By John B. Rosenman

[Illustration (“Carpet”) courtesy of Kiavash]

What’s the Figure in your Carpet?

C’mon, you know what I mean. I’m not talking about whether you write science fiction or paranormal romances or historical thrillers or outright smut. All that is related, of course, but I’m talking about something finer and more subtle. Something you have to search for and peer at. Something that’s staring you right in the face but is concealed by the fanciful design of your words or by paths you too often have traveled.

Your personal Figure is as essential to you as your soul and the way you walk. Only it involves the distinctive way you write and even the way you think about the way you write. It’s your personal style, part of the filter through which you process the world.

The Figure in the Carpet is a composite of many things. Some can be as delicate and small as a tendency to overuse a certain word or phrase. Plain speaking Ernest Hemingway believed you should do things “truly,” and William Faulkner loved solemn words like “avatar” and “repudiate.” The Figure in the Carpet can also involve larger, more significant patterns such as your basic writing style and the lengths of your sentences. Also, specific themes and images you use over and over again. If you’re typical, you have many quirks. Some of them are strengths, some of them weaknesses. Whatever they are, they are precise fingerprints of your mind, which differ from all others.

What’s my point? I suggest that if you can detect the Figure in your psychic Carpet and recognize it for what it is, that you not only can (1) develop a better understanding of yourself as a writer and person, but (2) improve the quality of your writing and story-making.

Let’s use me as a guinea pig.

Recently, an editor for one of my novels pointed out that I overuse ‘but,’ ‘then,’ and ‘and then’ throughout. Now, if I had used the “Find” feature under “Edit” on my PC, I could have spotlighted those habits and corrected them in advance. However, to do that, you at least have to suspect the precise nature of the problem(s) in advance. But, uh, thanks to her, I’m now on guard, especially when it comes to beginning a sentence with “But.”

A minor problem? No, the devil is often in the details. While overusing a conjunction once may not be a cardinal offense, excessive repetition can become a serious irritant, undermining the effectiveness of your prose and damaging your prospects for a sale.

To mention one more example in this area, my editor also said I don’t use contractions enough, e.g., preferring ‘he had’ for ‘he’d.’ A picky point? No, for too many ‘he hads’ can slow your style and make it seem stuffy. Ultimately, these and other weaknesses are not just cosmetic considerations. They weaken the way you think and express yourself and need to be recognized for what they are.

Okay, let’s consider a larger part of the Figure in my personal Carpet, a main part of the design rather than a minor thread. In my novels, I like to focus on the Hero or Heroine as savior and as messiah. In Beyond Those Distant Stars, only Stella McMasters, a cyborg, can save the human race from alien annihilation. More recently, in Alien Dreams and Dax Rigby, War Correspondent, we also have saviors. Both are painted in cosmic, spiritual colors and upon their shoulders the fate of billions depends.

Okay, nothing wrong with that. Superheroes, as good old Joe Campbell would tell you, have a thousand faces, and many novels, movies, TV programs and the like depend on superheroes to save humanity in one way or another. But these two particular heroes – Eric Latimore in Alien Dreams and Dax Rigby in Dax Rigby – strenuously resist the notion that they are special and that their destiny involves a divine or cosmic mission.

Now I was aware of this thematic pattern and that Latimore and Rigby closely resembled each other in some ways. However, I viewed them as variations on each other, sufficiently different to warrant their mutual existence. When I went over the galleys for Dax Rigby, though, I found that a character tries to convince our hero of his great role with the same words used by an earlier character to Eric Latimore:

“Don’t you know who you are? Don’t you know who you’ve always been?”

Whoa. Too similar for comfort. When I wrote Dax Rigby, I was not aware of this parallel, of the fact that I have a character repeat what a character in another universe previously said.

Is this a weakness or a justified variation on a theme? Perhaps it’s the latter, but one thing’s for sure: I must not do it a third time. My point, again, is that writers need to be aware of the infrastructure of their stories and novels, of the perils involved in repetition. The Figure in our Carpet exists whether we see it or not, and perceiving it enables us to know more fully who and what we are as writers and to accentuate strengths and avoid weaknesses.

