Inspiration – Page 2 – LOUISE PIEPER

Possums in the World Tree

I live in a valley named for the Norse god Odin.*

And there he is, overlooking the square at our local town centre, with his two possums Thought and Memory.** And their little possum baby, Mythappropriation…

You don’t remember the possums? Weird.

Listening to the possums last night, running up and down the branches of the world tree Yggdrasil, reminded me that last year I co-presented a session for writers talking about animal folklore and the symbolism of different beasts. Animals in a story tell you a lot about the character they’re associated with. Let’s face it, Odin squinting at you with two brooding ravens on his shoulders sends a very different message from this Odin with his fluffy possums.

A 9th Century Old Saxon adaptation of the New Testament put a dove, not above Christ in radiance, but on his shoulder, because it made him more god-like to those people (although obviously it wasn’t conjuring the idea of a warrior god).

I wouldn’t be messing with a character who had any kind of corvid or eagle on their shoulder. What about a wren on the character’s shoulder? Or a sparrow? A parrot? A duck? They all send different messages to the reader.

Philip Pullman tapped into this in the His Dark Materials trilogy with Daemons, and I think that anyone who has read all the Harry Potter books and tells you they’ve never considered what animal form their Patronus would take, is probably lying. (Mine would totally be a tapir…)

Another choice of animals is presented in fiction by the notion that every witch needs a familiar. So, what’s it to be? A traditional cat, called Pyewacket or Vinegar Tom (although they were an imp and a dog, back in the day, according to witch-finder general Matthew Hopkins). Maybe a bat, a rat or a toad? A pig? A raven or crow? A snake or a spider? Or something even more exotic?

I love the drawing, by Canadian artist Jean-Baptiste Monge, of a witch on a pig. A copy sits next to my desk, courtesy of RedBubble. When I Googled for that link, I discovered that, apparently, the map of Great Britain looks like a witch riding a pig. Who knew?

Terry Pratchett doubtlessly did and he also knew that a pig witch was going to get a different reaction than a witch with a black cat, because animals come with their own baggage of symbolism and folklore and superstitions.

So, which witch would you want to write about?***

It’s a fun writing prompt if you’re suffering the angst of an empty page. Do an online image search for “girl/boy/man/woman/child/person with a (animal of choice)” and see if you can find a picture of someone who might be a very different kind of witch.

Then write their story.

*Actually, the story of Woden is more interesting than that and totally explains the possums. The Woden Valley is named for an early property in the area, named Woden in 1837. But, did the owner, Dr James Murray, simply name the property after the god or was he influenced by the local Indigenous word for possum, wadyan?
Nothing is certain – but this story of urban etymology reported by the ABC last September makes for fascinating reading.

**This mural is the work of a Canberra-based artist, Voir, who not only painted the god and his possums, but also decorated my favourite coffee place – Coffee House in Fyshwick. Ona! Best. Coffee. Ever. Odin hit the street last December, courtesy of the Woden Youth Centre and the ACT government’s Graffiti Management program.

***All the art in this post is obviously not mine and my post isn’t meant to infringe on the copyright of anyone’s work. The blue-haired witch and cat is a painting by Russian artist Tanya Shatseva, the girl with the deer is a photograph by another Russian artist Katerina Plotnikova and the other two… sorry, I’m still trying to track down where I found them. I find all these works inspiring and I hope you do too.

All that is needed

FF-JUNE-PROMPT-1024x683 On the first Friday of each month the Australian Writers Centre runs a 55 hour 500 word writing challenge called Furious Fiction. It’s furious fun! June’s writing prompt was an image (extract above – see the full image and the winner and shortlisted stories here).

The first thing I saw was a face in the window. So, here’s my 500 words worth:

All that is needed
The room is a symphony of light and symmetry. Marta steps back from the table and I lean forward. I would press myself against the glass if I could. I would draw close and closer still, a moth to the room’s bright flame.

She nods once, affirming perfection, and tugs the cloth from her belt. Transformed from menial to hostess, she opens the door.

