Das Tagebuch Murnaus

Let's start with this:

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Funny typo aside, this story reminds me of one of my stories, namely the last time I read any of my writing in public.

There once was a gallery on Government Street down by Cascadia Bakery, around Herald Street - I can't recall what's there now. It was called the Well Hung Gallery, and it was started in 1996 (?) by some then-recent arts graduates from UVic.

One night there was a sort of open-mike reading going on at the gallery, and my friend Robin invited me to come and read. It was in the basement, which was a single large room full of chairs and IIRC maybe even larger than the gallery space upstairs. I went with Gary, and it soon became apparent as the audience filed in that we were, at age 33 or so, by far the oldest people in the room. I read my bit about halfway through the evening. There was no mike stand so I bent up a coat hanger to support the mike on the table at which I sat to read.

I had written just for this event a piece called "The Cane-Raisers", inspired by something I had been reading about William Burroughs. It started and ended with two quotes from I can't remember what, maybe Nova Express, and it was about old people who got tired of being shoved around and threatened by youngsters. They learned from "The Old Colonel" methods of exterminating them singly by means of exotic weapons like ultrasonic-vibrating sword canes, igniting their ridiculous hairdos, crowding them off subway platforms onto the third rail, and like that until their community became a well-ordered and polite place to live.

It wasn't a long piece, but about halfway through I became aware of an odd sound in the otherwise silent room. It was a sort of sniffing-snuffling, and after a moment I identified it as that sort of laugh-through-the-nose people do when they're not sure they can laugh out loud about something, but at the same time don't want to appear uncool by doing nothing. Most of the audience was doing it, and I guess it was because they weren't quite sure whether the old codger at the mike was being serious or not.

I drawled my way to the end, got a good hand, and the night wound to its conclusion. Most of the young 'uns then went off to go dancing at that gay bar up the street (I forget what it was called then), while Gary and I went off home to our respective dog and kid. I haven't bothered reading in public since then.

Last night I finally finished that damn article on the French and Indian War, 1754-63. Over 10,000 words so Mr. Editor will have to snip it a little. Took me forever to research and was written using the least efficient method: 90 minutes a day, after a tiring day at work and cooking supper. Not a bad job, though.

Want to know anything about the Siege of Louisbourg? Sod off, I'm not doing that anymore.

Think I'll go back to designing for a bit.

Why does it not surprise me that Margaret Atwood, the perennially arrogant ambassador of Rosedale Nation, came up with this?

***
Atwood adds 'inventor' to CV

By REBECCA CALDWELL
Thursday, January 6, 2005 - Page R1 (Globe and Mail)

Picture a book lover in a Kamloops, B.C., bookstore getting his favourite author to sign a book -- from her home in Toronto. Sound like a science-fiction scenario? Perhaps it's fitting then, that Margaret Atwood, author of futuristic fantasies The Handmaid's Tale and Oryx and Crake, has invented a prototype remote autographing device that has the potential to revolutionize book signings.

Atwood hit upon the idea for the machine after a strenuous tour for the paperback publication of Oryx and Crake that took her all across the United States last April.

"I thought, there has to be a better way of doing this," Atwood says. ". . . I am now an old-age pensioner, I cannot keep doing this. I can't keep eating Pringles [from the hotel minibar] and keep getting on the plane at 4 in the morning."

The machine, created in consultation with computer experts under Atwood's newly created company Unotchit Inc., is still in the development phase, but at the moment it will comprise two units. The first will consist of a screen, where the author can see and speak to the book reader in real-time, and a tablet on which the author will write the inscription. The second unit will be with the book reader, and will also include a screen to communicate with the author in real-time, and will have a flat book holder as well as an electronic arm and pen that will scrawl out the autograph.

The system will allow the inscription to be edited or spell-checked before being committed to paper and the quality of the signature should be identical to one done in person, Atwood says. The book reader will also be able to keep a record of the on-screen interaction with the author for posterity.

The autographing system is not meant to replace traditional readings or festivals. "It's an in-bookstore enhancement device," Atwood stresses. She expects the device to be ready for use in the next six to 18 months. The production cost of the machine hasn't yet been determined.

"I applaud anybody that tries to think out of the box about these things and comes up with a truly original idea, but it's also a wait-and-see thing," says Doug Pepper, president and publisher of McClelland & Stewart. "It has to come out, they have to perfect it, get the kinks out of it, and people have to learn how to use them and accept them. It certainly would be easier on the authors, and in terms of saving money, I would hope so -- we're always into saving money. One of the most costly things in any marketing budget is touring."
***

Here, dammit, you can have one for free:

Print it out and paste it in your thrift-store copy of The Handmaid's Tale. You don't even have to talk to her to get it (though the point is that she doesn't have to talk to you).