One last point: probably the major theme in my fiction is transformation in all its imaginable permutations. A woman contracts a deadly, horribly disfiguring disease that makes all her friends shun her, and in the end she turns into – a radiantly beautiful, angelic creature. In other stories, humans become aliens, or emerge like butterflies from a miraculous chrysalis. Sometimes the transformation is psychological or spiritual and involves a sea change of attitude rather than form.

Obviously, this theme is a broad, worthy one and I’m deeply fascinated by it. But how much is too much? No matter how resourceful and inventive I am, do I run the risk of being a one-trick pony and limiting my scope? Either way, it’s something I must at least be aware of.

So, gentle reader, as I asked before, what is the Figure in your Carpet? While it’s difficult to be objective and self-analytical, it’s still something we must do.

Here’s an assignment: Sit down and make a list of ten distinguishing traits of your writing. They can be small, concerned with word choice and punctuation, or they can be large, such as repetitive themes and character types, or a tendency to telegraph your endings. Or those traits can fall somewhere in the middle, like a tendency of your heroes to dream or share similar gestures, facial expressions, or mannerisms. Whatever they might be, your task is to recognize them and determine if they’re assets or liabilities.

If it helps, study the illustration at the beginning of this post. Put yourself in the Carpet and try to see the Figure in the depths of your own mind.

If you’re like me, you feel that once you have written a story or novel, your job is done except for telling a few friends about it and perhaps floating a note or two on the Internet. After all, the Process and Result of Creation is the main thing and anything else is boring work that belongs in the prosaic, trivial world of business. Let the PUBLISHER worry about promoting your work. REAL writers exist in a rarefied realm far above such petty concerns and shouldn’t worry about them. Their integrity depends upon not getting contaminated by the practical and vulgar world of the marketplace. Right?

Alas, no. The truth is, that sometimes promotion may be even more important than writing, and the writer ignores it at his or her peril. The need to promote one’s work is an urgent one because of many factors, the main one being that often there seems to be an infinite number of writers competing with you for the reader’s attention and the buyer’s buck.

I was reminded of this fact last week when I visited a local Barnes & Noble. I had tried to arrange a book signing there but without success. However, the CRM (Community Relations Manager) said she’d order some copies of my novel. When I went there, I was pleased to find two copies of Speaker of The Shakk in the Science Fiction and Fantasy section. However, that doesn’t mean that they’ll sell. In fact, judging by the high number of competing titles (it was a little like searching for a needle in a haystack), it probably won’t sell unless I promote it. Mundania Press produces a fine, professional-looking product, a 6 x 9” trade paperback with good stock and a striking cover. But the price of my book, $12.95, is steep. If it came to a choice between my novel and an Orson Scott Card paperback for $6.95 or $7.95, which book would you buy? That is, assuming you noticed my novel’s hiding space on the fourth shelf in row two in the first place?

Yes, folks, you’ve got to promote.

As I implied in my very first sentence, I don’t like to promote much. Also, to be frank, I don’t know much about it. However, for the benefit of beginning and developing writers (and aren’t we all developing?), I thought I’d mention a few of the things that I am doing to sell Speaker of the Shakk. This essay will therefore be sketchy and incomplete, the work of an apprentice promoter. Feel free to add other promotional techniques and methods in your comments after reading this. While my suggestions concern mainly books, they can be applied with lesser force to shorter works such as short stories (I once had a book signing at a Barnes & Noble for an erotic horror story that appeared in Hot Blood.)

One more point before I post my brief list: The publisher should promote your work too, make it possible for you to sell. Let’s assume you find a publisher that among other things, (1) gives you a good cover that grabs and interests the reader, (2) provides an astute, sensitive editor that helps you to polish your writing and avoid problems such as plot inconsistencies, (3) has your work posted on Amazon, Fictionwise, and other sales venues, and (4) advertises your book and sends it to various reviewers.

And if your publisher doesn’t do some of these things? Well, that means you have to work harder and be even more resourceful in promoting it yourself, doesn’t it?

Okay, here are some of the things I’ve done to promote Speaker of the Shakk.

