Anybody out there? Been a long time since I posted, I know. I doubt anyone cares, but the reason has been a headlong rush to finish the first draft of a new novel. That’s done (though an edit will doubtless occur soon, oh happy prospect). I’m doing some screenwriting in the meantime, and tomorrow I’m heading to Brighton for the World Horror Convention. But for now…
This may read rather like coming across a re-run of the snow-blown Christmas Special of some old sitcom in mid-March, but this lunchtime I happened to be leafing through old recipe cuttings (yes, my life really is that dull), and came across one of those features that magazines run like clockwork during the festive season:
“Why not try something different to boring old turkey this year?”
Indeed, I thought, as always — or, on the other hand, why not stop trying to establish some dreary measure of self-definition by opting out of well-established and non-harmful ways of being? Christmas and its associated culinary traditions are — for those not directed otherwise through parallel belief systems — one of the few moments of national or international bonding left (apart, of course, from those relating to the death of a ‘celebrity’ or the climax of some witless cultural cancer like The Gag Factor or Big Moron). And… it only happens once a year. How can something you do just once a year have got to the stage of being so unutterably boring? To be fair, allowance must be made for Americans in this regard, who may have eaten the same thing only a month before: but, for everyone else, let’s get this straight — can you only bear one pasta dish a year, or one pizza, or one Chinese takeout? No, I thought not.
So unless you’re actually allergic to turkey, suck it up and eat the bloody stuff. Share in the event. Join the party. Do what everyone else is doing for this one day: don’t try to prove you’re different and fascinating through smirkingly serving up boiled lark’s tongue or a remoulade of mutton with a tangerine foam. Nobody’s watching, my friend. Nobody cares. There is great peace to be found, once in a while, from doing what everyone else is, especially when the tradition has been around for a few hundred years. Take a few minutes off the endless battle to be an individual, from refining and promoting your personal brand. Melt into the undertow for a day. It’s actually a blessed relief.
Which brings me by a roundabout route to a book recommendation. I picked this up for my wife last Christmas, on a whim, and she enjoyed it so much she insisted I read it too. I’ve finally got around to it. The book is DELIGHT, by J. B. Priestly. Originally published sixty years ago — but available now, in the UK at least, in an attractive reissue from Great Northern Books — it’s a collection of over a hundred essays on things that happened to bring the writer ‘delight’. The subjects are extremely varied (I read entries last night on the sound made by an orchestra tuning up, family silliness, and the feeling you get the day after reaching the end of a long, hard piece of work), and all are short, two or three pages at most. The prose is superb (not flashy, just good-humoured, charming and very accomplished), and there are stirring insights into everything from the nature of friendship to the joys of procrastination, but what’s best of all is the project itself.
So much writing these days, especially on the web — my own often included, I know — consists of whining and critiquing and showing just how jolly determined we are not to have the wool pulled over our eyes. We live in a universe where everyone prowls with itchy trigger fingers, searching gimlet-eyed for fault and insufficiencies, where the default review is one star. DELIGHT is just the opposite, and there should be many more books like it. Not eating turkey is not a sign of being grown-up — and neither is the adolescent carping that so many of us seem addicted to, this oh-so-sharp but oh-so-cheap trashing of everything in creation.
Saying that something’s crap is easy. Saying that something’s great… is bold.
Let’s be bold.
34 comments
Comments feed for this article
March 22, 2010 at 5:14 pm
Rhiarti
Fabulous to see you resurface… and in such style, too! Adding Delight to my shopping basket, and muttering about having moved away from Brighton. Have a fabulous time at the Horror Convention!
March 22, 2010 at 5:41 pm
ememess
It’s nice to resurface… Enjoy delight 🙂
March 22, 2010 at 5:20 pm
Chris Cowan
You may also be interested in the following on a similar theme
Arthur Mee’s Book of One Thousand Beautiful Things: Chosen From The Life And Literature Of The World.
pp. xxvii. 320. Hodder & Stoughton: London, 1925.
Further information: Arthur Mee described this anthology as a “miscellany of beauty”: “In these pages are poems that will never die, thoughts that have come to us down the centuries, words that fill the air with music when they are said aloud, pictures we all love to see, gems of craftsmanship from artists who love beauty and have served it well, sculptures that adorn the galleries of the world.”
All of the extracts (poetry, Bible passages, quotations from great men and women…) are fairly short, so that this volume (like the Book of Everlasting Things) is an excellent resource for anyone requiring suitable passages for copywork.
March 22, 2010 at 5:40 pm
ememess
That sounds excellent – I’ll hunt it down 🙂
March 22, 2010 at 5:42 pm
Linda
Really enjoyed reading that, and yes, your absence has been noted!
It is far too rare that we celebrate the good things in life, however small or transient they may be. I anticipate with relish the sameness that Christmas brings each year; it is like a comfort blanket that has travelled my life with me since I was a small child. I may have seen some changes in terms of those sat around the table but very little else has changed…. and I like it that way.
You have inspired me to read ‘Delight’; it sounds like one of those rare gems that can lift your mood whenever you dip into it. I can’t wait to find it.
