Magical Realism, Jung, Picasso & the Circus

Without the marginal or liminal world, we are not able to experience the numinous - the mystical experience, the feeling we are in the presence of the gods or a universe which fills us with awe and wonder. Often this happens in nature, sex, meditation and dreaming, but are also primary concepts in both art and the writing of Magical Realism.
The marginal or liminal world which exists outside of the constructs of society, has been named in the past in other cultures: the Celtic Sidh, the land behind Maya, the veil, in East India. It is the place between the real world and the ethereal realm, a magical world, where we confront archetypes, gods and spirits.  Both numinous experiences in liminal or marginal peoples and locations  are where we confront our own inner archetypes, the hidden inner gods, spirits and even the demon or the shadow, as Jung called it. In our dreams we meet dark and dangerous entities and helpful guides. But we can also encounter them in our waking life, by using our lunar mind in creating fantasies and active imagination; in writing, painting and meditation. 
Recently the Asheville Jung Center, presented a webinar called, Tending the Lunar Mind, by Dr. Murray Stein, a noted Jungian analyst who is also a professor at the International School of Analytical Psychology (ISAP) in Zurich, Switzerland, the same university where Jung taught. Dr. Stein spoke about two important aspects concepts of the lunar mind: the marginal and numinous.
 The liminal is the place outside of the practical, organized structured world, but it is real. Gypsies and Circuses both live marginal lives: moving from place to place, and it was interesting to discover that Picasso had an affinity for both, as well as a keen interest in primitive art, creating much along those lines in his sculptures and some of his paintings, but also in little fetishes he hid in his studios. By living as marginal life as a starving artist, not following conventional rules, he could enter the liminal realm, become very much in touch with his lunar mind. This highly evident, as if we had the visual images of his dreams, in many of his paintings where he evokes archetypal motifs: the most obvious the bull, which he felt represented himself, and which he learned to identify with form his youngest days when his father an art teacher, took him to bullfights. Picasso said that he at times, painted his women as the horses on which the bullfighter rode and who were sometimes sacrificed to the fight, as seen in paintings like Guernica, his anti World War II German Invasion of France painting. All of these searches, through the expression of his art, was his search for the Sacred Fire, that powerful act of revelation which comes through creative acts. Picasso's youngest son with Francois, Bernard Ruiz-Picasso, claimed Picasso told him how he often didn't realize the symbolism in the images he painted were relevant to his personal life until later, a while after he finished his paintings, such as in Guernica.  
And so he could be close to the deepest depths of the liminal - in touch with the numinous, driven by his left brain/lunar mind thinking. To facilitate this, he chose other people to manage the practical side of his life, his many mistresses, eating in cafes and hiring managers to sell his art.
He was so fascinated with the gypsies who brought the circuses to his childhood home, that he often portrayed himself or others in Harlequin clothes. In the early 1900's in Spain at Carnivale and later to a lesser degree, in France, the Harlequin was not a funny clown, he was more Mercrurial, much like Hermes, whose jokes could often be sinister, cruel and confusing and sometimes even dangerous and terrifying.
Picasso called the circus,The Vague Terrain, as if he was already so entrenched in the lunar mind, that he could name it - a landscape which to him was another place and time.   
I found this all to be rather comforting, and revealing after I watched the brilliant video biography: Picasso: Magic, Sex and Death, which I found at the library. One of Picasso's close friends and his biographer, John Richardson, narrates and interviews members of Picasso's family, people he knew, and their descendants, as well as primary sources.

The books I write and am editing, fall in the category of Magical Realism. Parts of the books are based on fact: locations, politics and weather events (Katrina in Shaman Circus, the n'or easter and tornadoes in Mass. in Shaman Exile, and the flooding in Australia in Fireworks, Interference Equation. The magic is not full out fantasy, but a sort of an escalation, an exaggeration of real events which become magical, often, as lived and viewed by the characters. 

Jung discovered the lunar mind in the 1920's, when he began listen to the fantasies of a patient named Miss Miller, this was before neuroscientists found it in the laboratory and named it the left brain, which he found was emotional, fantasy oriented, and worked in childlike with images and stories. At first, Jung believed the lunar or right brain was inferior to the solar mind, the left brain, which was directed, organized, logical, practical, and followed the rules of society, as taught in the schools and lived in the cities. But as he worked with Miss Miller more and more, he discovered that the lunar mind was a story teller with purpose, it's ability to hyper associate, work in images and storylines, quite different from the real world, but relating to the real world, proved more informative and valuable to the sanity of a person. Recently, neurscience has confirmed Jung's interpretations of the lunar mind and found in clinical research that without sleeping and dreaming, people are be unable to thrive and even survive.Their health suffers, they are unable to regulate their body temperature, make decisions, judge other people as trustworthy, and be correct in the flight or fight syndrome when danger arrived. They end up with their immune system challenged, their anxiety high and become unable to handle their emotions.