1. First, I arranged for book signings at a local Borders and Barnes & Noble on two different days later this month. Both CRM’s have ordered 25 copies, and the stores promote a little by listing you on a calendar or announcement of events. However, whoever looks at them? At least one of the stores designs a sign.

2. At the signings, I will have a free 8½ by 11 inch promotional sheet listing two of my novels plus purchase info. Yes, I know a postcard or perhaps a bookmark would be better, but as I said, I’m a beginner. I have also taken this sheet to some local libraries, where I’ve arranged for it to be available.

3. I teach at a university as large as a small city. I arranged for a friend there, a tech
specialist, to post a “Message of the Day” announcement of my signings in Campus Announcements, our daily online newsletter. It will run repeatedly between now and the signings, and will be seen by every faculty member and staffer at the school who logs on. In this case, multiple postings can be crucial. If you see something once or twice, you may forget it. Three or four times, and it’s more likely to catch your attention.

4. I called the individual who handles events for the local paper and asked him if he could put in an announcement for the Compass. I then e-mailed him requested materials and information. (It didn’t hurt that several years before, the newspaper had done a great story about me sparked by the publication of a book of short stories by Dark Regions Press.)

5. I’ve promoted the novel on various Yahoo groups I belong to. To mention just one, An_Alternative_Read encourages writers to post excerpts of their novels and to provide blurbs and the like. I’m not sure how effective all these groups are, but you can also use them to invite members to your web site and urge them to post comments to your blogs. Some writers run contests and give away prizes and free electronic copies online.

Okay, that’s my “starter” list. Feel free to add other suggestions, such as networking at cons, public readings, trailers, RSS feeds, a writer fanzine sent to a subscription list, and so on. Perhaps in an ideal world, the unaided word would be mightier than any sword, capable single-handedly of selling itself to the masses. But in this world, the difference between an unread book and a commercially successful one, is often the writer who has a well-thought-out marketing plan and is willing to spend the time, money, and sweat to promote the book even before it’s gone to press.

by John B. Rosenman

No, no, I’m not talking about the sensational movie starring Daniel Day-Lewis in his first Oscar-winning role. I’m talking about my left foot, which until six weeks ago was strictly dependable, except for a weak ankle that necessitated wearing an ankle brace if I engaged in physical exercise. One day I noticed that my left foot hurt. Then it hurt a lot more. Then it got better and lulled me into a false sense of security, because just when it had almost returned to normal, it started to hurt again. The swelling returned, and each day the painful areas shifted. Now it was my toes, now it was the top of my foot, and now the bottom.

Finally, after two weeks of fluctuating discomfort, I went to a clinic. They X-rayed it and the doctor prescribed a pain killer. His best guess: gout, something that had occurred to me. He referred me to a podiatrist, and I went.

About this time, you’re probably wondering if I’m blogging on the wrong site. What does any of this have to do with writing or creativity? To which I say . . . patience.

I hobbled to the podiatrist’s office, had my foot X-rayed, and was led to a room with a padded chair where I waited, my throbbing foot extended like an offering to some sadistic god. After a few minutes, I heard someone in the hall and moments later, footsteps approached. I sighed, expecting a stereotype in a white coat – that is, a middle-aged podiatrist in a rumpled white coat who looked like Edward G. Robinson.

I was wrong.

Beautifully wrong.

Into the room walked a Vision of Loveliness, a Goddess Who Must Be Obeyed. Let me be plain here: to say that MY podiatrist was attractive is like saying Venus is photogenic. Folks, we’re talking Drop-Dead Gorgeous. I swear that within the first few seconds, I actually started to salivate, like Pavlov’s dog.

Then my writer’s brain kicked in. Mixed with my heterosexual proclivities, the result was bizarre or unusual, as it often is with writers, who have a tendency sometimes to see trivial experiences as dramatic or fictional events in which they are the main character or leading actor. Examining my X-rays, my doctor informed me I had Hammer-toe, not gout, and that a dislocated joint explained why one toe was partly looped over the other. She also said that she had received an operation just five days before for that same condition. Here she showed me a delectable bandaged LEFT foot as proof.

