by Kate Elliott
The first thing I thought of was the story of Dido and Aeneas, and how badly I have wanted to tell a different version of the story, a version Bee and Cat would prefer. From there it was an easy step to decide to tell the tale as Beatrice herself would tell it, in a way she found more fitting, and to incorporate as part of the story an incident briefly mentioned in Cold Steel in Chapter 13.
I studied several translations of The Aeneid and decided that the best way to accomplish everything I wanted would be to write the piece as a poem, in the style of The Aeneid, suitable for declaiming by an educated young woman in front of an audience, as one does.
The dactylic hexameter that the original is written in felt too complex to tackle in English. I settled on iambic pentameter in large part because I’m so familiar with it from hearing the works of Shakespeare performed in the theater. For me, it almost defines that epic, declamatory style.
Once I started writing and got the pattern in my head, the words flowed easily. The poem was a joy to write for many reasons, and I hope it will be a joy to read. Not least because I like the ending of my version a lot better.
THE COURAGE TO SAY YES
Recently an article by sff writer Nisi Shawl in Cascadia Subduction Zone, titled “Unqualified”, inspired writer Rose Lemberg to muse on Twitter about ways in which writers, and specifically marginalized writers, self-reject. On reading through and contributing to this #dontselfreject hashtag, author Malinda Lo wrote a post “On Self Rejection and Writing From A Marginalized Perspective.”
Among other things, Shawl discusses her experience at the University of Michigan, where she received no mentoring and no information about grants, fellowships, prizes, or awards. She adds, “It was all right to be ignorant of them, because they were obviously intended for good writers.”
This familiar form of self rejection (which I call “those other people are obviously good but maybe/probably I am not or at any rate other people don’t believe I am”) is neatly summed up by Lemberg:
Self-rejection is a huge issue. Self-rejection not just from sending out, but from writing itself, from creating. From fear that what you have to say is hopeless/irrelevant/not good enough to make it as a marginalized person.
Lo’s long and eloquent post about her own writing journey also discusses self rejection:
Yes: I still struggle with self-rejection. Maybe it seems strange, because I’ve had four novels published by a big publisher. Maybe it seems as if I must lack some basic self-confidence, but if you know me, you know that’s not true. I believe in myself; I believe I’m a good writer.
When does one become successful enough that self-rejection falls by the wayside?
I’m fairly sure certain people rarely have trouble with or never succumb to self-rejection, but for some of us this struggle—these wild swings between fragility and assurance—never ends.
I consider myself primarily a novelist. The long form—and especially the multi-volume form—appeals strongly to the way my mind builds story. So while I have written short fiction, I have written it sporadically, usually in response to direct requests for shorter pieces by editors. If you ask me to give you an example of my work, if you ask me “what of yours should I read?” I will reflexively suggest one of my novels.
It therefore came as a surprise to me when Jacob Weisman and Jill Roberts of Tachyon Publications asked if we could have lunch in June 2013 when I was passing through San Francisco to read and sign at Borderlands Bookstore in support of the publication of Cold Steel (the third volume of the Spiritwalker Trilogy).
Tachyon Publications is an excellent small press that specializes in science fiction and fantasy collections, anthologies, and novellas. He asked me if I would consider publishing a short fiction collection in their THE VERY BEST OF series (which has included collections by Charles de Lint, Tad Williams, and the magazine Fantasy & Science Fiction).
I listened. I nodded politely. I asked the sorts of professional and production questions a writer needs to ask to determine if the deal would be mutually productive and successful.
In fact, I was deeply flattered to be asked, and rather shocked anyone would think such a collection to be worthwhile. I have never received plaudits for my short fiction; many people do not know I write it.
The truth is: my first reaction was to self reject, to say “no.”
More than that: I struggled mightily with the idea that I OUGHT to say no. That it would be for the best for them and for me and for everyone, really. The WHOLE WORLD would be better off (my fragile self rejecting voice gibbered) if no short fiction collection by me ever saw the light of day.
At the time I temporized by telling Jacob and Jill that I would get more information, talk to my agent, and get back to them. It was a good way to delay saying no.
You may ask yourself: How did I get to a head-space where I even for a moment considered turning down a chance to have a respected and professional small press publish my collected short stories?
I have published twenty-one novels. My twenty-second and twenty-third novels are coming out later this year. By any measure I am an experienced and successful writer. Of course publication is no guarantor of quality. I might have published twenty-one mediocre or awful novels, and certainly there are some readers who, having read one or two of my books, would heartily subscribe to that theory.
Yet here’s another question: Why do I even say that? Why do I feel obliged to qualify the idea that I might be a good writer with the idea that I might be a bad writer?
Who am I talking to when I make a comment like that? To satisfy a hyper-critical aspect of myself? As an act of appeasement toward people who wish me ill or don’t respect my work? To apologize to people who don’t think about me at all (in which case why bother to address them when they aren’t listening anyway)?
Obviously my qualifications aren’t directed to people who wish me well. Such people (those who wish me well) may or may not enjoy everything I write but they would be the last to think it shouldn’t be published or that I should apologize for it. You don’t have to love every single thing a writer has written to wish them success in their writing endeavors.
