Prime Time Replay:
Paul Witcover
on Waking Beauty
MsgId: *omni_visions(2)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:03:34 PDT 1997
From: EllenDatlow At: 38.26.18.63
Hello. This is Ellen Datlow and this is OMNI VISIONS. Our host, Ed Bryant and our guest, Paul Witcover should be here momentarily. Ed is on a new internet provider tonight and may be having trouble....
MsgId: *omni_visions(3)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:04:02 PDT 1997
From: EllenDatlow At: 38.26.18.63
Hi Paul. Glad you're here.
MsgId: *omni_visions(4)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:05:33 PDT 1997
From: EllenDatlow At: 38.26.18.63
You might want to intoduce yourself (although there is a bit of a bio on your introductory page) to the audience and tell them a little about yourself while we await Ed.
MsgId: *omni_visions(5)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:06:55 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
Hi, Ellen. My server is very slow tonight -- but I'm here.
MsgId: *omni_visions(6)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:09:06 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
I'm going to be interviewing myself for a while apparently. My first book, Waking Beauty, was just published by HarperCollins, and everyone should immediately purchase it, if you haven't already -- that's the most important thing!
MsgId: *omni_visions(7)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:11:25 PDT 1997
From: EllenDatlow At: 38.26.18.63
Ed is having trouble getting on. I just talked to him on aol. He's going to try to come in again. His screen comes in grey and mine is too. We don't know why.
MsgId: *omni_visions(8)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:12:00 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
Here's how the Village Voice described the book: "an erotic forest primeval, a fantasia of magic and bondage."
MsgId: *omni_visions(9)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:12:46 PDT 1997
From: EllenDatlow At: 38.26.18.63
Paul, tell us a little about the book. What it's about, perhaps its genesis/inspirtion.
MsgId: *omni_visions(10)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:13:08 PDT 1997
From: guest At: 205.184.152.112
Would you rather read Jack Vance or Clive Barker?
MsgId: *omni_visions(11)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:13:52 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
This is the sound of one hand clapping
MsgId: *omni_visions(12)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:14:46 PDT 1997
From: EllenDatlow At: 38.26.18.63
We're not open to questions quite yet. After about 45 minutes the chat will be open.
MsgId: *omni_visions(13)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:15:59 PDT 1997
From: EllenDatlow At: 38.26.18.63
Paul, I know you've written and published short stories and a graphic novel. Is this your first novel written or have you worked on others that you didn't feel quite gelled. (sp?)
MsgId: *omni_visions(14)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:18:53 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
Hi, Paul, hello, Ellen; through the beneficence of Other Powers and sheer luck, I'm electronically present. Thanks for carrying on while I was feeling my way through limbo-gray screens and obstinate error messages...
MsgId: *omni_visions(15)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:20:13 PDT 1997
From: EllenDatlow At: 38.26.18.63
I'll bow out. Welcome Ed. Ellen
MsgId: *omni_visions(16)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:22:49 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
Again,thanks for your help, producer Ellen. Paul, my bio dossier on you says you were a Clarion Workshop attendee something like 20 years ago. I hate to pry, but *Waking Beauty* is a first novel. Were you working on this book for two decades, or did Life intervene in your writing plans?
MsgId: *omni_visions(17)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:27:10 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
Sorry, Ed -- I got booted off the system. Now I'm back -- hopefully for the long haul. Yes, I attended Clarion many years ago -- 1980 I think it was. Waking Beauty isn't the first novel I've written in that time, just the first to be published -- thank God, cause the others were pretty bad!
MsgId: *omni_visions(18)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:28:24 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
Uh oh--it is my hope that tonight's guest, Paul Witcover, is still on-line. If perchance you're not, sir, try and try again to get back on. For those of you who are impatient with this mode of communication, remember that Omni now is archiving all its interviews. You can tune in during the week and pick up all the neat conversations you may have missed in the past. Including...perhaps, this one...
MsgId: *omni_visions(19)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:29:58 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
Okay, so I'm a snoop. What's your life like in the non-writing professional world? I tried to deduce a bit from the novel, but I'm going to keep my conclusions to myself.