Two waiters hurry in, hired so Marta can enjoy herself. They look young and rumpled in borrowed suits. The freckled one darts a glance at the window and I shrink back into shadow, but no doubt he only checks the bottles of wine on the sill.

The guests follow. Sebastian and Elisabeth. Arthur, immaculate. Charles, messy as ever. His bow-tie sits askew and a lock of hair waves like a parrot’s crest. Sybille and Frances whisper secrets. Fiona casts venomous glances at her cousins’ dresses, their heels, their effortless chic.

Grand-mère claps her hands at all Marta has wrought. Her diamonds catch and scatter the light as she turns, admiring. I feel her gaze pass over me and her smile dims. But she presses her powdered cheek to Marta’s, murmuring praise.

I don’t know the other five. Friends? Colleagues? One is a redhead in a tight dress which hugs her curves, snug as whipped cream. Sebastian admires her and thinks Elisabeth doesn’t notice. Two dangerous men, sleek as jungle cats, in their dark suits and matching ties. Another man, attentive to a middle-aged beauty in an emerald sari.

The women flutter, bright as butterflies, finding their places. The men settle like sombre moths beside them. Their chatter fades and they turn to raise their glasses to the guests of honour.

Teddy stands in the doorway, a pirate in a three-piece suit. For a moment, he is all I can see. He smiles at the room but his gaze avoids the windows. An ice queen clings to his arm – diamonds on alabaster skin, white dress and ash-blonde hair. She looks cold but not as cold as me. Then she laughs and pulls him with her to the window.

Her face is inches from mine. She doesn’t see me.

“What a view you have,” she exclaims, “although we’re only, what, five floors up?”

Against the wall, the waiter pales beneath his freckles. Does he see behind the reflection of blonde prettiness is a dark-haired girl looking in from the other side of the glass with eyes like coals?

Teddy doesn’t see me. He never really saw me. He went on with his life and left me here, pinned like a specimen fixed to a board. The windows are old and heavy enough to break the spine of anyone incautious enough to lean out. Although someone would have to release the sash cord.

It wasn’t the fall which killed me.

“To absent friends,” Marta says and raises her glass to me.

Everything is perfect. Everyone is here. And I am the ghost at the feast.

The fruits of others’ labours

I love gardens. I like immersing myself in their sensory delights in different seasons. I like wandering around and admiring all the hard work that’s gone into creating a magnificent living sculpture. I like the quirky touches and the serendipitous pairings of plants and the way that you can turn a corner and find something new and beautiful.

But, I am a haphazard gardener, at best.

Which is why I adore open gardens. The generosity of people who share their lovely gardens with lazy sods like me (and, of course, other dedicated gardeners) just amazes me. I’ve seen newts in a garden in Edinburgh and ridden a mini train in a garden in south-east Queensland, and always been delighted by some element of each garden I’ve seen.

I joined Open Gardens Canberra not long after I moved here, and it’s currently the spring season for open gardens. Of course, the city has Floriade each year, which is a kind of huge open garden, but last weekend I visited two very different and very beautiful gardens.

Both were inspirational from a writing point of view.

The first was Wanna Wanna, at Carwoola, out near Captain’s Flat. This is an historic homestead with a glorious traditional garden – those are the twisted branches, in the image above, of the wisteria walk to the tennis court. I’m working on a story with a character who has inherited a much-loved, old garden, and Wanna Wanna was exactly what I needed to see… and smell, and touch, and enjoy.

Every garden ‘room’ brought fresh delights, but most intriguing was the literal room of the restored slab hut, which dates from 1859. I was fortunate enough to chat with one of the current owners, who explained some of what they’d done to turn the hut where the Taylor family raised nine children in the middle of the 19th century, into delightful guest accommodation – for two.

Not far away in distance, but a world apart in garden design, was Tour Rouge.

Here is the red tower which gives the property its name, attached to the loggia – an al fresco entertainment space which would inspire anyone to throw lavish parties just to show it off. Their online galleries show this amazing garden in all its glory.

For me, I could have spent the whole day – in fact quite a large number of days – tucked away in the gorgeous room at the top of the tower. What an absolutely perfect spot for writing!