Gazing at her exquisite instep, I realized that I’d had a foot fetish all my life and had never known it. What’s more, the fact that she and I shared the same affliction on the same foot, created an instant we-are-made-for-each-other soulmates aura I could not ignore. Never mind that it was completely one-sided and unreciprocated. When, after all, has any writer worth his or her salt let reality derail a satisfying romantic fantasy? When she advised me that my condition would only become worse with time and that I needed to have it fixed, I promptly said, without thinking, “Well, why don’t we do it right now?”

Turns out, a patient had cancelled his procedure and she could work me right in. I lurched up, limped to a phone at the front desk and called my wife, telling her to bring lunch (it was two o’clock and I hadn’t eaten), and to give me a ride home.

I then limped to a back room and climbed onto a padded couch. A nurse told me the only “real” pain I’d feel would be when she numbed my foot. She asked me if I was ready.

I gave her a John Wayne grin and said you betcha.

She sprayed some icy solution on my left foot and then gave it four needles. And let me tell you, those needles came from all directions and went in deep. Then my goddess materialized with an angelic smile. She suggested I might want to avert my eyes and perhaps contemplate the ceiling, but there was no way I was going to remove my gaze from her. Besides, I felt that a potentially heroic, semi-preposterous scene was imminent, and part of me wanted to play my creative part so I could dramatize it to others later.

SHE asked me if I was ready.

Repressing the urge to ask for a shot of bourbon and a hunk of rawhide to clench between my teeth, I gave her a fearless look and nodded.

She smiled and then broke the second largest toe on my left foot. I watched her proceed to the smaller toe adjacent to it and crack the knuckle out of that one. She then sliced my toes open, gutting and filleting them like little fish. I gazed down at the bloody ruins of my toes and thought, “Wait’ll I tell folks about this.” Next came the black stitches and a two-inch long pin, which she inserted horizontally to the hilt in the broken toe. In the month since this operation, I’ve had some pain and a little pleasure from this wicked pin, making up all kinds of inane jokes which probably amuse me only. You know, how the pin has improved my TV reception remarkably, and its only drawbacks are that I sometimes get stopped at the airport or pick up a cheap porn station from Seattle.

Well, I won’t belabor this chapter in my life any more, except to say that just after the slice and dice was completed, Jane arrived with a cup of chili (with cheese) from Wendy’s. In tales I tell of this saga, I usually mention the chili as a humorous example of my courage while they bandaged me up and gave me a prescription for enough Oxycodone to stop a charging rhino in his tracks.

Since the operation, I’ve gone back once more to have the stitches out, and I’m frankly ambivalent about my next and possibly last visit, when the divine doctor pulls the pin on our relationship and I can wear a regulation shoe on my left foot. But part of me foresees a continuation of this cosmic drama, with the toesies on my right foot misbehaving. Again and again I go back to her, but after she has cracked and repaired all my toes, what possible excuse will I have left to see her? Hmm, damned if I can’t think of some truly sick and morbid possibilities.

At any rate, like the ham I am, I continue to narrate and dramatize this experience. Sometimes I tell colleagues I was so enraptured by this celestial creature that if she had said, “I’m sorry, sir, but I’m afraid we have no other choice but to amputate your left leg,” that I would have given her a he-man shrug and said, “Well, Doc, if you really think it’s necessary . . .”

Okay, here’s the point of the whole thing, and the question(s) I want to ask those reading this blog. Are we creative types more likely to see even trivial experiences in our lives as momentous events in which we play a vital role – sometimes as an action hero, other times, as a watered down protagonist or Everyman? Is there a detached writer or editor sitting on our shoulders, weighing the possibilities? Do we dramatize our lives and ourselves more than others? I really want to know. Seems to me I’ve heard this discussed before and the general consensus is yes. But surely ordinary people do it too. There’s Thurber’s Walter Mitty, for example, who spiced up his humdrum life with heroic fantasies. But then, what was Mitty but a writer who hadn’t found himself? I’m also reminded of The Truman Show. Are we more likely to imagine we’re the star of a lifelong sitcom or dramatic series with smash ratings? Are we so narcissistic and vain, so enraptured by the image in our psychic mirrors, that we suspect that everyone we pass is an adoring fan?

