| | Our muses often work in mysterious ways… | |
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alj Five Star Member
Number of posts : 9633 Registration date : 2008-12-05 Age : 80 Location : San Antonio
| Subject: Our muses often work in mysterious ways… Fri Sep 28, 2012 12:11 pm | |
| It’s funny how the composing process sometimes works. Several weeks ago, as I was composing the second chapter of Daniel’s Daughter, I started writing this scenario: - Quote :
- Jack Thorne had lost all sense of time. From his perspective, lying in this comfortable bed as he recovered, it seemed that he was in a household of women. There were three of them, at least, whose faces drifted above him as he shifted from waking to sleeping and back again. Although he could tell he was recovering, the process was slower than he would have liked, and for a time, he was trapped here in this room, and as these women were his only visitors, he was making a point of getting to know them.
There was the young one, Maggie, barely a woman, whose deep green eyes and chestnut hair had him so enchanted that when she was around, he could think of little to say; he contented himself with watching her. Lucia, the brown-skinned one, who tended his wounds, was, the others had told him, a curandera, a healer. She was efficient and practical. Her hands were always gentle, and left him feeling rested and assured that he was getting expert care. It was the one they called Molly who intrigued him the most. She was not young, but she still had a fine figure, and her features would have been appealing, had there not been a hardness to them, a distance. He had decided to take on this Molly as a personal challenge, something to give him a sense of purpose so he would not feel quite so helpless and useless. She came most often at night, and said very little. She always brought a book with her, and would read by the lamplight. Keeping it as low as possible, she would pull out a pair of spectacles, wearing them as she leaned into the light, always intent on whatever she was reading. His curiosity grew along with his strength, and so one night he finally asked her, "What is it you read, Mum?" And I stopped. What was Molly reading? I started thinking back to the character as she appeared in Redstone’s Valley, and recalled this scene: - Quote :
- Maria wrapped the loose end of the lariat around the horn of her saddle and backed her horse so that the rope stayed taut, as Daniel had shown her shortly after they married, while Chase wrestled the calf to the ground and held it as Dub burned the Double-R brand into its side. She had ridden with her husband often during those early days, even for a time after she was carrying Dub, once Lucia had convinced Daniel it was okay. It hadn’t taken long for those skills to return. Isabela still tended the gardens and cooked, though much of the life had gone out of her. If it hadn’t been for the large household, she might have given up, but they gave her reason to keep going. Molly, with Lucia’s help, looked after the rest of the household, and kept the children at their lessons. Adam and Chase thought they ought to be allowed to work full time, but she kept them reined in as well, for a few hours at least, reading and discussing the books from the library that the families had put together. She steeped them in Wordsworth and Goethe and even Victor Hugo, working in her special way to instill a love of idealism in them, in spite of the harsh realities of living through a war. Maggie had come through that horrible night, and was developing a resilience, an inner strength and even wisdom that was unusual for a ten-year-old.
Molly, I remembered, was an Idealist, who loved reading and teaching the Romantics, so, who was she reading tonight? Wordsworth? Jake had been fond of Wordsworth, even as far back as his days as a Texas Ranger: - Quote :
- Even up to the night before the battle, it had seemed a good thing. The rangers had spent the day travelling from Leon Creek up toward the Medina River, and were coming close by when they camped for the night. They stopped, settled in, and made camp before dusk. This was his favorite time, this time around the campfire, for Rangers were mostly gentlemen: soft spoken, knowledgeable men, many of them even idealists, their packs containing books - as important a commodity as the hard-tack and jerky, their ammunition, extra shirts, even water.
He remembered how he had looked around him at the men he rode with, men like Ben McCulloch, Kit Ackland –He continued to recall those familiar names, as he took another sip of his drink - Ad Gillespie, Sam Luckey, Peter Bell, and Ben Highsmith. He recalled sitting by the fire and listening as Pete Bell took a volume of Wordsworth from his saddlebag, and read for all to hear:
O Duty! if that name thou love Who art a light to guide, a rod To check the erring, and reprove; Thou, who art victory and law When empty terrors overawe; From vain temptations dost set free; And calm'st the weary strife of frail humanity!
