After my last post I was contacted by one of the three people who read this blog (the other two subscribed by mistake and can’t figure out how to fix it). She told me that I should be happy to write entertaining mysteries and not worry about the transgressive thing.
Uh, yeah.
I am not under the impression that my Minerva books are useless. Indeed, I am working on the last rewrite of “The God of War” now, a rewrite I hope and believe will be the final breakthrough to the traditional publishers. Most folks who have read the first 30 pages of the latest version agree. Including a potential agent.
I suppose I didn’t articulate clearly in the last post that I am jealous of my transgressive friend because I feel she is writing Literature (with a captal “l”) while I am writing entertainment.
Truth is, you write what the Muse gives you. My friend’s Muse whispers to her about the demimonde. My Muse gives me clues to murders.
It’s all good, as some of my friends say.
Indeed, you never know whether you are writing trash, disposable BS, or great art. Arthur Conan Doyle thought Sherlock Holmes was beneath him. He wrote lots of other stuff about knights in armor and such. No one reads that stuff. But 125 years after the first Sherlock Holmes story, the whole world knows the name of his fictional creation who starred in what his creator thought was “trash.”
Shakespeare himself thought his plays were throw-away garbage, written for the theatre goers from the nobility to the street people. He was sure that, after his death, those flimsy little plays would disappear but his great epic poems, Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece would be his claim to fame.
Goes to show you. You can look at the “literary” books published in the 1890s and find a paltry few which have lasted. Mostly stuffy by Henry James, who wasn’t terribly popular in his time.
Of course, I have no delusions about Minerva. I think she’s fun. I think she’s original. I think people will really like these stories. I hope she does so well I can finally put down the lawyer’s robe and pick up the pen to make a living.
But literature? I have no say in the matter.
I hope this clarifies things, class.
Mark Bruce, Writer 