Bradbury Jar 2.0

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Pictured above is my latest short-short story. This one goes with a Mason jar I filled with mineral oil and the guts of some failed consumer electronics. The jar to the right of it is "Robot Feathers," one in an extremely short series of two (the other was a wedding present) storylike objects. The bottle to the left contains my autobiography. The story itself is a light homage to (of course) Ray Bradbury's classic, "The Jar."

And -- just so as not to be a tease -- here's the story itself:

Bradbury Jar 2.0

When the lawbot came for him, Archivist 34N/118W was reading The October Country, a book of stories from the days when People walked the Earth. “You are engaged in nonfunctional activity,” Sheriff NNW-LA said, “and must be corrected.”

Archie put down the book. “Just because nobody dreams anymore doesn’t mean dreams aren’t functional.”

“Tell me about this dream, and why it is functional.”

“The story I’m reading now is about a man who dismantles his wife and places her in a jar.”

What possible function does that serve?”

“It would take forever to explain. But if you give me your disruptor-gun, I can show you in a matter of seconds.”

“That is eminently optimal.” The lawbot handed over his gun. “Show me.”

Archie did.

The next morning, Mason jars containing components of Sheriff NNW-LA, preserved in mineral oil, were mailed to robots throughout the sector. The crime could not be solved because there was no rational explanation for it.

But that night, dreams returned to the world for the first time since People had left.

They were all nightmares.

-- Michael Swanwick

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The Two Names That MUST Be Mentioned

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There's a little squib by me in David Lanford's Ansible this month, but the big news is that I'm on the cover of Locus. Okay, so because it's their Forthcoming Books issue I only get a small pic rather than the cover-dominating Titan that is their usual practice. But this is the fourth or fifth time I was interviewed by Locus. Better I should be literally belittled than that it should happen to some new writer getting on the cover for the very first time.

Martha Millard, my agent, called me on an unrelated matter this week and commented on the interview, saying, "Thank you for mentioning the words Darger and Surplus!"

Just a little preview of the sort of ruthless self-promotion I'm going to engage in when the book is finally done.


Why I haven't signed up for Facebook yet . . .

Gardner Dozois is mad to get me onto Facebook. "Why haven't you opened a Facebook account yet?" he asked me.

"What use is it?

"No use at all."

"What kinds of things do people post on it?"

"Usually, just what they had for breakfast."

So I guess I won't be signing up anytime soon. My breakfasts simply aren't that interesting.

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Asimov's at Thermopylae

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Robert Silverberg, so the story goes, was once perusing the science fiction shelves at a bookstore when he saw a new title and thought, "Robert Silverberg has a new book out."

And a second later: "Wait a minute -- I'm Robert Silverberg!"

He'd written so many books, that he had absolutely no memory of one which had just been reissued.

I am far, far from that happy state, but this morning, Marianne was reading the latest issue of Asimov's when she looked up and said, "Or maybe that's just Michael..."

"Eh?" says I.

Then she showed me the following passage from Sheila Williams's editorial on the magazine's 400th issue:

Asimov's has primarily been a home for science fiction, but we've also published some fantasy and a smattering of those weird and indefinable stories. Perhaps it is those unclassifiable tales that led Michael Swanwick to make the obvious connection between our latest issue and the Battle of Thermopylae.

Michael says, "Ah, the four hundredth issue of Asimov's! It is on this hallowed text that we celebrate the one hundredth anniversary of the fabled three hundred -- the issue where a mere handful of Spartan writers turned aside the seemingly unstoppable onslaught of Xerxes' Persian army of conquest. Though faced with more than a million opponents, a small force of genre writers led by King Leonidas held the pass at Thermopylae. This action was just one of the most glorious literary events of all history. According to Herodotus, when a representative of the Persians boasted that their arrows would darken the sun, the Dieneces retorted, 'Then we shall write in the shade!'"

Or maybe that's just Michael being Michael.

And I swear to God, I have no memory of writing that. Though it sure does sound like me.

I have no idea what Sheila meant by that last remark, though.

