Friday, January 22, 2010

It ws a dark and stormy night....

I have never begun a novel with more misgiving. If you're going to read this, don’t bother. After a couple pages, you won't want to be here. So forget it. Go away. Get out while you're still in one piece. I write this sitting in the kitchen sink. All this happened, more or less.

I was born twice: first, as a baby girl, on a remarkably smogless Detroit day in January of 1960; and then again, as a teenage boy, in an emergency room near Petoskey, Michigan, in August of 1974. Call me Ishmael. In a sense, I am Jacob Horner. I am an invisible man. No, I am not a spook like those who haunted Edgar Allan Poe; nor am I one of your Hollywood-movie ectoplasms. I am a man of substance, of flesh and bone, fiber and liquids. For a long time, I went to bed early. You don't know about me without you have read a book by the name of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer; but that ain't no matter. If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth. I am a sick man. ... I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man. I believe my liver is diseased. In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since. Mother died today.

It was a wrong number that started it, the telephone ringing three times in the dead of night, and the voice on the other end asking for someone he was not. It was the day my grandmother exploded. In the beginning, sometimes I left messages in the street. It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn't know what I was doing in New York. The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel. I was 50 years old and hadn't been to bed with a woman for four years. I had no women friends. I looked at them as I passed them on the streets or wherever I saw them, but I looked at them without yearning and with a sense of futility. I masturbated regularly, but the idea of having a relationship with a woman—even on non-sexual terms—was beyond my imagination. [But] It was love at first sight. Miss Brooke had that kind of beauty which seems to be thrown into relief by poor dress. It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife. What if this young woman, who writes such bad poems, in competition with her husband, whose poems are equally bad, should stretch her remarkably long and well-made legs out before you, so that her skirt slips up to the tops of her stockings? Having placed in my mouth sufficient bread for three minutes' chewing, I withdrew my powers of sensual perception and retired into the privacy of my mind, my eyes and face assuming a vacant and preoccupied expression.

A screaming comes across the sky. Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of lather on which a mirror and a razor lay crossed. Through the fence, between the curling flower spaces, I could see them hitting. They shoot the white girl first. We started dying before the snow, and like the snow, we continued to fall. The cold passed reluctantly from the earth, and the retiring fogs revealed an army stretched out on the hills, resting. It was a pleasure to burn. I had the story, bit by bit, from various people, and, as generally happens in such cases, each time it was a different story.

Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again. Granted: I am an inmate of a mental hospital; my keeper is watching me, he never lets me out of his sight; there's a peephole in the door, and my keeper's eye is the shade of brown that can never see through a blue-eyed type like me. They're out there. Black boys in white suits up before me to commit sex acts in the hall and get it mopped up before I can catch them. It was like so, but wasn't. Where now? Who now? When now?
Already guessed what it’s all about? Reads quite nicely don’t it? It better! Because the above is a ‘story’ written by stitching together some of the most famous opening lines in literature. Opening lines only. Except in a couple of instances, only the first sentence or the first few words. Look them up. Ah yes. The title of the post too. The classic evergreen opening from Edward Bulwer-Lytton's Paul Clifford.
Next up? A story using famous ending line? Maybe. A song on the same line? Maybe. Maybe not. Once is enough. Next time, new experiment.

3 comments:

Shenoy said...

And here’s the key (annotations?)…whatever. The lines and books. Here goes:
It was a dark and stormy night....[Edward Bulwer-Lytton's Paul Clifford]
I have never begun a novel with more misgiving. [Somerset Maugham, The Razor's Edge] If you're going to read this, don’t bother. After a couple pages, you won't want to be here. So forget it. Go away. Get out while you're still in one piece. [Chuck Palahniuk, Choke] I write this sitting in the kitchen sink. [Dodie Smith, I Capture the Castle] All this happened, more or less. [Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five]

I was born twice: first, as a baby girl, on a remarkably smogless Detroit day in January of 1960; and then again, as a teenage boy, in an emergency room near Petoskey, Michigan, in August of 1974. [Jeffrey Eugenides, Middlesex] Call me Ishmael. [You better know this one, now] In a sense, I am Jacob Horner. [John Barth, The End of the Road] I am an invisible man. No, I am not a spook like those who haunted Edgar Allan Poe; nor am I one of your Hollywood-movie ectoplasms. I am a man of substance, of flesh and bone, fiber and liquids. [Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man] For a long time, I went to bed early. [Marcel Proust, Swann's Way] You don't know about me without you have read a book by the name of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer; but that ain't no matter. [Mark Twain, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn] If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth. [J. D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye] I am a sick man. ... I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man. I believe my liver is diseased. [Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Notes from Underground] In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since. [F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby] Mother died today. [Albert Camus, The Stranger]

It was a wrong number that started it, the telephone ringing three times in the dead of night, and the voice on the other end asking for someone he was not. [Paul Auster, City of Glass] It was the day my grandmother exploded. [Iain Banks, The Crow Road] In the beginning, sometimes I left messages in the street. [David Markson, Wittgenstein's Mistress] It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn't know what I was doing in New York. [Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar] The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel. [William Gibson, Neuromancer] I was 50 years old and hadn't been to bed with a woman for four years. I had no women friends. I looked at them as I passed them on the streets or wherever I saw them, but I looked at them without yearning and with a sense of futility. I masturbated regularly, but the idea of having a relationship with a woman—even on non-sexual terms—was beyond my imagination. [Charles Bukowski, Women] [But] It was love at first sight. [Honestly man, you gotta know this one] Miss Brooke had that kind of beauty which seems to be thrown into relief by poor dress. [George Eliot, Middlemarch] It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife. [Yep, that’s the one!] What if this young woman, who writes such bad poems, in competition with her husband, whose poems are equally bad, should stretch her remarkably long and well-made legs out before you, so that her skirt slips up to the tops of her stockings? [Gilbert Sorrentino, Imaginative Qualities of Actual Things] Having placed in my mouth sufficient bread for three minutes' chewing, I withdrew my powers of sensual perception and retired into the privacy of my mind, my eyes and face assuming a vacant and preoccupied expression. [Flann O'Brien, At Swim-Two-Birds]

END OF PART 1

Shenoy said...

PART 2

A screaming comes across the sky [Thomas Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow]. Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of lather on which a mirror and a razor lay crossed. [James Joyce, Ulysses] Through the fence, between the curling flower spaces, I could see them hitting. [William Faulkner, The Sound and the Fury] They shoot the white girl first. [Toni Morrison, Paradise] We started dying before the snow, and like the snow, we continued to fall. [Louise Erdrich, Tracks] The cold passed reluctantly from the earth, and the retiring fogs revealed an army stretched out on the hills, resting. [Stephen Crane, The Red Badge of Courage] It was a pleasure to burn. [Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451] I had the story, bit by bit, from various people, and, as generally happens in such cases, each time it was a different story. [Edith Wharton, Ethan Frome]
Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again. [Daphne Du Maurier, Rebecca] Granted: I am an inmate of a mental hospital; my keeper is watching me, he never lets me out of his sight; there's a peephole in the door, and my keeper's eye is the shade of brown that can never see through a blue-eyed type like me. [Gunter Grass, The Tin Drum ] They're out there. Black boys in white suits up before me to commit sex acts in the hall and get it mopped up before I can catch them. [Ken Kesey, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest] It was like so, but wasn't. [Richard Powers, Galatea 2.2] Where now? Who now? When now? [Samuel Beckett, The Unnamable]


And the one I wish I had included…slipped my mind. The eternal…..” Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins.”

Sanga said...

Reads like some my dreams or nightmares - disconnected but strangely interesting as well.