I'd often wondered why I called my first novel Shaman Circus, since there's no circus in the novel. Just a rather confusing round of Shamans who can't quite figure out how to live their destiny and more often fail or are punished by circumstance for their failures or perhaps as tests of their commitment, but also manage to create incredible forces of power for good in unusual ways.  My second novel in the Shaman series, Shaman in Exile, does include plot aspects within the liminal world of the Circus in the countryside of France, on the outskirts of a city. I chose to include a circus, because of the amazingly bizarre circus we have in Greenville, SC called, The Inner Circus. Beside scheduled performances, stilt walkers, poi spinners, mimes and other performers dressed in odd, not conventional circus costumes, and sometimes frightening masks, often show up at the park, on Main Street, or art fairs and our first Friday Gallery Crawls in the Pendleton Arts district. When I lived in my studio in that area, 2007 and 2008, it was a highly liminal world. At night, due to crime at that time, the area was deserted, not a car parked anywhere, not a person in sight. This was when I was writing Shaman in Exile. At that time, I had no idea the circus was considered a liminal realm, or that appeared in Magical Realism novels.
 So it was an act of synchronicity to watch the Picasso video after the Tending the Lunar Mind webinar. Now I finally get some of Picasso's cubist works, not my favorite, I prefer his blue period, but now I understand more of what his paintings mean, but also why he kept morphing his style in more and more bizarre styles. Due to the way he felt inclined to paint himself in Harlequin costume, he allows his solar mind, his massive ego, to take the liberty of entering the lunar mind when he stepped in his studio. In fact, eve3n with his solar side, the Bull, when he entered the liminal realm in his studio, he became a shaman, and often thought of himself this way, according to his son, as unpredictable as the Hermes/Mercurial Harlequin.Pierrot. Picasso is one vibrant testimony, among the many in the artists and writers to lfind the lunar realm through creative acts, at the very time Jung was discovering the liminal worlds in the minds and dreams of his patients. 

Shaman in Exile on location III

I'm picking back up on my location series regarding where I lived and the locations I used while writing my Shaman novels.
Now we continue with the locations of Shaman in Exile (in progress). Starting May of 2006, I wrote the first part of Shaman in Exile in New England, where I had to move for six months to handle the details following my mother's death.  I lived in a 400 sq. foot 1940's cottage in Hampton Village, New Hampshire, a small seasonal coastal town which is nearly deserted  from the first weekend in October until Memorial Day weekend.

For those 6 months I lived without hot water, a stove and had only a college fridge.  I used a hot plate to cook but did have internet via a highly expensive chip (necessary for the legal work).  I did learned to cook full meals on two electric eyes but also ate out at favorite local eateries.  Le Bec Rouge, where I also saw live bands downstairs, Lupo's, right up the street on Ocean Blvd. with a view of the Atlantic Ocean and a TV so I could catch up on the news, and Ronaldo's an Italian place with a North end of Boston chef, and Ouda's, a small gunshot bldg. which tipped over by the ravegas it suffered during the winter.  It's right on the bay and is frequented mostly by fishermen and lobstermen. Ouda is a fiesty and often irreverant German owner/cook who threatens to handcuff you to the girll if you don't clean your plate. The portions are massive and cheap. 

Each of these places are featured in Shaman in Exile.      

For the second part of Shaman in Exile, I lived in my art studio in the Pendleton Street Arts District in Greenville, SC after my return to South Carolina. Pipes had burst in my house, taking out kitchen and bathroom floor and parts of the foundation. So I had to move out while reconstruction went on for another 8 months.  I decided to live in my studios - cheaper than an apartment, no utility bills or security deposits.  Plus I worked a whole lot more with fewer distractions.
This Pednleton link has a lot of photos of the various art studios, including the Village Studios where I lived in the two room studio/bathroom from Oct. 2006 to May 2007, while my house was under reconstruction after water pipe leaks destroyed the kitchen, the bathroom and part of the foundation, while I lived in Hampton. The studio is featured in both Shaman books. 