MsgId: *omni_visions(20)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:30:16 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
About 5 years ago, in a state of desperation and depression about my writing, I enrolled in the Master's program at City College here in NYC. It was there that I got the idea for Waking Beauty, which began as a short story but quickly metastasized into a novel
MsgId: *omni_visions(21)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:31:47 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
Well, ed, when not writing, I make a living working as a dominator in the S&M scene . . . I find it gives me valuable experience in dealing with editors!
MsgId: *omni_visions(22)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:33:59 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
The novel's full of remarkable textures; it's a highly sensual piece of work. Some of the promotional material compares you to, oh, Anne Rice, Salman Rushdie, Clive Barker, and Dante. 3 out of 4 ain't bad! Is this kind of rich imagery intrinsic to the rest of your work, or did this book tend to bring out that quality in the creation?
MsgId: *omni_visions(23)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:35:49 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
Hmm. A professional dominator could work out very well as a top officer in either the SF Writers Association or the Horror Writers Association. Writing organizations have difficulty finding the proper note of leadership in their officers.
MsgId: *omni_visions(24)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:38:19 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
I had the same reaction to Dante! I don't know what he's doing on that list -- it's rough enough being compared to Clive Barker! But the sensuousness of the book -- and thanks for noticing! -- is something that is intrinsic to my writing . . . sometimes to its detriment!
MsgId: *omni_visions(25)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:41:36 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
This is going to sound a little facile, I know, but a comparison I might make if I were writing flack copy for HarperPrism, would be to observe that your work reminds me a bit of a more secular Gene Wolfe. You don't have the same hardcore Catholic sensibility coming across that Gene does. But there's certainly the same love of words, especially the Right Words...
MsgId: *omni_visions(26)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:44:20 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
Obviously Gene Wolfe was/is a big influence of mine. I consider the 5th head of cerberus to be probably the best science fiction novel ever written; certainly the most literate and self-aware.
MsgId: *omni_visions(27)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:48:28 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
There may actually be a small groundswell of renewed interest in *5th Head of Cerberus* since I've seen it mentioned a couple of times in cloning/sf bibliographies in mainstream newspaper pieces of the Dolly Incident. Let me ask a question of esthetics... The jacket painting for *Waking Beauty* is marvelously executed. It shows a pair of (presumably) female wrists found with rope, the palm of one hand cradling a red rose. Jacket art is unavoidably message. Does this work in your mind as the initial message you want to book to extend?
MsgId: *omni_visions(28)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:52:00 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
It IS a beautiful cover! Thanks go to my editor, Caitlin Blasdell, who had the idea. I like it because it's so striking -- the first impression I want the cover to give a potential reader is: Wow! This looks cool! I'm going to pick up the book and see what's inside. From there, it's up to me.
MsgId: *omni_visions(29)
Date: Thu Apr 17 22:56:02 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
It'd be far too limiting a definition to suggest the book is something of a "science fantasy epic." But publishers and booksellers want to be able to pigeon hole the work. In your own soul, how would you describe *Waking Beauty*? Or even better, could you come up with a one or two line pitch, say, should the Weinsteins at Miramax call you into the office and suggest shoveling buckets of bucks your way?
MsgId: *omni_visions(30)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:01:06 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
In my own mind, the book makes use of science fictional and fantasy tropes, but doesn't belong to either genre. Unfortunately, you're right, and booksellers must find a pigeonhole. If I were to pitch it to the Weinstein brothers, I'd say: Harv, baby, think Blue Velvet meets The Brain That Wouldn't Die.
MsgId: *omni_visions(31)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:05:58 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
Damn, I choked (with outloud laughter) on my Diet Coke... Paul, I suspect you could dominate Hollywood. Let me backtrack a little... What kind of writerly preparation goes into a novel such as this? Sure, reading all that Wolfe. Presumably some exceedingly eclectic life experience. Or do you depend heavily on a rich imagination? Can you suggest some of the interal compounds that eventually were catalyzed into this work?
MsgId: *omni_visions(32)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:06:55 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
That egregious typo is "internal"
MsgId: *omni_visions(33)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:10:38 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
Clearly being raised a Roman Catholic, then rebelling against the church, didn't hurt any. Endless reading of comic books, mythology, Remembrance of Things Past -- virtually everything I'd absorbed in my life up until that point somehow found its way into the book. Most of all, I discovered that I was trying to learn how to write about different varieties of love.
