Being Famous Means Repeating Yourself. Ad Nauseum.

I’ve been spending some minutes in between writing doing stuff like stalking Alan Moore and Neil-O on the internet again, doing stuff like reading their interviews. Neil-O is definitely the easier of the two to stalk since on his blog, he actually has links (Assuming you’re willing to slog through his archives) to websites and other places that have taken the time to compile the various articles and interviews he has given over the years.

I was kind of curious about this, because on day two of Neil-O palooza one guy was telling me after his one on one interview with Neil-O that the guy never repeated himself, which completely floored me as I’d expected that this was impossible. It turns out it is.

This is not to defame Neil-O in any way, but it just seemed inhuman to me that someone could find a way to answer the same question differently every time it was asked, and I was grateful for confirmation that Neil-O is indeed mortal when I started noticing the same answers being given for various interviews over the years.

And really, I can’t blame the guy.

I mean, if you’re going to have different people over the course of your career always asking similar questions, it’s just logical that you’re going to start giving the same answer, because A) a well versed answer comes off as extremely clever once you’ve nailed down the phrasing and B) there are only so many ways you can fumble through “Where do you get your ideas from?” before it starts getting really, really old.

In the near-miraculous event that I ever find myself in a situation where I am interviewed and people are asking me questions, I’m not sure how I’m going to answer most of the questions, but I have this mean spirited idea in my head that the high-falutin’ literary questions will be answered with total agreement. IE:

Interview 1:

Interviewer: It seems that The Pale Summer your message is essentially an existentialist one, espousing themes of choice and control of one’s life.

Me: Yup, you got it. That’s good, I wasn’t sure anyone was going to see that.

Interview 2:

Interviewer: Face it, The Pale Summer was your ode to fatalism, wasn’t it? I could see it all over the plot.

Me: Yup, you got it! That’s good, I wasn’t sure anyone would notice that.

I figure after about 10 interviews someone is going to finally realize what I’m up to and sue me.

It has been another boring, yet remarkably productive day. Momentum continues to push the novel along, and it’s still coming out like I’d hoped, with the occasional surprise here and there.

55, 000+ words. Wow, only 45, 000 words left to spend. There’s a chance this thing might actually be done by the end of August.

And then the line edit and the rewriting.

Oh.

Joy.