Please tell me what you think. Am I nuts, or perversely normal? Really, I can take it.

In the meantime, I’m getting ready for a trip to the Dentist next week. Though he’s in his fifties and does look like Edward G. Robinson, I feel my muse stirring. After all, his assistant’s from Sweden and she’s one hell of a looker. . . .

by John B. Rosenman

In the spirit of public service to writers everywhere, especially beginners, this is the first in a series of fearless exposes of GREAT WRITER MYTHS. Illusions may be nice and comforting, but they have a downside: they can blind you to reality and prevent you from coping with it. For a writer this can be particularly deadly and pernicious. Thinking that stuffed, DOA turkey you wrote is actually a living, champion thoroughbred about to win the Triple Crown will never enable you to develop as a writer and achieve your potential, which is possible only if you try something which you do have some talent for and were meant to do, like collect stamps, be a serial killer, or run for high public office.

This month’s myth came up a few months ago on one of the loops I frequent. Someone was saying that even negative criticism from an editor or publisher was good because it showed he had noticed you and that you had made an impression. In return I wrote, “This is often, perhaps usually true, but not always. I have received personalized rejections savaging my stories and ripping them apart.”

Folks, I thought I had made my case. However, the bloke at the other end wrote: “If you get personalized rejections, YOU HAVE ACHIEVED A CERTAIN LEVEL.” He added, “I was in a writers group . . . and whenever someone received a response, it was cause for celebration because we usually just got form rejections . . . If someone takes the time to send you a personal note, it’s because they think you have potential and believe you should keep writing.” In fact, you should consider personalized rejections as a encouragement from “the publishing world” that “You’ve come a long way, and are almost there.”

Okay, I remember that for years when I started writing, all I received were form rejection slips. I’m sure most on this site have had a similar experience. You might even get to the point where you’d be happy just to see a scrawled “Thanks” or “Up Yours” on one of those forms. Under the circumstances, we can understand why a writer, especially a desperate, beginning one, would look forward to and treasure even the most casual response or recognition of his existence from an editor, why he would embrace even the most tenuous sign that a real live human being existed out there who had actually taken a few minutes to read his words and respond. But folks, while a reply, even a negative one, OFTEN implies something positive, and suggests that you may have climbed out of the great unwashed multitude of writers and achieved some small degree of distinction, it does not necessarily mean that. To think otherwise is to embrace a delusion and an illusion about the submission process, and friends, my conscience would not rest if I did not put this mischievous myth in the crapper where it belongs. Call me a mean-spirited killjoy if you like, but thinking a slap in the face is actually a flirtatious come-on will only prove a liability. Ultimately, it will weaken rather than strengthen you.

I can already here someone say, “But why deny a writer what encouragement he sees? Why take away what hope he has?” To which I would respond, “Didn’t you read the previous paragraph?” Getting published and achieving success as a writer is difficult enough; when you form a habit of grossly misinterpreting editors’ words and signals, it becomes immeasurably harder. Reading the situation for something else than it really is will only handicap you because it separates you from reality and makes it impossible for you to learn from what editors actually mean and improve your writing on the basis of it.

To be honest, I don’t know how much a problem this Pollyanna attitude toward negative feedback is. Perhaps I’m making a big deal out of a small one, and clutching at editorial straws is a tendency that afflicts only the terminally desperate. Assuming it’s a genuine problem, though, here are five things that such writers should remember.

1. These days, more and more editors/publishers are commenting on writers’ work anyway. This is largely due to the fact that magazines and publishers are paperless and do their thing increasingly online. Everything’s cheaper: space, layout, and TIME. When all you have to do is type a few words and click Send, you’re far more likely to comment on that story you hated. The sanguine writer I mentioned earlier wrote that editors “are basically business people and have no time” to send comments they don’t mean. Well, when a response is just a key tap or a mouse click away, they often do.

2. If the editor’s review is relentlessly negative and/or vicious without any mitigating features, such as an invitation to send more of your work, then you can probably bet he’s not interested in a second date. In other words, don’t assume he’s aroused and wants to play bump and tickle just because he responded.