“Duty,” the enlightened poet had written. That was why they were all here, wasn’t it – that sense of having a purpose, of giving back to the community, proud to be a part of it. The young ranger had eased off to sleep, listening to the rest of Wordsworth’s words…
Glad Hearts! without reproach or blot Who do thy work, and know it not: Oh! if through confidence misplaced They fail, thy saving arms, dread Power! around them cast.
Had he consciously heard that last stanza, he might have felt a bit of trepidation. (Incident at Bandera Pass) And Jake’s fondness for Wordsworth had stuck, even after he left the Rangers, vowing to never again make a living by using his pistol: - Quote :
- It was quite a few minutes and several glasses later before either of them spoke again. It was Jake who broke the silence, looking at the, temporarily empty, glass in his hand. It had a gleam to it that was enhanced by little prisms of light sparkling from its cut edges. “Where did you get these, anyway?”
“A gift from my uncle. Old family stuff, to remind me that I had one.” “A glass?” “Old family.” “Ah, then it’s a gentleman’s thing.” Daniel was still sober enough to know he had to tread gently. It wouldn’t do to give a hint that he knew why Jake brought that term up. “Knew a fellow once who called himself a gentleman. He lived in a house in the Vieux Carre. He paid for it with the money he made from a cane plantation on the river. They say he could whip a field hand half to death, then sleep with the man’s woman just after. I decided early on that if he was a gentleman, I wanted no part of being one.” “Is there a point to that story?” “A man is a man when he lives with honor, doing the job he was put here to do.” “And you believe that? That man was put here?” “Put here, or he chose to come.” “And where did you get that notion?” “First, from my uncle, later my father and grandmother, but mostly, these days, just by watching people, listening to the things they say, seeing what they do and how they do it.” “And you can still say that, knowing how your ‘gentleman’ friend…” “Wasn’t my friend.” “How this man treated the people he was supposed to be looking after?” “Supposed to be.” Daniel poured himself another glass. “It’s all in that notion of “supposed,” isn’t it.” “Then there is a difference between what’s right and what’s wrong. A few weeks back, you seemed to be questioning that, as I recall.” “Not questioning that it is. Just saying there isn’t an easy way to figure which is which. You can look at extremes, like that man back in New Orleans, or a man out here who, say, decided that he wanted his neighbor’s cattle, or seed grain, and so he just shot the neighbor and took it.” “So we need laws.” “That’s part of the answer, but the laws are no better than the men who make them, or the men whose job it is to enforce them.” “And if the laws aren’t enforced…” “Or if the wrong people are chosen to enforce them…” Jake thought a minute. He looked closely at the empty glass in his hand, but this time, he didn’t reach for the bottle. He just twisted it, to let it catch the light. And said softly, “a light to guide, a rod/To check the erring...” “Wordsworth? Ah, ‘Duty,’ sure, that would be one way of saying it,’’ Daniel nodded, then thought about it, and added, “Who put you on to Wordsworth, anyway?” “Daniel,” Jake replied, still looking at the prisms in the glass, his mind recalling the image of the ranger, Peter Bell, discharging his pistol in the direction of a brown-haired warrior, “You do not want to know.” (A Time for Love) But Wordsworth didn’t seem quite right for this scene. Hugo? Maybe. It was, at this point in the story, the waning days of the Civil War, and I have read that Les Miserables was a favorite of the Confederate officers, who often kept a copy in their saddlebags. An irony, but still not quite right, considering the circumstances. Who, then, and a little voice at the back of my head whispered, Melville, and this is what my fingers wrote: - Quote :
- Molly looked sharply at him, over the rim of her glasses. Once she had ascertained that he was simply awake, and not in any discomfort, she told him, "The Whale."