MsgId: *omni_visions(34)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:13:03 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
Indeed, that last observation comes across clearly and affectingly to us readers. I'm curioius about 20 years ago. Did the Clarion Workshop experience do anything for you as a writer? Or work against your best interests? Some of my curiosity is because my own Clarion experience goes back to the pre-Cambrian--1968, to be exact.
MsgId: *omni_visions(35)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:15:44 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
Yes, didn't you have the experience of being "taught" by Harlan Ellison? I had a very good experience there, with the exception of one instructor who failed to find anything of value in my work "even on the sentence level" -- which was so patently bullshit that I dismissed everything else he had to say. Algis Budrys helped me immeasurably by pointing to a paragraph I wrote at the end of one story and saying: this is your genuine voice. And I'll be damned: it was.
MsgId: *omni_visions(36)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:20:53 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
Yeah, Harlan actually gave me my first sale when he taught his week. He has a lot to answer for. My other big thrill was meeting the incredibly young (!) Chip Delany, whose *Nova* had just come out. I naturally wonder if the faculty guy who trashed your work will ever check out the new novel. Perhaps he should be forced to read it via the same means as were used to condition Malcolm McDowell in *Clockwork Orange*... You collaborated with Elizabeth Hand (last week's interview with Jim Freund, check it out in the archive, hint, hint) on a graphic novel for DC. How did you like taking that route? And do you enjoy the collaborative process?
MsgId: *omni_visions(37)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:24:55 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
Actually, the instructor who criticized my work is dead now -- I'll let that pass without further comment. Liz Hand and I collaborated on the comic book ANIMA for DC comics, which had a run of about 2 years. Interested parties should check out my web page at http://www.sff.net. We've also written short stories together and hope someday to do a novel. Working with her is effortless and exhilarating -- our minds work along the same bizarre lines and even complement each other's weirdnesses -- now that's a rare and beautiful thing!
MsgId: *omni_visions(38)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:29:08 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
I'm going to ask producer Ellen to open up the chatware so any who wish can ask Paul Witcover questions. We've got some more minutes left, though not an indefinite supply. The server tends to turn rather Draconian a midnight, Eastern time, and all it touches, dies. Metaphorically, of course. Paul, what's on your writing horizon? Are there forces, either external or internal, that want to go more in world of *Waking Beauty*? Do you want to (or are you presently) working on projects quite different?
MsgId: *omni_visions(39)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:32:09 PDT 1997
From: guest At: 207.172.107.180
Paul, what authors would you say have influenced your writing the most?
MsgId: *omni_visions(40)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:33:26 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
Ed, I'm currently putting the finishing touches on my next novel, called Pynn. It's quite different from Waking Beauty, in that part of it is set in the "real" world and part in a comic book. I'm very pleased with it so far -- I feel like all the lessons I learned in writing Waking Beauty are being put to good use.
MsgId: *omni_visions(41)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:36:06 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
Samuel Delany taught me and a lot of other writers just how much was possible in science fiction. Gene Wolfe has already been mentioned. I think Michael Moorcock is incredible; his work gets better and better.
MsgId: *omni_visions(42)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:36:15 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
I don't know if you keep track of reviewer response to your work, but is the mainstream paying some attention to the book? Clearly HarperCollins and your editor designed a package that would not put off the non-genre audience.
MsgId: *omni_visions(43)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:38:50 PDT 1997
From: Meriday_Beth At: 206.190.93.19
Evening Ed, Mr. Witcover. (This is a *particularly* bizarre method of internet discourse...altho I *think* I'm getting the hang of it :) ) Thank you both for the interesting introduction to Mr. Witcover and his novel, and for mentioning one other thing he's done. As someone *not* familiar with his work, I'd be interested in knowing what else he's done-- and if he has any favorites he'd like to recommend (yes, *other* authors' works are eligible, but no unnecessary modesty, please :) )?