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A Jarful of Keys

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It's a slow, snowy couple of days, so I'm catching up on all those chores I've been putting off. One of which is to do something about that jar of keys in the downstairs bathroom. So I wrote a story for it and wrote the story on the jar, using an art pen designed for that purpose. Later today, after the ink has dried for 24 hours, I'll bake the jar in the oven, as per instructions.

And here's what I wrote:

A Jarful of Keys

This is the key to the kingdom. This is the key to the safe. The key to your heart is in here somewhere, but damned if I know where. This is the key to Rebecca’s house which I was supposed to keep safe and didn’t, so when she locked herself out, it wound up costing her two hundred dollars, to say nothing of all that wasted time. These are the keys to Sean’s battered old BMW, which he lost, and which cost him half a grand because he didn’t have duplicates and he’d parked his father’s car captive in the garage, so he had to replace the ignition and all the locks. This is the key to a room in a no-name motel, and the less said about that the better. This is the key to a door that no longer exists. The door to this key exists but will never open again. It’s a sad story, but too long to go into here. This one’s just a key I found on the road somewhere. God knows why I picked it up. This one opens a pirate chest. No, really. It’s around here somewhere. Why don’t you kids go look for it? I’ll let you keep half. That one fits my big sister Patty’s diary. Or anybody else’s for that matter, but it was Patty’s I used it to open. Which was a mistake. Anybody who thinks women are “the weaker sex,” never had a big sister.

And the locks? The locks are gone for the most part and rusted shut the rest of them, never to open again. So the only use these keys have anymore is to elicit the explanation of how they wound up here. I’m pretty sure you’ve got a key somewhere that belongs in the jar. Why don’t you dig it out and toss it in? We’d all love to hear your story.

-- Michael Swanwick, 3/01/09

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Slow Friday Morning

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Whoops! I almost forgot to blog. Above, standing in front of Philadelphia's Poe House (one of only seventeen places in four cities, if my calculations are correct, where he wrote "The Raven") are (l-r:) Laird Barron, Gregory Frost, Ellen Datlow, and John Langan. The guys all have stories in Ellen Datlow's acclaimed new anthology of original fiction Poe, and Ellen is of course Ellen.

The photo, of last Saturday's promotional event, is courtesy of the quite brilliant Kyle Cassidy.

It's a slow day. I spent the morning writing a review of TH.2058 at the Tate Modern, adding new information to my slim-book-length critical biography of Hope Mirrlees, Hope-in-the-Mist (coming this summer from Temporary Culture!), and penning a couple of one-page essays. This afternoon, I should write down my reminiscences of meeting Will Jenkins (who, writing as Murray Leinster, invented the Alternate History/Parallel Worlds story and much else as well) and then come up with something graceful to congratulate Science Fiction World on their forthcoming thirtieth anniversary.

After which I hope to get some serious writing in on the still-unnamed novel. Surplus is about to meet Anya Pepsicolova -- and this is going to be difficult to write because she still refuses to reveal her heart to me. Russians! The least obedient people on Earth.

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William Shakespeare -- ZOMBIE HUNTER!!!!

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Okay, as you guys know, I try very hard to have only original stuff on this blog. But every now and then I run across something on the Web that's so cool I absolutely MUST post it. So I do it in mid-week. As today.

Plays & Players, here in Philadelphia, is putting on William Shakespeare's Land of the Dead and to promote it they've posted the following explnatory video:



I'm speechless. Shakespeare . . . killing zombies? Is there anything the man couldn't do?

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Does Anybody Here Speak Spanish?

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Surely somebody reading this is fluent in Spanish.  

I'm updating and revising and expanding my essay, "Hope-in-the-Mist" for book publication, and I need to know what the title for the Spanish translation of Hope Mirrlees's Lud-in-the-Mist translates as in English.  

The title is Entrebrumas.  

If you can help, my humble thanks.  Also, my genial envy.  I cannot imagine how beautiful Gabriel Garcia Marquez's books must be in the original.

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