
***For me this is anything over a week.