So, a thousand thanks to Mike and Lybbie Hillman at Wanna Wanna, and to Danice and Rob Duffield of Tour Rouge, and to all the other gardeners who take part in open gardens.

Your hard work and generosity is very much appreciated.

And in the coming weekends, thanks to Open Gardens Canberra, I have more gardens to look forward to.

Time for a confession

Earlier this year, my son was the State winner for the ACT and NSW in the 2017 Somerset National Novella Writing Competition.

For those of you who said you’d like to read his novella, here it is, on the Somerset site: The Confession of Father Cosimo by William Pieper.

It’s the tale of a 16th Century Jesuit priest, who travels to the small village of Montello del Lanzigo for two reasons, and discovers that the right thing to do isn’t always clear.

Read and enjoy, and if you know any school-aged writers, you can pass on the details of how to enter the 2018 competition (with a deadline of 1 December 2017) via that first link.

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Boxed up joy for Book Week

It’s Book Week according to the Children’s Book Council of Australian and my social media feeds, which are full of adorable photos of kids dressed up as their favourite fictional characters. I’ve noticed a proliferation of commercially available costumes this year – mostly Disney, DC and Marvel trademarked apparel, with the occassional “classic” movie-styled character included, such as Alice in Wonderland or Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz. Is this new, I wonder, the marketing awareness of Book Week? Or have I been the amazing Captain Oblivious for the last couple of years? Anyway…

I’m not going to get all grumpy and whiny about how watching a movie is not the same as reading the book. We all know it. Anything which gets kids reading, though – even if it’s *shudder* princesses – is a good thing. So rock the frocks, boys and girls, or the lycra, and then read the book. All the books.

In the spirit of Book Week, and of using movies, comics, and TV shows as a gateway to a lifelong love of reading, here’s a sight guaranteed to gladden the heart of book lovers, librarians, and Whovian geeks alike.

This beautiful book box is in a quiet street in my neighbouring suburb. The front door opens to reveal a treasure trove of books, free for the taking, to suit the tastes of children, teens and adults. Oh, yeah! I love book boxes so much.

So from my happy place, I say happy book week, everyone – read, enjoy, and share the book love.

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On the shoulders of giants

With our awards for speaking about being on the shouldrs of giants Last year, I wrote about winning the ACT Rostrum New Speaker of the Year award with my speech on the topic of Silence. I was delighted when, this year, my son entered the new speaker competition and won the award.

It did, however, mean that we had to speak in competition last night, on the topic of On the shoulders of giants. Well a picture’s worth a thousand words – and there’s the outcome: William took home the New Speaker award, and I took the plate for the 2017 Speaker of the Year.

If you’d like to read the 1000+ words I delivered on the topic – about how reading fiction lifts us to the shoulders of giants because stories are awesome and the human brain is amazing – here they are:

Let me tell you about a giant.

“Every afternoon, as they were coming from school, the children used to go and play in the Giant’s garden.”

It was so lovely it made them happy, but when the giant returned after a seven-year absence, he was not happy to find them there.

“’What are you doing here?’ he cried in a very gruff voice, and the children ran away.

‘My own garden is my own garden,’ said the Giant; ‘anyone can understand that, and I will allow nobody to play in it but myself.’

So he built a high wall all round it, and put up a notice-board.

TRESPASSERS WILL BE PROSECUTED

He was a very selfish Giant.”

It’s easy enough to be selfish – our own things are ours, whether they are gardens or books or ideas. But to stand on the shoulders of giants means we must share ideas, because it is the knowledge and understanding gained by those who have gone before us, which lifts us to the level of a giant’s shoulders and allows us to see further, and clearer, than we otherwise would.

The story I began to tell you, The Selfish Giant, is one of Oscar Wilde’s fairy tales. I thought, in speaking on the subject of being on the shoulders of giants, I would begin with a literal giant, written by a literary giant, to consider how the metaphorical giant of the great body of literature raises us up, so we can see further, and understand how to be better human beings.

I have read The Selfish Giant many times – and each time, even though I know the fate of the giant, it reduces me to tears.

How can Oscar Wilde, dead for almost 117 years, make me cry?

I know I’ll find the giant under his shroud of blossoms, at the end.