March 22, 2010 at 5:45 pm
ememess
Sometimes, sameness is good 🙂
Depending where you are… Delight is here.
March 22, 2010 at 5:53 pm
Linda
Thanks for that; it is sometimes difficult to find things locally since I live in Jersey.
Have ordered it already!
March 22, 2010 at 6:19 pm
Chris Limb
Good to read another blog entry at last (and to hear that a first draft is complete).
It does indeed seem that the default state for opinions these days is negative. Perhaps this has always been the case, but the difference is that we now live in an era when everyone can (and more often than not does) express these opinions. In writing. At length.
Of course there’s nothing wrong with a well written negative critique (I must admit to enjoying the sheer savagery of Charlie Brooker) but as you mentioned in an earlier blog entry about Customer Reviews the bulk are appalling…
Brighton currently damp and grey – please bring some weather.
March 22, 2010 at 6:56 pm
ememess
Aha, yes, with Brooker it’s very hard not to be swept away by the sheer vitriol 🙂 I’ll do what I can with the weather, but it ain’t that dry up in London either, I’m afraid…
March 22, 2010 at 10:13 pm
katey
Fine, I’ll eat your turkey. I’ll even happily take the dark meat. But try and sneak a sprout onto my plate and there’ll be trouble, Mister.
As for the general theme of your post, I agree wholeheartedly. You know what; I think the problem is that in this era of advanced technology, material abundance, medical breakthroughs, and almost-peace, we’ve not got enough real problems to focus on, so we direct the negativity associated with our apathy toward something totally irrelevent and totally underserving. Pretty sad, huh?
There are many simple pleasures in life that can be experienced daily if you can just shut up your inner critic for long enough to notice and appreciate them. Whilst I understand that looking for the positives in life isn’t a skill that necessarily comes naturally to everyone, it sure is worth the effort to re-learn how to see things as if through a toddler’s eyes, rediscovering that sense of wonder at the world.
March 23, 2010 at 9:14 am
ememess
Funny thing. I LOATHED sprouts for years. But now… I kinda like them. I’d try to find a metaphor in there for learning to appreciate the simple pleasures, but I sense you’re not the audience for it 😉
March 23, 2010 at 3:08 pm
Kate
OK, I’ll go. For years my Mum would put a couple of sprouts on my plate at Christmas and insist I try them, because my tastes might have changed and I may find out I like them (probably because of people like you, you traitor ;)). Each year I would dutifully bite into one of those watery balls of earwax and wretch, and my family would laugh. Now that I cook my own Christmas dinner and eat it in my own house, the simple pleasure comes from being grown-up enough to choose what goes on my own plate, and from being childlike enough that if my husband sneaks a sprout onto my plate, I will most likely throw it in the direction of his head…
March 22, 2010 at 11:29 pm
Jordan
So glad to see you back (and even more glad to see talk of drafts and new novels and such)!
Thank you for the recommendation, and more importantly the reminder to look for the positive, and delight in the little things. Or the big things. 🙂
March 23, 2010 at 12:08 pm
ememess
Finishing a first draft comes *very* high on my list of delights… 😉
March 23, 2010 at 2:10 am
Azzah
*Delighted* you are back. Enjoyed the way you bitch slapped yr way through that blog about people who can only complain about something as sacred as the tradition around a turkey dinner and have a sick need to break out of the moldy mold. You set them straight. Shut up and eat what everyone else is eating and damn well enjoy it. Then you gallop into the delights of Delight. The irony does not escape me.
March 23, 2010 at 9:02 am
ememess
You have a fair point 😉
March 23, 2010 at 12:25 pm
Toasty
It’s the weather
It’s January and February, they are torture, they are there to break us, they are instruments of misery, then it gets better, then there is light.
I was talking to an australian at work saying i think you would struggle to write well in australia as it is so beautiful and i would be hard to get anything done and not go to the beach.
Glad you’ve resurfaced.
I have a question if you can email me, it’s not a toughie either.
March 23, 2010 at 10:00 pm
MariBiscuits
Great post. Sounds like your absence was worth it, congrats on finishing first draft.
I think it can be too easy to be negative in blog posts or reviews. Everyone loves to have a good old rant, and proclaiming dislike for something shoddy can be enjoyable to read and write. In a way it is a lot harder to be positive, as someone will always be willing to disagree and we don’t want to expose ourselves to criticism or people questioning our taste.
Worth the effort though I think, and a great way to share and discover hidden gems and common ground.