"A whale," he replied, and shifted slightly as he asked another question. "Have you ever seen one?" "A real one?" "A real one." Molly almost smiled as she shook her head. "No," she told him, but she said nothing else and went back to her reading. But Jack was alert, for the moment at least, and wanted to talk as much as he wanted to get to know her better. "I saw a sperm whale once." he told her. "I watched it lift its great fanned tail just as it dove into the deep." It worked. Now she was curious. "And where was this?" "In the waters off the coast of Singapore." "Singapore?" ""Yeah, I was on a steamer out of Melbourne, heading through the Indian Ocean on my way to England." "Melbourne in Australia?" "Aye." "You're Australian?" "I am, yes." "A seaman?" Jack shook his head. "Grazier," he told her. "Well, my stepfather is one." "At a cattle station?" Molly was an educated woman, it seemed, to know so much of far-off places and cultures. "Nothing so grand as a station, Mum. A nice sized farm, a bit north of Melbourne, near the edge of the high country. Your hills remind me of home, at least the bit I saw of them before I was hit." "So, what brought you to Texas?" "I came to find my father." Molly looked at him with more curiosity. "His family, I should have said. He died before I was born. My stepfather is a good man, but I had an urge to learn more about who and where I came from. When I arrived in England, I learned that my great-grandfather's uncle had left Somerset for New Orleans near the end of the last century, about the same time my father's ancestor sailed to Australia." "To the penal colony?" "Yes, actually, but not as a convict. My father and his brother were both Marines, and younger sons, so they chose to follow their own lives, each settling on opposite sides of the world, apparently. My great-great grandfather was serving on a ship in that fleet when it sailed into Botany Bay, bringing the first of those convicts to their new home. He liked what he saw of the land, so he stayed." Jack could see that Molly was warming and growing more interested in his story. He decided to ask her something a bit more personal. "How are you connected to the American Thorne's?" At his question, though, Molly slipped quickly back into the protection of her distance and reserve. "My late husband was Daniel's partner. My stepson looks after our interest." Her voice had returned to its crisp coolness. She was clearly done with the conversation. "And you are talking far too much, Mr. Thorne. Go back to sleep." Jack realized that he had overstepped, so he shifted the attention back to himself. "I've been asleep more than I've been awake for, well, the days and nights run together. I reckon I've got them a bit mixed up," he apologized, but continued, hoping to draw her back out, "I don't think I can sleep, but you are probably right about the talking. Perhaps you might be willing to read to me. I'm more than curious about that whale." Molly clearly preferred the idea of reading aloud over being asked to answer more questions, especially personal ones. She relaxed and almost smiled a little as she turned the book back to its first page and began, "The Whale, by Herman Mellville; 'Book the First,'" she turned another page and began reading aloud, "Call me Ishmael…" Of course, I now realize that it cannot stop there. I’ve introduced the thing. There will have to be some follow-up. So, what? Moby dick was a book I had to read for the American Romantics course I took in college, working on a degree in English Lit. Only it came up during a very busy semester, so I had skimmed much of it, read many of the better known chapters and of those beautifully written passages that ran throughout the overly long book, and filled my knowledge in with Cliff Notes – managed to make an “A” on the essay exam by bu******ting my way through (a valid means of learning, BTW, but explaining that is a whole ‘nother post – and this one is getting awfully long already.) So, I downloaded an online version of the novel and googled the Spark Notes. I was amazed at the parallels between Moby Dick and the Redstone concept: the idea that we cannot know the whole of reality, or God, the evils of imperialism which led to the destruction of indigenous cultures, the similarity between the plight of the whale and the buffalo, the wisdom of so-called primitive cultures, it keeps going on. I’m working on Chapter Three of Daniel's Daughter right now, which will include Jack’s first meeting with Daniel. It still needs a lot of work, but that scene will begin with Jack reading The Whale as Daniel approaches him. The book will serve as a means of beginning their conversation. I love it when a plan comes together. Ann |
| | | alj Five Star Member
Number of posts : 9633 Registration date : 2008-12-05 Age : 80 Location : San Antonio
| Subject: Re: Our muses often work in mysterious ways… Mon Oct 01, 2012 11:03 am | |
| I have been letting myself get distracted all morning, but here is the beginning of Chapter Three so far. Hopefully, I have managed to make that connection I was aiming for: - Quote :
- Jack made his way slowly out of his room and onto the veranda. He was surprised at how shaky he still was. Lucia had assured him that his wound was mending, and that now it was more a matter of regaining his strength, but he was learning that it, too, was a slow process. Once outside, he saw a corner with a rocking chair, a straight ladder back, and a small table between them. He shuffled his way to the rocker, and happily sat into it, placing the book on the table as he caught his breath and looked at his surroundings. This veranda seemed, from where he sat, to stretch its way around a large house His own room was quite comfortable. He had been slowly creeping from its bed to the sitting area in front of a fireplace, and back again to his bed. This was the first day he felt strong enough to venture beyond those confines. As he looked around, the first thing that caught his attention was an enormous pink rock that protruded from the ground, directly in his line of vision, though it was clearly miles away. It caught his breath. A word ran through his head: Uluru. The rock formation before him was not as large as the one in the northern territory of his homeland, but it had a similar impact. It rose, in contrast, out of the surrounding landscape, more like a leviathan rising from the ocean than an ordinary hill. Leviathan. The word brought him back to the book he had brought with him: The Whale. He had been intrigued from those first words that Molly had read to him. As he got stronger, the women had stopped taking turns staying up with him during the nights. He had asked Molly if she would leave the book with him so he could continue reading it on his own. She seemed reluctant, at first, to let go of one of her "babies," but smiled and handed it to him once he reminded her, "I reckon I wouldn't get very far, Mum."