MsgId: *omni_visions(44)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:41:19 PDT 1997
From: Meriday_Beth At: 206.190.93.19
(Ed, dammit, stop asking my question before I get it there, huh? (: )
MsgId: *omni_visions(45)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:44:30 PDT 1997
From: Meriday_Beth At: 206.190.93.19
MsgId: *omni_visions(46)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:45:32 PDT 1997
From: EllenDatlow At: 38.26.18.63
Beth,press pause and wait a few seconds before you post or when the board refreshes you'll lose what you're posting. Ellen Datlow
MsgId: *omni_visions(47)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:48:11 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
Sorry, once again thrown off! Tag-team wrestling was never like this! Beth, my only other work that's been published has been short-stories and novellas (in Asimov's, Twilight Zone, Further Adventures of Batman & Superman), none of which are any longer in print, unfortunately. To answer your question, Ed, my book hasn't been as widely reviewed as I would have liked . . . maybe because it's a first novel.
MsgId: *omni_visions(48)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:49:56 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
Paul, you're speaking of short fiction almost in the past tense. Do you still write it? Do you like to craft it? Have you any short pieces still out in the pipeline? Any hope of a story collection in a while?
MsgId: *omni_visions(49)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:51:31 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
I'd love to do a story collection! I currently have enough pieces to fill one, I think. However, the truth is, I don't really understand how to write short fiction yet -- not that I know all about how to write a novel, either. But somehow the longer form feels more natural to me.
MsgId: *omni_visions(50)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:53:44 PDT 1997
From: Meriday_Beth At: 206.190.93.19
Hi Ellen (long time! :) ). Yeah, figured that out the first time I tried typing something... (Btw, your name appears in the header, above each of your messages; same with each of you...)
MsgId: *omni_visions(51)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:54:24 PDT 1997
From: guest At: 207.172.107.180
I must congratulate you on a fantastic novel! I don't think I've read anything quite like it. When do you expect to finish your next one?
MsgId: *omni_visions(52)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:54:56 PDT 1997
From: EllenDatlow At: 38.26.18.63
Right. I knew that. I just forgot:)
MsgId: *omni_visions(53)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:56:05 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
Well, an advantage to writing successful novels is that it will help convince a publisher that a story collection would be a worthwhile venture. Then there's the editing route... Lots of writers these days are finding themselves helping to compile theme original anthologies. Would that tempt you? Remember, it could be any theme...
MsgId: *omni_visions(54)
Date: Thu Apr 17 23:58:01 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
thanks to the person who found my book unlike anything he or she has read! I think it's pretty unique as well . . . although clearly it does have literary cousins. I'm finishing up Pynn now; it should be out in 98.
MsgId: *omni_visions(55)
Date: Fri Apr 18 00:03:03 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
I'm going to hedge my bets in case the server cuts us off precipitously. I want to thank enthusiastically our guest tonight, Paul Witcover. Look up his new novel, his first novel, *Waking Beauty*. It's a spectacular and completely satisfying work of the fantastic. Sensual, inventive, the list of positive adjectives could go on and on. HarperPrism is the publisher. Thanks to my producer, Ellen, and to Meriday_Beth and the others who asked questions. Check in next week for Jim Freund's conversation with Laura Mixon and Stephen Gould in a special Earth Day consideration of their collaborative eco-thriller, *Greenwar.* And see me in 2 weeks when I talk with Douglas Winter, writer and editor of *Revelations*, a big new original anthology in which Clive Barker and a dozen more write the fantastical history of our century.
MsgId: *omni_visions(56)
Date: Fri Apr 18 00:04:48 PDT 1997
From: PaulWitcover At: 208.196.104.61
thanks, ed, for your kind words and provocative questions! It's been a pleasure. Thanks also to Ellen and to everyone who is out there . . . especially that person who liked my book so much! (Is that you, Mom?)
MsgId: *omni_visions(57)
Date: Fri Apr 18 00:07:36 PDT 1997
From: ed_bryant_mod At: 204.133.96.1
Good night, all.
MsgId: *omni_visions(58)
Date: Fri Apr 18 00:09:03 PDT 1997
From: EllenDatlow At: 38.26.18.63
Night.
Home || Prime Time || Live Science || Machine Dreams || Project Open Book || SF-Fantasy-Horror
Continuum || Antimatter || Mind-Brain Lab || Interactive IQ || Gallery || OMNI ToonsQuestions, comments and suggestions can be mailed to the webmaster.
Copyright (C) 1997 by Omni Publications International, Ltd. All Rights Reserved.