 3. Some editors are mean, negative, overly critical. It’s their nature to see warts on everything and to praise almost nothing.

4. By the same token, some editors are kind-hearted and positive like Paula Abdul and  praise too much. They don’t want to hurt your feelings but may unintentionally do something even worse: lead you astray by sending the wrong impression. I mean, what part of the word REJECTION don’t you understand?

5. Finally, lest I’ve created the wrong impression here, often editorial feedback is indeed a positive sign that you have registered on the editor’s radar. Especially if it’s a prozine with a good reputation or a respectable, advance-paying publishing house, the reader may be justified in feeling encouraged. And if the editor/publisher invites you to send more, then yes, the rejection might be a golden opportunity. On such occasions, NO might imply a possible future YES.

At any rate, I know that all readers’ comments on this essay, whether pro or con, will be an affirmation not only of my insight, genius, and writing abilities, but of my humanitarian concern for writers everywhere. Even if you appear to be negative and rip my opinion and words to shreds, I will know your true sentiments. And if you happen to edit a decent magazine – well, my story is already in the mail.

That’s it for this month, friends. Tune back in May, when I will expose and explore GREAT WRITER MYTHS # 2: Writing for Storytellers Unplugged is Not Only a Fast Track to Fame and Glory, but Will Ensure That You Always Have a Hot Date on Saturday Night.

John B. Rosenman

By the way, check out my interview which will be posted early this morning at the following site:

http://www.apenandfire.com/?p=466

[This is a paper that I read at a conference on Science Fiction/Fantasy/Horror several years ago at Norfolk State University.]

Science fiction, fantasy, and horror are like love and good sex. Most of us assume we know what these terms mean, but when we try to formulate mutually acceptable definitions and reach a shared understanding, we are likely to find ourselves hopelessly divided. Many authorities in these fields even argue that there are no completely acceptable definitions, and that even the best ones will be somewhat inaccurate or misleading.

Within literature and the arts, such a situation is fairly common. For example, there are scholars who contend that even the best definitions of Romanticism and Classicism will be somewhat wrong. Closer home, we may not even be able to agree on a label for a work that most of us love. Consider the movie The Wizard of Oz, in which a girl is knocked unconscious and transported in a dream to a wondrous land in which a scarecrow longs for a brain and a tin man pines for a heart. Most of us might classify this classic as escapist fantasy, but think again. If we consider Dorothy’s nightmarish encounters with a wicked witch, flying monkeys, and all those imaginary “lions and tigers and bears,” can’t a case be made that the movie is actually dark fantasy or horror, at least when seen through a child’s eyes? Or what if Dorothy boarded a spaceship and flew to Oz (located on a planet beyond the Milky Way) and returned the same way? Would the movie then be science fiction or a mixture such as science-fantasy?

What I am suggesting is that some of the art we love may be hybrids, as heterogeneous and ultimately unclassifiable as the complex people we know. Still, human beings crave the comfort, even illusory, of consensus, and they insist on defining their terms. In that spirit, I will try to define briefly what science fiction, fantasy, and horror are, as long as it’s understood that any definition, even the best, will be somewhat deficient.

To do so, I will talk about the ignition switch on my car. For months, it’s been giving me fits, for it has been difficult and at times even impossible to turn it off. I’ve taken the damned thing into the shop half a dozen times and spent a small fortune getting it repaired. Yet after driving home today, I still had to spend five minutes turning it off, and it appears that more costly trips to the shop await me.

Now, if I were to write about this problem as a mainstream, “traditional” writer would, my treatment of the subject would reflect a realistic world we all recognize. Perhaps a thingamajig or a #9 widget in the steering column caused the problem, or the man who sold me the car in the first place knew my car was a lemon, and simply didn’t tell me. Whatever the case, there would be a prosaic, everyday explanation for my woes, one very much in keeping with what we know and accept as reality.