March 28, 2010 at 5:11 pm
Supermaw » Blog Archive » Weekly Web Geek Digest #5
[…] also great to see writer and director Julian Simpson and novelist Michael Marshall Smith both treating us to new blog posts and updating us on their other projects. I have also been […]
March 30, 2010 at 8:55 am
Eygló Daða
Bold! I like it. Will have to check the book out. And on the subject of giving books, do you have a rule? I try (and I break this rule often) not to give books I haven’t read myself so I can be “sure” the book will be liked by the person who receives it but also so that I am not giving books I myself hate. 🙂
March 30, 2010 at 11:52 am
ememess
Hey there 🙂 With fiction, I’ll only ever recommended stuff I’ve read, obviously. Non fiction, I may take a punt. With DELIGHT, I just noticed it and took a quick look – when I realised I’d been standing there fifteen minutes I thought it was probably safe to recommend…
April 2, 2010 at 7:53 pm
rwakeland
I’m glad to see that you finally updated. I work in a bookstore where there’s a lot of downtime, so I always look up your name in our system hoping there will be a listing for a new book. To spare me from my boredom, sometimes I have to resort to self-help and humor books. It’s nice sometimes to have something quick to breeze through that can make you laugh without slamming politics or philosophy into your brain (and being known as a horror fan keeps my coworkers from thinking that I’m a slacker).
By the way, I’m over in a US college town. Here there is no tradition: the people spend their time in vegetarian delis and foreign restaurants, slamming down flavored coffee and debating Twilight. Holidays are rarely celebrated with the usual.
April 8, 2010 at 1:06 pm
Stuart MacBride
Congratulations on killing off the first draft, Mike. That’ll teach it.
Much though I approve of your backing the art form of appreciating stuff rather than doing it down, I’m still not eating turkey for Christmas. Or mince-bloody-pies.
But neither am I going to go out of my way to be different. No braised bison bollocks for me. Instead I’m going to use it as an excuse to eat all the unhealthy stuff my wife and I love, but don’t cook very often, washed down with lots of lovely wine. The same thing I do on family birthdays and anniversaries.
May 4, 2010 at 1:06 pm
Bec
Hi MMS,
We are here. Always waiting for more of your words!
My favourite band, Virus, always makes me think of Only Forward. Not sure if I was listening to them a lot at the time of reading, or if there is just something about the music which strikes me with the same imagery as you.
See if you like it, if you wish: http://www.myspace.com/czral
Bec
May 4, 2010 at 1:15 pm
ememess
Sounds interesting – I’ll go check them out 🙂
May 8, 2010 at 1:39 am
Supermaw » Blog Archive » Weekly Web Geek Digest #5
[…] Delight « And another thing… From: michaelmarshallsmith.wordpress.com Maw says: A delightful blog post from novelist Michael Marshall (Smith). […]
June 2, 2010 at 3:53 am
Gigi Peterkin
Dude…it’s June. How many times will the first draft die? How many edits will there be? Don’t make me resort to email – tedious. Though some of my best work is done in email… no?
June 10, 2010 at 4:54 pm
Simiyon Moonseed
Fantastic news that there’s a new book coming. Absolutely ADORED Bad Things. Here’s to the flow!
June 10, 2010 at 6:50 pm
ememess
Delighted to hear you enjoyed BAD THINGS! Yep, new book has now had its first edit, so it’s inching close…
June 20, 2010 at 12:55 pm
Matt McKenzie
Hello there. I’m terribly pleased there’s a new novel on it’s way. I’ve followed your work from…erm…1994, I think it was, with Only Forward. I’ve loved every novel.
Since 2001, I haven’t had a television ariel or receiver. I decided to pull the thing down (melodramatic as it sounds) in a fit of pique at the bilge that more often than not spews forth from the offending item. This has created much more time to sit a read, listen to the radio or music and creates a wonderful platform from where I can release a vitriolic tirade on the ‘evils’ of the idiot box. Yes, there are some decent programmes, but I found myself becoming more and more irritated by the broadcasts – why didn’t I just turn the damned thing off?
Still. What was my original point? Hmmm…don’t know.
Have you read any Haruki Murakami? I believe you may enjoy Kafka on the Shore, if you haven’t already.
I can barely wait for your new novel. Thanks for everything.
June 20, 2010 at 12:56 pm
Matt McKenzie
Curses. There’s no ‘edit’ facility! 😦
June 21, 2010 at 10:23 am
ememess
Hey there 🙂 Nice to meet you, and thank you for your kind comments… I haven’t read any Murakami yet, but I know I probably should.
I hear you on the TV, by the way: you may – or may not – find today’s post of interest… 😉
June 21, 2010 at 6:07 pm
Kate
You’ve been Murakami-less for all these years? Gosh, you poor, deprived thing!
Not everyone loves him, but he is the only author, other than your fine self, that I make sure to read religiously.
Murakami World – where bizarre things happen to the most ordinary of people and things often just don’t make any sense but you still leave feeling satisfied.
June 30, 2010 at 12:45 am
Squander Two
I had goose last year and it was lovely, so I intend to have it again this year. That’s not being wantonly dismissive of shared traditions, is it? It’s an older Christmas tradition than turkey, after all. I’ve heard that it was the popularity of Dickens’s A Christmas Carol that led to the Great Switch from goose to turkey, but have found it difficult to verify that. It would explain, though, how there’s a big turkey still available at the butcher’s for Scrooge to buy on Christmas morning.
Anyway, I too loved Bad Things, which is surely more important than what I eat at Christmas.