 This is what my studio looked like while I lived in the two rooms over Christmas (my studio and a bathroom anotyher area about 400 sq. feet.).  There was an area downstairs with microwave and a shower that all the artists could use.

The two nude women are paintings of my characters.  The one on the easel is Shya, who appears in two of my gothic urban fantasy short stories set in New Orleans and the one on the right on the wall is of Mavis, the artist who survived Katrina in New Olreans in Shaman Circus.

Shaman Circus on Location II

I became intrigued with the locations behind the stories in my favorite novels, when Caitlin Kiernan released her novel Threshold and added a small limited edition chapbook from Subterranean Press (now out of print and highly collectible) called Trilobite which was about the writing of Threshold. In it were  photos she'd taken of many of the sites in and around Birmingham, Alabama, which she used in the novel. I'd pictured most of them  just as she wrote them, but some photos added details which enhanced my appreciation of her terrifying tale. Ever since that book, I've been entranced with the specifics of locations I read about in the books I enjoy.

So, to continue with the locations used in my novel, Shaman Circus, here's the house which Jacob flashbacks to where he and Cate lived.  It's one of my favorite scenes in the book. The house is now torn down, bulldozed away and replaced with a gas station.
 Many of the real locations I included are gone.  Exposures Art Gallery closed.  I never took photos. Too busy planning and holding an art show. The location of the ritual was a combination of two real locations, both are intact, one near King's Mountain in NC, the other is intact, but altered for the book. Whitten University is a fictional institution, although Perry's flower shop was an actual location I moved from another city to New Orleans. Alas, it no longer exists and was a wonderful experience, not simply a flower shop at all, but an entrance to a dream land. The temple is fictional but draws aspects from various places in and around New Orleans.

Dougal's, where Alex and Laney, two anthrolpolgy professors from Whitten meet often has been bought and renamed.  Although I'll try and get photos of the interior (which is the same) when I go there tonight for St. Patty's Day. My friend Donna Nyzio, painted huge panels of the Irish, map, flag and a harp, for the outside but those have been removed. It's a shame we never thought to take pictures. It's a true Irish pub, dark, with a huge fireplace, tables and couches, lots of cool touches and ambiance. 

While in New Orleans, Jacob lives in a bus very much like this one.  He did install a windshield and added a few curtains. And the small bar where his band plays: Bad Jacqui's, is based on a club I loved on Decatur St.  in New Orleans, now sold and altered.  

So, writers: how often do you utilize places you've been whether you loved or hated them?  Do you use locales you'd like to go in your novels?

 And readers.  Do you care? 

out of balance

I'm being a naughty naughty writer in allowing the seesaw to tip out of balance.  I meant to write today on Fireworks, but have run away to work in the garden due to the weather, which feels more like coastal New England than South Carolina.

Back to work on "Interference Equation - Fireworks" today. Listening to a switch off of Din of Thieves and IAMX. I need to read more Fissure submissions, but Monday's are my days for my writing. I do need to go fill out more job applications, but may do that tomorrow. Procrastinating isn't my usual way of operation, but I don't want to look like a drowned rat.
High Time I stepped off the ego train and went back into the world of my confused and bizarre, but spiritual, quantum physicist, Sean O'Connor, as he stumbles through his erratic life in Greenville, SC. He looks a lot like the man in my painting, "The Philosopher," except he has black hair. Haven't painted any other of the characters but need to.
Spending a weekend with my granddaughter, doing fun real world little girl things, brought me back down to earth. I kind of slid up into a freakish bubble after the art show and poetry readings. so time to get grounded in my little world that I know the best, where Carl Jung and John Fowles whisper warnings, tests or answers, and I struggle to make a little bit of sense of it all in my cozy nest.
Of course, Halloween month is our favorite month and as Kendall says, we get to play with all of our October friends, who are: ghosts, witches, black cats, skeletons, gargoyles, vampires pumpkin-headed creatures and werewolves. Most of them are now living on our porch advising on which October movies to watch which night. We watched Corpse Bride, Saturday and I'll also have to work in Bram Stoker's Dracula, Frankenstein, Mirromask, Nightmare Before Christmas, The Crow, and other faves within the next few weeks. Some of those are not for Kendall, but I mustn't forget my roots either.
Books will be Coraline by chapters, Wolves in the Walls, and the Graveyard Book which I've been saving for her (and for myself to savor) for this month.