In that moment of irrational anxiety as I contemplated a short fiction collection, it seemed wiser and safer to reject myself rather than to face the prospect of someone (who?) rejecting me. Yet ironically rejection is the risk every writer (and artist) takes every time we cast our creations into the public view. We don’t control the response of the audience; nor should we. Once the work is out of our hands, people will respond to it on their own terms.
Writers are far more likely to have to deal with invisibility and disinterest than outright rejection, but the voice of self rejection often plays to the fears of being judged, found wanting, ridiculed, condescended to, told what you write is trivial or unnecessary or done with the wrong words or the wrong aesthetic. That publication is hopeless, irrelevant, something meant for “good writers” who (by some definitions) can never be “us” but only ever someone who fits the description better, whatever that description might be.
As I considered Tachyon’s proposal and examined my own reaction to what any rational analysis would call a no-brainer, what really struck me is how much courage it takes to say yes, especially when you are already starting from a fragile place. I admit I was in a particularly fragile space when Tachyon approached me, mostly unrelated to writing and publishing (it didn’t help that my rib was broken and that we were waiting to hear if my father’s cancer had returned, as indeed it turned out that it had).
But because of that fragility I had to dig down and find the determination to not self reject despite my track record of multiple novel publications, of award nominations, reviews, sales. I had to fall back on the stubbornness that has gotten me this far because this is a career that benefits from a personality that takes stubbornness and persistence to the extreme sports level.
I write these words to let people know that many more writers and artists than yo
u may realize struggle with self rejection. It isn’t just you. It isn’t just a few.
Did I do the right thing by signing on for the short fiction collection?
Of course I did. My experience working with Tachyon Publications has been professional, pleasant, and stellar. Publishers Weekly gave the collection a starred review. As for readers, I hope they will enjoy it. That’s all I can do: write as best as I know how to write and dig deep enough to find my courage.
It’s what I hope for those of you struggling with self rejection. Be bold. Say yes.
A CHAT WITH KATE ELLIOTT
The Beatriceid is a retelling (actually, two retellings) of The Aeneid as a prequel episode in the Academy life of sisters/cousins Beatrice and Catherine from your Spiritwalker trilogy. What strikes us most about The Beatriceid is the successful way you blend the retelling of The Aeneid in the spirit and voice of your Spiritwalker characters. What inspired you to “mashup” the Virgil epic and young Cat and Bee?
I first reference The Aeneid in Chapter 5 of Cold Fire, when I mention the plot of an opera called “The Dido and Aeneas” and have Bee hum what I refer to as “the famous aria.”
Spiritwalker is set in an alternate history of Earth. This alternate history hinges on many differences, chief among them the presence of magic which works on thermodynamic principles. The setting includes many historically attested political institutions, religions, social customs, and ethnicities, but I felt the divergence from our history was substantial enough that for the most part I tried to avoid direct borrowings from or references to medieval or early modern Western literary works.
For example, no character ever quotes Shakespeare because, in a world without Germanic peoples and languages, no person fitting the parameters of Shakespeare’s life and career would have lived. Meanwhile, the reader is introduced to the existence of the renowned poet Bran Cof as if he has the same literary prominence in that world as Shakespeare now does in ours, even though I made him up. He is a figure who might have lived had the Celtic linguistic and political tradition remained central in European development rather than being pushed to the margins by the Germanic expansion.
However, I did feel I could keep some of the foundational Hellenic and Roman literary works, such as The Aeneid, since both Greece and Rome factor into the early influences of this alt-history in very much the same way they do in our world. In the Spiritwalker universe the expanding Roman Republic engaged in a long, drawn out war with the Carthaginian Empire just as it did in ours. But when they fight the battle of Zama, Carthage rather than Rome wins, and thus Carthage rules the Mediterranean Sea for some centuries longer while Rome is contained as a land empire.
Because Bee and Cat were raised in a Kena’ani (Phoenician) household originally founded in Carthage, with all the prejudices against Rome that would suggest, I simply could not resist tossing in a reference to the well known episode from The Aeneid in which the hero Aeneas, fleeing the calamitous end of the Trojan War, sojourns briefly in Carthage (here called Qart Hadast, for “new city”). Naturally Bee and Cat have learned a different version, one far less flattering to Aeneas and Rome.
The title I use, “The Dido and Aeneas,” references the title of Henry Purcell’s famous opera “Dido and Aeneas.” Purcell, of course, uses Dido as a given name, while I use it as a title, the dido, that is, the queen, since it appears that dido could be used as a title, not simply as a personal name. “The Queen and Aeneas” would also work but doesn’t carry the associated weight of “Dido and Aeneas.”
As well, the title of the aria Bee hums in Chapter 5 of Cold Fire is an altered reference to the most famous piece in the Purcell opera and one of the most famous arias in Western opera, “Dido’s Lament,” an absolutely gorgeous and hauntingly sad piece of music. If you read the paragraph in which the reference to the opera appears, you’ll see that I already had a very good idea of how the version of the story Bee and Cat tell differs from the one we know. That’s the version I wrote, complete with sardonic commentary about history, men and their stories, and Rome.