But let’s look at my ignition switch from the standpoint of fantasy, which is perhaps the oldest art form there is. Long ago, when cavemen looked up at the dark, thunderous sky, they probably imagined fearsome giants warring against each other. Such an explanation for the unknown fits in well with The American Heritage Dictionary’s definition of literary fantasy as “Fiction characterized by fanciful or supernatural elements.” Fearsome, warring giants are certainly fanciful or supernatural, and if my explanation for my ignition problems was fantastic in nature, I might invent all sorts of fanciful or supernatural causes. Perhaps my ignition didn’t turn because of those ubiquitous gremlins we always hear about. Or some wizard or sorcerer cast a spell on my machinery. Who knows, if I’m paranoid or deranged enough, perhaps I’ll conclude that my car is alive and simply doesn’t like me or misses its former owner. Either way, my explanation won’t be a “realistic” one, though it had better have a realistic consistency and internal logic of its own. For example, if I say the ignition switch acts the way it does because it doesn’t like me, I can’t suddenly show it being nice to me and working well without a valid reason.

Next, let’s look at my ignition sorrows from the viewpoint of horror. But first, a warning: strictly speaking, horror may not even be a genre, for it is primarily an emotion that one finds universally in everything from Hamlet to “Hansel and Gretel.” Our friend, the dictionary, doesn’t even provide a literary definition of it. For practical purposes, let us define horror as art whose major effect is to frighten and terrify, using everything from subtle, creepy mood and atmosphere to gore, vomit, and assorted gross-out effects. In keeping with this definition, I may sense an eerie, intangible presence in the front seat that interferes with the ignition switch’s proper function. Perhaps that presence slowly grows in haunting, ghostlike fashion and one night, I even feel phantom fingers lightly brush the back of my neck. Or, if I want to describe my ignition switch in such a way as to fill you with gut-wrenching horror, I might have blood or a long, slimy tongue ooze out of it, just before I insert the key.

On the other hand, I could approach this situation from the standpoint of psychological horror – that is, horror that reveals, in Poe-like fashion, my psychic sickness, the deranged and demented recesses of my diseased mind. If so, I might conclude that my ignition switch was tampered with by one of my colleagues because he – or she – has always hated me and delighted in causing me trouble. Indeed, perhaps that very colleague now occupies this same stage with me at this very moment, and I know who it is. The only question is, should I seek my revenge with poison, an axe, or through some more diabolical means?

Here’s one last horrific possibility: it’s late at night and I’m stranded on a back road way out in the boondocks because, for a change, my ignition switch won’t turn on. Perhaps the situation makes me feel like Pip in Moby-Dick. Like him, I feel all alone in the universe, which is completely indifferent to my fate. As the wind howls, I realize I could die and rot out here and never be discovered. The world itself would proceed just as before and wouldn’t even miss me. Certainly that is scary, isn’t it? Certainly that is horror. Now imagine I receive a visitor, one of the “Old Ones” from H.P. Lovecraft’s Chthulu mythos. The creature is from another planet, and it belongs to a mysterious race far older and more intelligent than our own, and with far greater powers. What’s more, it is so strange and hideous in appearance as to have a Medusa-like effect upon the beholder. Merely to look at it, is to be driven absolutely and irrevocably insane.

We’d all agree, I believe, that this last situation certainly qualifies as horror. But note that I described the creature who comes to keep me company on that lonely road as being “from another planet.” Doesn’t his extraterrestrial nature and origin make the scene belong more to science-fiction, or, to mention a new hybrid, to science-fiction horror? Again, if I give that creature a more supernatural, fantastic twist, perhaps we should opt for the label of “dark fantasy.” As I mentioned before, sometimes these terms can be slippery. Who knows? If the creature’s funny or humorous, the whole thing might even be comic fantasy or comic horror, along the lines of Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein.

Last, let’s consider my faulty ignition switch from the standpoint of science fiction, which the dictionary defines as “A literary or cinematic genre in which the plot is typically based on speculative scientific discoveries, environmental changes, space travel, or life on other planets.” Instead of Lovecraftian Old Ones from another realm, perhaps my ignition switch is recalcitrant because a nearby wrecked (but undiscovered) spaceship from a distant galaxy is trying to contact me on the car radio, which I have yet to turn on because I don’t like either news or music. Another possibility is that the malfunction is caused by local environmental changes that are caused in turn by global warming that presages a worldwide catastrophe, and my defective ignition switch is simply the very first symptom of humanity’s looming fate.