How can any story or poem, especially the ones I am familiar with, make me cry? I know that love will end, friends will betray, lives will be lost. I know that the dog will die.

It’s no surprise.

If we come right down to it, all of these stories are just strangely shaped black squiggles on a white page. What gives them such power?

We usually speak about seeing further from the shoulders of giants in relation to science. And science can help us understand the power of reading fiction. Research into the human brain says we’re primed for language, but not for reading.

So, it’s a slow process, the initial decoding of the letter shapes, and the sounds, progressing to recognising whole words, and the brain making the connection between the spoken word and the written one. But, if you’re lucky enough not to struggle with reading, if you ‘get it’ and become a fluent reader, with a good vocabulary, something extraordinary happens in your brain.

Your eyes see squiggles, but your brain comprehends not just the word, but the meaning, sometimes the multiple meanings, and the implications, and the images and the ideas.

You fall.

You are immersed in the story.

Your perception literally changes – MRI studies indicate that the parts of the brain used for spatial placement and physical activity are activated when you read – in other words, you know you are sitting on the couch with a book, but at the same time your brain perceives that you are in the drawing room at Longbourn, that you are on the battlements of Minas Tirith, that you are being chased in the dark on your way home from your school’s Halloween pageant.

So the act of reading about something stimulates the same neurological regions as doing that thing. Stop and think about that for a moment.

Think about the things that you will never do, would never be able to do, whether it is catch the golden snitch so your Quidditch team can win, or fight yourself free of slavers on a brig off the coast of Scotland with the assistance of a Jacobite rebel, and realise that reading lets your brain feel as if it has done those things.

Reading puts you in another person’s shoes. It lets you perceive the world through the eyes of someone who is not like you. To feel what they feel. Not just figuratively – science tells us this is happening at a biological level.

You might be thinking, so what?

What difference does that make?

That gift, that opportunity for empathy, is the moment where you are lifted, beyond yourself, and put on the giant’s shoulder.

Theory of mind is a psychology term for being able to understand that you have beliefs, desires and intentions, and that others also have them, and that theirs’ may be different to your own. Someone with a strong theory of mind has greater empathy, and is more compassionate, more likely to volunteer in their community, and more tolerant of diversity. It’s someone who can see over the walls that we build around ourselves – the selfish walls that we think will protect what is ours, but which only lead to misery.

Reading fiction develops your theory of mind. Fiction gives you greater empathy because it lets you see the world through another’s eyes.

Yes, it can make you cry – but it’s worth it.

I am not, and I will never be, a man, a king, and a hero.

But when I read the words Tennyson’s gave Ulysses:

“It little profits that an idle king, by this still hearth, among these barren crags, Match’d with an aged wife, I mete and dole unequal laws unto a savage race, That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me”, I do know him – I understand his longing, his melancholy, and his frustration.

I will never be a 19^th century Russian landowner, but how can I read Tolstoy’s description of Levin looking at Kitty, in Anna Karenina, and not be affected by his love: “He stepped down, trying not to look long at her, as if she were the sun, yet he saw her, like the sun, even without looking.”

I am not a selfish giant. Oscar Wilde’s tale cautions us against selfishness, against walling ourselves off from others. We only have to look around us, at the world today, to see the danger of building walls – the danger of being selfish, and having no empathy.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist, Jane Smiley, described the job and ambition of a writer as being to develop a theory of how it feels to be alive.

By sharing their theories, writers allow us to go beyond our personal walls – to use the books we read to build a ladder to reach the shoulders of giants. With them, we can develop a theory of mind from many different viewpoints – male and female, black and white, rich and poor, young and old.

Oscar Wilde also said we are all of us in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars. Reading helps us develop our understanding of others, our empathy for them. It helps us be less selfish. Reading lets us climb out of that gutter, and onto the shoulders of giants.

And as a passionate reader, I tell you, it’s from the shoulders of giants that you get the very best view of the stars.

