Not the end

[Pt. 14 of an ongoing text...]

Has a novel ever committed self-slaughter? What would that look like? Some novels have been left unfinished — but that’s not what I envision when I think of this concept of novel-cide. For some reason, I feel that there must be at least a couple chapters of anti-text that follow the self-termination, to prove to the reader that the narrative is truly deceased. And, by that term “anti-text”, I don’t mean unintelligible gibberish (although that could work too); I mean the addition of any old writing that does not continue the story or refer to its plot or characters — even filler material would work fine. In fact, filler is preferable.

Isn’t that funny, how we have these fixed notions about what nonexistent concepts are “supposed to” be like? Who am I to prescribe how a book’s demise should appear? 

And this accumulation of chapters of text that I’m contributing to here — I know that it’s not a novel, but is it even a fake novel? When I started writing it, I wanted to just let it sprawl or ooze or sprint or boing in any direction it wanted. If I remember right, that’s why I started out praising you, O reader; for I was thinking: “If this thing holds together, it will not be on account of any internal, inherent consistency or coherence: it’ll be due entirely to the capability of its reader’s imagination. 

QUESTION: Is that fair? To ask the reader to write her own book? 

ANSWER: Yes, it is fair. (All’s fair in love.)

But I feel kinda bad for giving you such lousy material to work with. It would’ve been nice if I’d have provided better dots to connect. The only thing I can say in praise of my own part of our collaboration here is that at least I followed the most important Novelistic Law: I centered the plot on the concept of “Boy meets Girl” and then ended the tale with our heroes getting married. Tho I attempted to hide the fact that I’m a softy at heart by claiming that the book committed suicide — I admit: it’s too ambiguous for a story to fall on its own sword after winning the battle. If I wanted the novel’s self-murder to feel real, and if I truly wished for readers to believe that the book would burn itself alive as it did, I should’ve had my protagonist and alter ego Bryan get turned down by all those women, rather than for them to jump at the chance to wed me; but I just couldn’t bring myself to do this to myself: those gals were so sexy (you should’ve seen how I envisioned them!) …I guess I’m always trying to have everything both ways.

And how did this project end up degenerating into another Jesus Legend? Haven’t we had enough of these? Who cares if, in this one, he’s handsome and rich — I call this lazy writing. 

Maybe I’m burnt out, you say? — Nah: if I were burnt out, I’d stop; but the truth is that I don’t feel burnt out; I feel the opposite. I wanna compose seven books at the same time and bind them all so that you can read them simultaneously as one vast painting. You see a flash and you’re blinded; scales fall from your eyes, and you’re my convert for life. I’m searching for a form that doesn’t exist. 

Truth gets in the way. No matter what the reality is, I find it dissatisfying. That’s why I keep shifting around. I’m agitated. I wonder why I was born with this conviction that things should be otherwise — where did I get this notion? Is it a memory, or a superdimensional communication? (It can only be either of those two things.)

Back to those women, and my compulsively marrying them… I feel that I should say a word about their identities. I try to stick to the archetypes, the big first names, in hopes that that will excuse my… 

I guess I just wanna etch myself next to the queen on the pyramid’s mural — is that considered vandalism? How much is the fine; I’ll pay it. I hope you see it as pathetic ambition. 

Again, the reason that marriage is so often on my mind during novel composition has much to do with the central part that this institution plays in the wretched, insulting tradition; for, aren’t there many novels that take as their main subject the very simple question: How will our heroine make a living, if she does not find a patriarch to objectify her? 

My stance on this matter is probably obvious, but I’ll say it anyway: I myself prefer marrying ALL the women and living happily ever after. 

And I like to portray Jesus Christ with firearms because he’s usually only given a sword or black magic (plagues, etc.) — I think it’s nice to see him in a well-tailored suit, looking handsome (clean cut) and packing heat. I chose a pistol because that’s a popular type of handgun — I hope I’m right about this; admittedly I have very little knowledge of such things. All I know about firearms comes directly from the movies; but only the older films from the 1940s and 50s. And I wanted to reference Jesus loading bullets into the cylinder of his gun, but I wasn’t sure if pistols technically even have cylinders — I feared that maybe they only have cartridges or whatever — and I didn’t want the gun crowd to get frustrated with my ignorance, so that’s why I gave Christ a revolver as well. A large percentage of my readership are gun-lovers.

But, to point out the obvious: Whenever I allow you, O gentle reader, to speak or act inside the shenanigans of our joint-masterwork, it’s not altogether your own words and actions that get recorded. The problem is that I, the author, am on the other side of this gulf that is fixed between us. If you could send me suggestions for things that you’d like to say and do within the book, I’d eagerly add them; but my only option is to assume that by relaxing and making my consciousness passive during composition, it’s possible that my beloved reader shall send me thought-suggestions as mental vibes from beyond. Thus I attempted to let you “auto-write” yourself and all your lines (hence my wonder above, regarding superdimensional communication); especially that fire-breathing tirade that you made against the critic in the last scene, which caused his character to do a backflip over the railing and emerge as your ideal spouse. (Could it be that you and I just wrote the first novel where its reader even ends up married as well? — I think we deserve more praise and worship for our accomplishments.)