InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "I just work here."

Ella Claire Gainsborough {Beauty} (bookshelved) wrote in bellumletale,
@ 2010-01-08 02:46:00

Entry tags:

beast, beauty

TO: Daniel Webster (needapenname@netmail.com)
FROM: C. Davis (davisc@publishinghouse.net)
SUBJECT: Dreaming that sylvan peace

Mr. Webster:

I offer an olive branch.

It isn't an apology, because I'm not acknowledging any wrongdoing. However, if we're to work together, it's probably a good idea for us to understand one another, our nuances and peaks and valleys.

I was born in a state where everyone has Southern twangs, but yet I have none. I was very young when I realized that books could do the most magical things, like make me a princess or a pirate or a little girl with siblings galore and Peter Pan around the bend waiting for me. It was a silly thing, or so my parents believed, but they humored me, as parents do when it means their child will stay quiet when they have a headache or are embroiled in the fighting that passes for true love in this day and age.

As I got older, I found that the words on a page could be experiences in a completely different way. They could teach and make you realize the complexity of people. We walk through our lives with blinders on, not stopping to look at anyone else unless it suits us or is necessary, but in books we don't do that. We turn the pages, and we care about our fellow man in a way we never do in real life. We wonder about their motives, and we cheer for their successes and cry when they lose. It's a connection so profound, and one we seem unwilling to make face-to-face. Why do you think that is?

For instance, if a strange man was hiding and eating your food, you would call the authorities. But in Frankenstein, we root for Victor's creation, we want him to succeed, to be loved, to not unintentionally harm. And when he does unintentionally harm a young child, we feel pity for him, and we blame Victor for what he did. In the day-to-day world, we wouldn't be so forgiving. Why is our compassion limited to the page instead of to real, feeling people who need it?

Why do you write? What drives you to it? When did you begin?

I first took pen to paper when I was eight. I was at the local library, and I was reading a story. It was Marianna Mayer's version of Beauty and the Beast and the illustrations and the words, they filled my head with dreams of things no book had ever done in quite the same way. I'd always been a reader, but this book, it changed something significant in me. It was the first book I begged my parents to buy me, and I still own the copy. It's worse for wear and looks like it should have been used for kindling years and years ago, but I can't bear to part with it. The day I read that tale, I went home, and I wrote the most atrocious story you could ever imagine. It was about a princess who disliked traveling, and it was a silly thing of no merit. But I sat at my desk with pencil and paper for hours, and I became lost in the words in a way I'd never been. And I fell in love with writing that day, and I never looked back.

Am I a writer? That depends. Do you consider authorship to be based on skill or on passion? If passion, I qualify. If skill, perhaps not. But it doesn't mean I can't pinpoint a fantastic story on the page, nor does it mean I can't help make a story better. I don't want your glory, nor do I want to control your pen. I do want to be a part of what you're creating. It might be selfish of me, but there you have it.

As Albert Einstein said: "I am neither especially clever nor especially gifted. I am only very, very curious." Were the quote mine, I would add and opinionated at the end.

Curiously and opinionated(ly),
C. Davis

P.S. Do tell me what you think of the story. I'll withhold my opinion on whether I like or dislike it, so your opinion can be untarnished.

Publishing House
Publishers of fine literary works
Phone: 1-800-566-Book
Fax: 1-800-566-9999

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labete
2010-01-08 09:49 pm UTC (link)

I am starting to think I don't have enough wits to hold up to this continual onslaught of questions.

I use my middle name because a) it is different from my father's and b) there is this fellow in the UK writing really spectacular books about coral reef animals of the indo-pacific under the name "Daniel Webster" and I don't want to sully his reputation with my shenanigans, such as they are. Considering your comments on my fortune, you should mention that to your erstwhile employers, and tell them to shut up, or I will not give them anything else to publish. You wouldn't like me on your shelf, Claire. I am not a very pretty ornament.

I refuse to give up my sympathy for Hulda, who would not have let such an idiot touch her unless she thought herself in love, which was subsequently turned against her in such a cruel manner. Loss of faith, indeed.

D.B.W.

P.S. No. Oral hygiene being what it is these days.
P.P.S. We don't have to discuss it. I'll blame the dr cough syrup.
P.S.S.S. I suppose, at this point, denying you anything is pointless. A paragraph of what?