The Beatriceid is written in iambic pentameter—no small feet (excuse the pun)! How difficult—or easy—was the writing process? Are you a fan or regular writer of poetry?
*groan* I never excuse puns!
To be honest, the hardest part of the process was getting past my own fear that I wouldn’t be able to manage it. I admire and love poetry but do not write poetry as a general rule, although I have written bits and pieces (as well as some song lyrics) over the years, mostly when I was younger. So I don’t consider myself a poet, and the attitude that any attempts to write poetry would result in ludicrous and mediocre verse loomed as my biggest obstacle.
Therefore it really took me a long time to get started considering how well I knew the plot and how I would be telling two stories wrapped around each other, one about Cat and Bee and the other about Aeneas and Dido.
To prepare I bought several translations of The Aeneid to get a sense of how Virgil told the story, and to read examples of an epic story retold in iambic pentameter. It helps that I’m relatively familiar with Shakespeare, and have a musical background that makes patterns like this feel very natural to me (far more natural than free verse, which daunts me to write although I enjoy reading it).
Once I pushed past my anxiety and actually started writing, the rhythm settled quickly into my head and the words flowed easily.
The Spiritwalker trilogy has been completed, but you have independently published other books, chapters, and stories that further embellish the world and characters. Can we expect to see even more stories with Cat, Bee, Vai, Rory, and other beloved characters?
Oh gosh, yes, I hope so. I currently have five partially written stories set in the universe, three of which deal with Andevai before the events of Cold Magic, one of which follows an adventure Cat and Andevai have after the end of Cold Steel, and the last of which deals with…babies.
I know the complete plots of four of these stories; I just haven’t had time to finish them. Someday I hope to publish a collection of Spiritwalker fiction that will include the already extant and available stories as well as these five and a few more. I would particularly like to write a story of Cat, Bee, and Chartji working together on behalf of the revolution but I don’t have a plot for that yet. The possibilities seem endless.
This has been quite the prolific year for you, as you published an anthology of short stories early in the year followed by two brand new first-in-a-planned-trilogy novels (Court of Fives and Black Wolves). What are you working on next?
While it may seem I am a writing machine, I only published a single piece of fiction in 2014, a free-on-my-site Spiritwalker-universe novelette, The Courtship. So the deluge of Kate Elliott works in 2015 comes about because of what I wrote in 2014.
However, I do of course have more work coming! A Court of Fives related novella called Night Flower is already available in an ebook edition from Little, Brown Books for Young Readers. Poisoned Blade, the sequel to Court of Fives, is finished and going through production for publication in August 2016.
Meanwhile I am working on the second Black Wolves epic fantasy and the third Court of Fives novel. As always, I poke at other work on the side (although I’m so busy I had to bow out of a short fiction anthology I was solicited to write for), and I am really hoping to finish one or more of the Spiritwalker short pieces. I also have two novellas/novelettes I would love to write set in the Black Wolves universe, and several novel projects impatiently waiting in the wings and clamouring to get written. There seems to never be enough time to get all the work done I’m eager to write.
Finally, a question we ask all of our interviewees: We Book Smugglers have faced condemnation because of the sheer volume of books that we carry back home on a daily basis. As such, we have on occasion resorted to “smuggling books” home to escape judgmental, scrutinizing eyes. Have you ever had to smuggle books?
Oh dear yes, I have. I do so in two ways.
&
nbsp; First: My spouse travels for his work, and I find I buy a fair number of books (online) when he’s gone and thus he doesn’t even see them enter the house. Then when he’s home I virtuously can be seen to purchase nothing.
Second: I have kindly offered to order books for him, and therefore when he asks me to buy a book for him it’s so painless to add one for myself.
It’s not that he objects to books; he’s an academic and loves books too. It’s just…we have so many already. SO MANY BOOKS. Seriously, I have such a TBR backlog built up that I could get locked into my house for months without internet and not worry that I would run out of reading material. Owning all the books I hope to read is my addiction.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Photo Credit: April Quintanilla
Kate Elliott has been writing stories since she was nine years old, which has led her to believe that writing, like breathing, keeps her alive. She is the author of over twenty science fiction and fantasy novels, including her YA debut Court of Fives, as well as Cold Magic, Spirit Gate, King’s Dragon, Jaran, and her short fiction collection, The Very Best of Kate Elliott. Her new epic fantasy, Black Wolves, is now available. She lives in Hawaii with her spouse, paddles with outrigger canoe club Ka Māmalahoe, and nurses along an aging schnauzer.
For more information on the Spiritwalker universe or Kate’s other series, or to sign up for her new release e-mail list, the author invites you to visit her website at KateElliott.com or her Facebook page, or you can follow her on Twitter @KateElliottSFF.
About the Artist
Julie Dillon is a Hugo Award-winning freelance scifi and fantasy artist from Northern California. She’s been drawing most of her life, but officially kicked off her freelance career in 2006 and has been working steadily since then to keep learning, growing, and challenging herself artistically.
Julie received her BFA in Fine Arts from Sacramento State University in 2005, with continued education at the Academy of Arts University in San Francisco and Watts Atelier.