Like many — most? — people who like to think of themselves as creative, I’ve had my share of disappointments with the success of others‘ ideas:
- Sometimes I’ve used a plot device, a character type, even a simple phrase in something I hope to have published… only to find it in some other work already published by some other author — who’s become fabulously successful. Argh, I think, why couldn’t that have been ME? Why did I wait so long? As though the gimmick (whatever it is) somehow caused the success.
- Sometimes somebody uses a plot device, character type, etc…. and the work tanks miserably. Argh, I think, I could have done so much better with that! And been successful, too! As though the (mostly imaginary) mishandling of the gimmick (whatever it is) somehow caused the failure.
- I once wrote a horror story which, even now, I think is publishable. Except for one thing: After I’d sent it to exactly one publication (where it was rejected — surprise! — because it was too long), a horror movie came out in which the “monster” might have been the one in my story. Argh, I thought, now I’ll have to hold off for a few years to give people time to forget the film. And then, a few years later, came the sequel. Which wallowed at the box office, much to fans’ surprise. So far I’ve been holding off for over ten years.
And then there are ideas which don’t fall into the disappointing category at all. You think to yourself, Why didn’t I think of that myself? or at least, Why didn’t SOMEBODY think of that sooner? (Think Harry Potter here, kiddies.) All you can do is applaud in wonder.
And finally there are the ideas — especially combinations of two or more other ideas — which are so bizarre that you’re surprised anyone at all ever thought to put them together.
I think this falls into that category. I give you the Ukelele Orchestra of Great Britain, performing… the theme from Shaft:
…and the same group’s rendition of the theme from The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (which seems to go on and go on and go on — but is well worth hearing through to the end):
Sometimes you just have to sit back and decide whether to applaud or keep silent.
11 responses so far ↓
1 sher // Oct 7, 2008 at 1:10 pm
tres bien!
NICE blog/web . . . Love the metioning of Diana Gabaldon as well. She is one of the “guilty pleasures” I withheld from the Haven blog . . .
Kudos on your site!
2 John // Oct 7, 2008 at 2:10 pm
@sher - Hiya, Sher, good to see you here and thanks for the feedback.
I’ve never felt guilty about knowing Diana (well, honestly, having known her; we aren’t much in touch anymore). Just about everybody to whom I ever recommended Outlander (male as well as female) ended up with the same guilty habit, though. :)
Here’s hoping Haven’s doing well!
3 marta // Oct 7, 2008 at 7:25 pm
I wish I’d thought of His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman. And The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster. Oh, the list!
Let someone else worry about the market. You write what you want and send it out. Don’t wait another ten years!
4 Sarah // Oct 7, 2008 at 8:48 pm
Yep, what Marta said- send it out anyway!
5 cuff // Oct 8, 2008 at 1:12 pm
That first clip is like a wall of sound, ukelele style.
Back in the days when I used to write more regularly, I constantly feared that some (to me) clever turn of phrase was coming not from me but from some other source buried deep in my memory. And there was no google to check against, either. Just my own broken memory.
6 John // Oct 8, 2008 at 4:47 pm
Marta, Sarah: Oh jeez. I gotta watch it with the self-deprecating throwaway lines — some busybody’s bound to chime in and tell me I just need to buck up and work harder. :)
@marta - Serious question: why those two titles? something they have in common?
7 John // Oct 8, 2008 at 4:50 pm
@cuff - Gaaah! I hate that fear, too. In some ways, I’m lucky not to have published more, otherwise I’m sure I’d have ended up in George Harrison’s shoes — claiming (however truthfully) to have purloined something by accident.
8 s.o.m.e. 1's brudder // Oct 8, 2008 at 10:28 pm
An architectural equivalent: Janice and I designing the house, I ruminating over just how we should do the newel posts and railing for the stair, sketch after sketch in the sketchbook. Janice pulls one of my beautiful coffee-table books of houses that I know and love so well and points to the very detail I’ve been laboring over. AAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGHHHHH! Did I steal it? Did I ever even remember seeing it? So exquisite - and so: “Been there, done that”. Worst of all the actual details were soooo much better than I remembered.
9 John // Oct 9, 2008 at 5:33 am
@s.o.m.e. 1’s brudder - One of the elements drawing professionals to their line of work in the first place is an appreciation of the work of others. Writers don’t stop reading when at work on a book, e.g.
There’s no getting around it. Say you’d banned every coffee-table and picture book and every trade magazine from your presence while working on the house. You still wouldn’t close your eyes when in other houses you just happened to be in at the time… Better to have these screaming moments in private than when out at a party or in a fine restaurant or something. :)
(Remember McCormick & Schmick’s in NYC? One of the things I still remember about it was how you had to go down a fairly grand flight of stairs to get to the restrooms, and the stairway was right in the middle of the floor — not shoved back in a corner, as though the architect were trying to disavow any knowledge of, umm, the side-effects of eating out.)
P.S. The reCAPTCHA words, below, at the moment: Hobart his. I love encountering the old Triple Towns telephone exchange at random right now.
10 marta // Oct 9, 2008 at 3:59 pm
Why those two titles, you ask? Not much more than they were on my mind. I don’t think they have anything in common except I love them both. They fall into that rare category of who-else-can-I-convince-to-read-this?
11 John // Oct 9, 2008 at 7:00 pm
@marta - That’s my favorite category. They need a couple shelves in Borders just for that — and staff picks and “Borders Recommends” shelves don’t count.
They WERE great picks. (And I noticed they were still on your mind when last you blogged.)
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