Here I would like to make a statement that may sound extreme but that I think is important. Because science fiction is so “speculative,” so concerned with infinite possibilities and alternate realities, it possesses a conceptual richness or potential that transcends what we find in all other literature, including that which has been traditionally taught in classrooms. The scope of science fiction is so vast and limitless that it embraces not only this world and universe but others; not just this time period but the distant past and the remote future; not just outer space but the inner space of the human body or a drop of water, which may be inhabited by microscopic beings much like ourselves. There is African science fiction, Jewish science fiction, feminist science fiction, humorous science fiction, and science fiction for juveniles and children. Moreover, science fiction may be “soft” and so non-technical that anyone can read it. Or it may be what’s called “hard” and based so much on current science and scientific extrapolation that you almost have to be a scientist to understand it.

Indeed, science fiction embraces so much, that I might not even have an ignition problem at all. The switch I’ve been complaining about may actually belong not to me but to another John B. Rosenman on a parallel or alternate Earth. Back here, in this Norfolk, Virginia, my car works fine and has never required even one repair.

Oh well, it doesn’t hurt to dream.

In closing, I hope I have helped to clarify what science fiction, fantasy, and horror are, and shown how they sometimes intermarry and have very interesting children. Considered together, these three art forms offer endless possibilities for the creative imagination, which I believe will be amply demonstrated at this conference, sometimes in unorthodox ways.

Recently a writer on one of my loops asked when he should kill a story or novel. His novel, after all, had been relentlessly rejected, often by agents with varying criticisms. The verdict was in and it was unanimous: the thing was a turkey that could not be sold. Shouldn’t it therefore be put to rest?

His question struck a nerve with me. Similar to many writers, I’ve written some real stinkers, wretched, amateurish deformities that beg to be put out of their misery. After all, they shoot horses, don’t they? Wouldn’t lighting a match or hitting the delete button be an act of kindness? Looked at another way, who wants his most embarrassing, amateurish works polluting his hard drive and filing cabinet, perhaps even threatening his future? Imagine some future scholar discovering them before or after your death and using them to “revise” your literary reputation.

The horror, the horror!

What follows are three reasons not to inter the rotten fruit of your brain, the mawkish and misshapen music of your muse, the putrid and putrescent purple prose (like this) of your psyche:

1. You can learn from that piece of dreck. Yes, that’s right. Years later you can take it out and learn from your mistakes, whether it’s ludicrously inept writing, plot inconsistencies, or inadequate characterization. You can also develop more of a comprehensive overview of your writing career, both of where you’ve been and of how far you’ve come. And that may enable you to chart a better creative course in the future, one in which you avoid such earlier disasters.

2. If you keep that story or novel around, you can revise and polish it, perhaps sell it to a lucrative market. Think about it: is any story so bad that no part of it can ever be salvaged? Even if it fills you with shame, there still might be an idea or passage, the germ of another story or novel that can spring like a phoenix from its ashes. If necessary, consider that story to be a collection of random reflections you once scribbled in a notebook and which could be the fodder, the spark, for future stories.

3. Last, no matter how much it stinks, that story is a part of you. In a way, it’s your child. Wouldn’t it be a crime, even a sin to murder it? That story is a product of your past, a facet of your identity, however ill-executed it might be. As Aldous Huxley said, “A bad book is as much of a labor to write as a good one; it comes as sincerely from the author’s soul.” In addition, a bad book, when placed against a good one, can serve as a marker of how far you’ve come, how much you’ve conquered and transcended your deficiencies. And that, my friends, is inspiring, a cause for celebration and optimism.True, a bad book or story can be an embarrassment. It can strip away our pretenses and smug belief in our greatness, and expose us for the frauds we are, not only to ourselves but to those who praise and admire our work. A bad story or book can remind us that even our masterpieces are built on quicksand, and that our most monumental achievements owe a debt to failure and immaturity. When you think of it, maybe a dose of painful, character-building humility is yet another reason to preserve and acknowledge our failures, especially if we deserve it.