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bookshelved
2010-01-08 10:07 pm UTC (link)

I have quickly learned that if I ask ten questions you will answer three. I'm trying to increase my odds by adding more queries. A very logical tactic, you must admit, and one I'm very proud of.

I am not familiar with your shenanigans. Perhaps I am not an elderly spinster at all, and perhaps I was still in pigtails when you were at the height of your shenanigans. Which is more likely, do you think? That I am very old or very young?

Your sympathy for Hulga is surprising, but I should have realized it existed when you referred to her as Joy. It's a romantic thing, to call her that, and speaks to a kindness that I cannot bring myself to mock. You, I believe, might be likable, despite your very obvious attempts to be otherwise.

Do you intentionally speak so little of yourself? You might have your author title rescinded for such a crime, you know.

Simply,
Claire

P.S. I am so glad.
P.S.S. My mother was my father's Guinevere, and he was her Arthur.
P.S.S.S. I will allow you to choose. I'm feeling particularly generous, since you've made me smile with the prospect of acquiescing.

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labete
2010-01-08 11:10 pm UTC (link)

[This email skips the usual cycle. There's a much longer wait, and the division he mentions interrupted it. For attending parties at the hospital, they had to clean the tear in his chest, and he was not a cooperative patient, since the night before (when the first paragraph was written) they adjusted the dose of painkillers and it wasn't a good time. They upped it again, but it took him time to steady out, and here he is trying to write the same email. Enjoy.]

Touché. I have to point out that you often say you'll attempt to inquire but never actually broach the question, so you can't scold me for not answering. I'm not a crossword to fill out, and as you so aptly discovered in one of my prior emails--I forget which--I just don't trust you. It certainly would not damage your professional opportunities to forward my emails verbatim if you chose, though, for some reason, I doubt you would go that far. I hardly get along with Quinn, much less a new copy editor from a publisher that doesn't care for my disappearing act. Considering the absolute fiasco that happened on the forums of my website some months ago, when half my personal history ended up on the internet, you'll forgive me if I guard my privacy with teeth. I sincerely doubt that you are over sixty, because over sixty women do not bother to take jobs with cantankerous reclusive authors who do not like being copy edited, so you may take that as a compliment if

Sorry, I am coming back again to this email which I think I didn't send, since I was interrupted, though I probably would have changed my mind on whether or not to send it eventually, I don't remember my train of thought and I feel your sally about queries should be returned, and even if I was an ass about it yesterday, I can't think of any better way to phrase it now, phrasing is eluding me, for some reason, today.

I have no idea why I should be jealous of your poetic phrasing of your parents relationship. If I was to find some similar example, it would probably something truly horrific, like Macbeth. Then what would you think of me? No worse, I think, than what you would of thought if I'd have just sent the above.

I'm sorry I couldn't find the time to send you your requested paragraph. ~~When I get home~~ I'm sure I'll dig something up at some point. I won't say anything else about Joy, other than my sympathy doesn't extend farther than sympathy. I feel sorry for her, but I don't like her. That kind of caring makes sense.

~~I shouldn't send this. I'm~~

I wasn't going to send this, but something has come up and I don't have time to make another, so it is as it is.

D.B.W.

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bookshelved
2010-01-09 01:03 am UTC (link)

[This e-mail is sent after the failed dinner with Leah and Ed, and it is delayed by an additional few hours where the sender read the e-mail, went to think on it in the arboretum, and then returned to respond.]

You are giving me carte blanche to ask what I would then? Very well.

You say you do not trust me, because you fear I will expose you to the censure of the world and to the public eye. I would ask you why I hadn't done anything yet, if that was my intention. But I suspect you'd simply argue that I was waiting to amass a collection of correspondence before I attempted to sell your e-mails.

Why are you a cynic? There, that was direct, was it not? I'm aware of the fiasco that happened on your forums, though I didn't experience it, and you'll be happy to know I have gotten no information on your personal life from any such venue. In turn, I will tell you what I've figured out on my own.

You're tired enough to make errors in typing, which I can tell you're entirely too intelligent to do under normal circumstances. You aren't writing, which is something you claim inability to do without. You vacillate from being exceptionally charming (like a pair of comfortable shoes?) to being bitingly sharp (a less familiar suit?). Your e-mails come like clockwork (except for this one), as if they were being sent by someone with a very set schedule of some sort. I can only deduce you are significantly ill, which is nothing to be ashamed of or feel the need to hide.