Fiction makes heroes of us all.

heroes A couple of weeks ago I went to an evening event for adults at the National Museum. It was the latest in their Night at the Museum series, and this one had a Heroes and Villains theme.
scar We were encouraged to dress up, make masks, shoot Nerf bullets at the ninja balloon targets, and ‘fly’ against the green screen, as well as learn a bunch of stuff about historical heroes and villains, forensics, and much more. I had a whole packet of fun.

Mmm – see my fake scar!

The next weekend, I was hanging out with the lovely CSFG peeps, at the Noted writing festival. We were making bespoke flash fiction for anyone who wandered up and wanted it, or passers-by could grab one of the pre-prepared stories. I had a great time, escaping off into tiny little stories, and so did everyone else.

flashfic

Thoughts on escapism have been fermenting in my brain ever since. They keep rising to the surface, executing Kraken-esque rolls, only to sink back into the abyssal depths. What keeps throwing me off, is all the memes on the theme of ‘to hell with this adulting gig’ which flit across my social media awareness.

I don’t want to talk about unicorn frappes, and fidget spinners, and the trend for immature behaviours in adults. I don’t want to discuss man-child tantrums from people in the public eye. I don’t even want to consider how sitting in the dirt making mud pies is arguably more fun than doing the dishes. Those aren’t my preferred method of escape from the trials, tribulations, slings and arrows of day-to-day life.

I like fiction.

Made-up story worlds are my access-all-areas pass for fun.

Now, that can spill over into real life with a little villainous cosplay.

But, I’m happiest reading or writing fiction. And, if I could judge from the delight on people’s faces, as they received stories written just for them, I’m not alone in that.

Of course I’m not alone in that.

Even better, reading isn’t just harmless fun – it’s good for me. It makes me smarter, gives me better problem-solving and lateral thinking skills, and helps me develop empathy. My reading is practically a public service.

It’s so good in fact, that it kind of makes me a superhero.

Which doesn’t mean I can’t have a little fun, and play the villain.

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A sensational method of immersion

fountain Appeal to all the senses is excellent writing advice, and yesterday I discovered it’s fabulous advice for curators, too.

I spent a few glorious hours at the National Gallery of Australia to see their exhibition of a magnificent collection of art and objects – aptly named treasures – from the Palace of Versailles. Marble busts, gilded Rococo statues, paintings, tapestries, furniture, fans, plates, and more – it was certainly a feast for the eyes.

But I take my hat off to the NGA curators, who have thought well and truly outside the box, and incorporated elements to appeal to all the senses.

The main doors had an avenue of urns and plants, which hinted at the sumptuous treasures within. At the exhibition entry I was greeted by a massive photograph of the Hall of Mirrors, complete with two of the gold and crystal candelabras from Versailles. It looked like I was there. Better, it smelt like I was there. The foyer is scented with an orange blossom fragrance (Louis XIV’s favourite flower) designed for the exhibition by master perfumer, Francis Kurkdjian.

It’s fabulous, and instantly evocative – the gallery equivalent of grabbing your readers’ attention on the first page.

hall mirrors

And the rest of the story did not disappoint: clever staging; brilliant use of lighting; evocative music; and audio-visual elements that added depth, sound, and movement to what could otherwise have been static displays. The manipulation of space was wonderful and subtle – a massive room revealed the scale of the carpet and tapestries, but this was balanced with smaller spaces showing domestic details.

dragon I particularly enjoyed the simulation of the garden maze – with walls covered in dense artificial leaves – as a backdrop to the lead statues, such as this dragon.

The magnificent centrepiece of the exhibition – the 1.5 tonne marble Latona fountain – has a room to herself. I entered the antechamber area – fascinating with its details of the hydraulics necessary for Versailles fountains, and display of bronze and brass piping and nozzles – and rounded the wall to … wow.

So, the stature of the goddess Latona is gorgeous. But, as the assistant director of the NGA, Adam Worrell, said in an article in the Canberra Times:

“We didn’t want to bring her as an art object, put her in a room and say, ‘Look how beautiful she is’. We actually wanted you to understand what her life has been at Versailles,” he says. “If we do our job properly, you’ll actually get a sense of standing at the Versailles fountain, looking at the sculpture. If we get it right, it’s definitely going to be the highlight of the show.”