Status report and musings on the writer's dilemma

Completed a number of necessary items this week. Some in response to my editor at All Things That Matter Press. As the owner of a small press, I knew the pages necessary to include in a new book.
I have a long list I send out to all Shadow Archer Press authors. But when it came to my own novel, Shaman Circus, I realized how difficult it can be to write a long and short summary, a long and short bio that's not just a list of credits, but has some interesting facts as well, along with deciding on a dedication and remembering everyone to acknowledge. It took me longer than I expected to pull all of those elements together and email them to him, while they work on copy-edits.
And in addition, I'm taking his suggestions regarding blogs and marketing, which is a whole new learning curve in some of the blogging realms and web aspects, as well as learning how to publicize without a "toot your own horn" aspect going on all the time. I've discovered it's a very fine line I haven't mastered yet. Already people like B. Miller, Brian K. Ladd, Joseph Goosey, Leigh Green are teaching me how to do this effectively.
And now I'm onto working out cover concepts with an overseas artist and we'll have to wait to see if they match with my publisher's ideas.
And then to balance that off, there's been so much to do with my press, printing many copies of Justin Blackburn's book as he travels all over the country, selling books like crazy at organized readings as much as spontaneous readings at places like Starbucks. The guy is amazing on how he can sell books and needs to teach the rest of us.
Also, j michael niotta's book is in the works and I've completed printing on Enzo Marra's book, and am working on books to be released early 2010.
So that's a lot. But that's not all. Even as a writer or handles marketing, works their everyday job (right now mine is Shadow Archer Press (SAP)- a demanding mistress) and write blogs, Twitter, Facebook, Myspace (which has proved a touchstone for SAP) etc., the main thing is to keep writing.
Writers must switch off the administrative side of the brain and go back to the creative - something I've had a hard time doing lately, only averaging 500-1,000 words per session as opposed to 3,000. In addition, a writer can't play hermit all the time. They must get out and be flooded with influences, observe people, society, local and current events, mayhem, conversations, - all the fodder we need to develop characters, construct complex plots and make our stories or poems vividly alive.
Hmmm... a balancing act to be sure. A teeter-totter always ready to toss us in the mud, a paradox inviting all our archetypes to run wild.
Such is the life!

The Submission Process

It was nice to see Neil Gaiman on Twitter sweating over whether one of his stories was going to be accepted. Granted he only waited one day, but still, its good to know established writers, well rock star status writers, still have to sweat it out.

Which brings up the whole issue of submissions, rejections, acceptances. As a writer, I still get a little bummed out when I get a slew of rejections, as any writer does (maybe not folks like Gaiman) but as an editor, knowing the other side, I want to writers out there, especially writers new to the whole submission process, to not take rejections personally.

Many of the stories I reject are not simply due to quality, but more due to how they fit into the way a magazine is shaping up. If I get a slew of Sci-Fi stories and no horror or fantasy, I'll have to reject good Sci-Fi stories just so I'll have a balance. If I'm doing a seasonal issue such as a Halloween issue I might go heavy on accepting horror. But new writers always feel like its their fault their story is rejected and often that's not the case. Sometimes its a matter of style, sometimes a simpler matter of space in the publication.

The best thing I advise, as many writers before me have advised, when you send a story or poem or manuscript off, forget about it and go write more. Don't keep checking your e-mail box. Use Duotrope http://www.duotrope.com/ to keep track of your submissions, follow the markets' writers' guidelines and develop a thick skin. Research your market and make sure your work fits.

When an editor rejects your writing - they are not rejecting you as a person. Step away from your writing. When you get to the submitting point you've turned it into a business.

Magazines are innundated with hundreds, even thousands of stories per issue and only have room for 4 or 5. Many rejections are perfectly good stories. If an editor makes a suggestion for changes, even though rejecting the story, don't take it as a slam, but as a helping hand from an objective reader. After all that's what editors to - they present your work to their readers and they know better who they are than you do.

If an editor accepts your story, but suggests changes, don't blindly accept them, if you can argue a valid reason why you don't want a change or edit, a good writer will listen. Afterall, we are limited in our scope and writing evolves quickly. New styles of writing may stymie an editor who hasn't been exposed, but its often that kind of writing which ends up becoming classes, winning awards like The Pushcart Prize or The Booker Prize. So editors need you - the adventurous writers to teach us these new developments.