Are you ill?

And I can assure you, I intend to share these things with no one. You do not know me well, Daniel, but money is not the driving factor in my life. You will, I hope, learn that in time.

Regarding my parents, since a confession seems appropriate here, they are not a love story, despite the poetic phrasing. Lancelot was not one knight for my mother, but many knights. And my father came with a past that made escaping involve constantly moving about. The round table at the Davis house was not all chivalry and words of love. And your Macbeths, do you refer to their relationship or their tendencies?

I will leave it at this. I have just been reunited with a family member I have not seen in a very long time, and who I was very anxious about seeing. To say it did not go well would be an understatement.

Claire, who hopes you will learn to trust her in time.

P.S.: E. Dickinson, I find, speaks truth like few other poets:

It's all I have to bring today –
This, and my heart beside –
This, and my heart, and all the fields –
And all the meadows wide –
Be sure you count – should I forget
Some one the sum could tell –
This, and my heart, and all the Bees
Which in the Clover dwell.

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labete
2010-01-09 01:50 am UTC (link)

[A shockingly short delay.]

The match to you, Claire. I'm staying at a hospital, but they say that I might be able to go home tomorrow or the day after. ~~They say a lot of things like that, though.~~

I think I have always been a cynic. If I wasn't, it was only as long as I was able to avoid noticing the nature of my parents, who are, as you said, old money, and powerful, and never satisfied with either.

You speak about both your parents by appellation, but not this new family member. A sibling, I surmise?

My mind is not right for poetry. I worry I would misquote it, and I've none of my books, a fact that is driving me absolutely mad. I can't return the pretty words, and I feel as if I should do a better job at apologizing if my patterns were quite so obvious as you say, but I can't think of a way to do that, either. What was it you said in an earlier email? Writer's block? Perhaps.

D.B.W.

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bookshelved
2010-01-09 02:19 am UTC (link)

You're trying to confuse me by changing the timing of your replies, aren't you? (Let the record show: smiling)

Somehow, I do not feel better for having won this match. I confess it that it feels somehow wrong, to have forced you into such an intimacy, even if I came to the conclusion on my own. I suspect this is how Catherine Morland felt in Northanger Abbey when she made her assumption about Henry's mother and was found out.

A half-sister. We share a father, but not a mother, and my parents spent their entire lives running from my father's past. I longed for her to like me, but my curiosity is not generally as well tolerated as it has been by you.

I would send you a book, if I could. I will send one via Mr. Quinn, so you can have it when you return home, which I hope is soon. See, I am perfectly willing to respect your privacy and not press for a physical address. I've been told you don't give that out, you see, and I behave - on occasion.

You do not owe me an apology, Daniel. I'm enjoying our correspondence, even if the tone in my last e-mail was curt. A night ill-spent is no excuse for pulling the skeletons from your closet forcibly.

Feel better and rest, and yes I am mothering again. It is what spinsters not yet turned 60 do.

In my thoughts,
Claire

P.S. You owe me a poem and a paragraph.

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	labete 2010-01-09 06:42 am UTC (link)
	[Just after.] I was at the keyboard, I admit. A friend is coming, I have to go. Thank you for the book. I hope things go better with your sister. I wonder what I might have been like if I had one. D.B.W. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

bookshelved
2010-01-09 06:56 am UTC (link)

~~I admit to liking the fact that you were at the keyboard.~~

You're making me delete things before I send this e-mail. This rarely happens, and I don't know what to think of it. I'll ponder that as I try to sleep this evening. I find sleep to be an elusive thing; the curse of a mind always whirling.

If we had been raised with other children to confide in, I would think we'd be better off for it. Less alone, as it sounds like your childhood was as lonely as mine. I realize there a things much, much worse that could have befallen us, but a child doesn't have the knowledge to come to that realization, and so it hurts just the same.

If you like the book, I expect the things you owe me in return. I leave the ball in your court, for now.

Claire, who very much hopes your friend cheers your spirits.

P.S. Get well. This is an order from your copy editor, and (hopefully) from a newly made friend.

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