So he turned his attention to the book, which he had placed on the small table, picked it up, and turned to his bookmarked page and read again: "...to any one not fully acquainted with the ways of the leviathans, it might seem an absurdly hopeless task thus to seek out one solitary creature in the unhooped oceans of this planet. But not so did it seem to Ahab, who knew the sets of all tides and currents; and thereby calculating the driftings of the sperm whale's food; and, also, calling to mind the regular, ascertained seasons for hunting him in particular latitudes; could arrive at reasonable surmises, almost approaching to certainties, concerning the timeliest day to be upon this or that ground in search of his prey..."
He was quickly into his reading, so much so that he jumped in his chair when he heard a voice beside him:
"Ah, God! what trances of torments does that man endure who is consumed with one unachieved revengeful desire."
Jack turned quickly and saw that a man had walked up to within a few feet of where he sat reading. He had been so engrossed he hadn't noticed, but the man's words were so fresh in Jack's mind that, without thinking, he responded, "He sleeps with clenched hands; and wakes with his own bloody nails in his palms." Surprised at himself, he turned back to the book and realized that he had read the mans word and his own response just a few paragraphs earlier. He looked back at the man who had so quietly joined him, and who seemed to know precisely what he had been reading.
The man was a bit above average height. His long brown hair was pulled back. He wore a loose calico shirt over buckskin trousers, and moccasins rather than boots. His beard showed traces of grey, but it was his eyes that were the most compelling. The skin around them crinkled into lines that suggested smiles. Their shade was a deep blue-grey. He pulled the ladderback chair around at sat in it as he reached out his hand. "You would be Jack Thorne," the man said in an accent that was like the ones he had heard in South Louisiana, where he had first come ashore after leaving England. "I am Daniel Thorne-Redstone. It would seem we are related?"
"Apparently," Jack replied, "your cousins in New Orleans directed me here."
The man who had introduced himself as Daniel chuckled, and the crinkles around his eyes deepened. "Lucia tells me you are recovering, I am told that my daughter is enchanted with her new cousin, and our Molly has clearly given you her approval." He nodded toward the book in Jack's hand. "Welcome to the Double-R." |
| | | Abe F. March Five Star Member
Number of posts : 10768 Registration date : 2008-01-26 Age : 85 Location : Germany
| Subject: Re: Our muses often work in mysterious ways… Mon Oct 01, 2012 11:39 pm | |
| Ann, I think your muse is working in harmony with you. Isn't it great when things come together? |
| | | dkchristi Five Star Member
Number of posts : 8594 Registration date : 2008-12-29 Location : Florida
| Subject: Re: Our muses often work in mysterious ways… Tue Oct 02, 2012 7:37 am | |
| I can tell that your muse is in order by your prolific writing. My muse is gone. I'm having trouble writing anything more than 600 words for my local newspaper. |
| | | alj Five Star Member
Number of posts : 9633 Registration date : 2008-12-05 Age : 80 Location : San Antonio
| Subject: Re: Our muses often work in mysterious ways… Tue Oct 02, 2012 8:04 am | |
| It comes and goes, DK. September was not a productive month - too many distractions. I'm hoping October will be better. |
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