They got it right.

The panorama image, at the top of the post, really does not do it justice. The images behind the statue flow and change, and together with the sounds, create the illusion of bright movement, and rushing water, and all the decadent, sunlit glory of a sumptuous pleasure palace.

Magnifique!

And, just when I was thinking that the only senses left to satisfy were touch and taste, I emerged into the gift shop, and found feathers, and linens, and silks, and Moet, and chocolate, and tiny berry macarons, and a hundred similar delights.

I came away from the gallery absolutely inspired. I can’t recommend Versailles: Treasures from the Palace highly enough. The exhibition is on until 17 April.

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The landscapes of writing

I know some people hate driving, especially long roadtrips. I love them for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is that they’re great for writing.

On Monday, I did a 7 hour round trip to Orange, which is living up to its name, and throwing in a whole extra palette of reds and golds and yellows, with its glorious autumn display. For that I had company, so my unsuspecting passenger go to be a sounding board for working through ideas on character development. Well, that’s not entirely true – the ‘unsuspecting’ part – my family are used to it by now.

For most of my recent trip, to the Clare Valley, I was by myself. I know a lot has been said about the allure of the open road rolling out before you, but I’d like to add that there’s something very satisfying about solitude + speed + very loud music. That might sound reckless, but I’m tediously law-abiding. The speed limit is speedy enough, especially if I put the windows down and scream sing Five Finger Death Punch or Nick Cave songs to fields full of sheep. They don’t seem to mind.

Of course, it’s not all fun and games and Whiskey in the Jar. I bought the worst coffee I have purchased in years from Horsham and then had the early morning torment of needing the caffeine but not wanting to drink anything that bad. Oh, don’t worry, the siren song of sweet caffeine was way stronger than the sensibilities of my taste buds. Reader, I drank it.

And then feared for my sanity when I encountered … this … thing …

But, traumatic as that was, it’s all grist for the mill for writing. There’s a lot of inspiration to be drawn from a landscape, and I drove through some beauties. One of the reasons why writers need to go to the place where their story is set, is totally not because travel becomes a tax deduction. It’s to soak up the sense of the place. This is especially awesome if you are writing something set in a real-world place which is beautiful and has great coffee.

Manuscript number four started out, years ago, when I wrote down a dream I had about the sort of wedding jewellery they wore in Arlvagne, and their barren queen who longed for a child. Yes, it came complete with the country name and, no, there’s no such place, so I figured it was fantasy.

So, obviously, dragons. Check.

And a world. Bother.

My roadtrip involved 3,250 km of driving around the back of the Snowy Mountains, down to Melbourne, then west past the Grampians and over the Murray River, into South Australia, through Adelaide and up to the Clare Valley. After the weekend I stayed in Hahndorf, and then Ballarat. From that lovely old gold-mining town I headed through Daylesford to Kyneton.

I had some great-great-ancestral types out that way and I drove past their old property at Pastoria. I was almost lost when I missed a quick left, then right, turn over the Burke and Wills Track (ah, the irony – inept explorers FTW) and then I was paced by a camouflaged APC in Puckapunyal before I rejoined the motorway heading north again.

As I went, I thought about my story and the landscape of the world where it takes place. I noticed the way that the white trunks of the gums can catch the light and look like rows of bones, lined up on the hill. I noticed that the bark of the red mallee hangs in wretched strips like flayed skin, with the livid trunk of the tree smooth beneath it. I noticed the granite rock formations that jut out of the soil, the grass growing up to lap at their edges, and the sheep that graze among them, almost indistinguishable from the stones.

These are the rocks and bones that will make a true foundation for whatever flights of fantasy I want to add in building a landscape for the world I’m writing. It’s not the same process as writing about a real place. I don’t want to just cut out a patch of the Mallee region, or a wedge of the Macedon Ranges and slap it onto the map.

But the landscape that is emerging, as I write, has definitely been influenced by the places I drove through because the mechanics of driving – of watching the road, the other drivers, speed, steering, all that stuff – only takes up a bit of my brain.

The rest is noticing details of the landscape, thinking about the story and, like any writer, wondering “what if…”