Tag Archives: Despair

Back to Work

When I finished writing the first draft of The Redemption of Erâth in June, I decided it would be worthwhile to give the story a rest; take a break, relax, think of other things, and not even read it for some time. I originally intended only to take this break for a month, but a month turned into two, which turned into three…

Anyway. It’s the first of September (yes, yes…don’t correct me), and it’s time to begin a new resolution. I would very much like to have this story finished, in publishable form, by the year’s end. If I can achieve this, it will leave me in a good place to begin writing the second book at the start of next year. The pattern of completing one chapter each week has worked out pretty well so far, and I would to make an attempt at this again.

Now, at the risk of stretching myself and completely destroying my sanity, I feel it’s also time to turn my attention back to a long-neglected project, very near and dear to my heart. Many, many years ago I discovered a story, one that spoke to everything that was in me, that embodied my very person, and it was a story that I knew I must tell. However, I was younger then, and unprepared for the task of writing a book. However, the story has stayed with me, always, and given that its events have remained unwavering in my mind, I know it is a project I must complete.

I write, of course, of A Gothic Symphony, a tale of the struggle against despair and depression. For those of you who have enjoyed the dark-tinged fantasy of The Redemption of Erâth, this will be nothing like it. Not even close. Autumn – the fading death of the world and the descent into long, cold nights – is at the very heart of this story, and coming into this time of year, I can’t but imagine this is the time the story must be told.

I don’t know if I will manage; editing The Redemption of Erâth is, above all, my priority. I very much want to continue the story next year. But I feel I have waited too long, and this story must escape me onto paper. If you are interested, please stop by; perhaps you will find something new to enjoy.

Tales of Despair: When the Walls Begin to Crumble

Imagine you are not who you say you are. You are something different, something other, that no one else sees. Something that no one else can be allowed to see, for fear it will destroy you both.

So many years ago, you became this other you. Like a slow tide, you were unconsciously inundated, uncertain when the first cold touch of sea first came, but knowing that the depths were rising. Before long, all that remained were dead eyes, remaining above the surface – and soon, you sank below, and the deep and the black swallowed you whole.

The dark became your life; it threatened to take your life; it was around you, and in you, and through and through, it was you. And the drowning was a bliss, because as slowly the breath was stolen from your lungs, all things became unimportant, and thought left you mind. Day upon day passed, undistinguished, and the very light of the sun was darkness to your eyes.

And then, like all things, it came to pass; the waters receded, and the world returned…but it was not as before. You were changed, irrefutably, and irreparably. The world became always dark, and the thrills and joys were muted and grey. And you began to notice the ways of the world, and cynicism and spite grew like poison thorns in your mind. You pitied – and envied – the thoughtless, empty, blissfully unaware souls that surrounded you, deluding themselves with false happiness and toiling ignorantly towards insignificant goals.

And you came to realize that you had to survive. There was no place for one like you anymore in the world. And so, piece by piece, you crafted your mask – you built the walls.

And you built them high, and strong, and through the windows came the smiling light of a joyful soul. The walls were whitewashed, and the roof was tiled, and the shutters painted, and the garden neatly tended. What a beautiful house, they all said – what a wonderful person. There is humor, there is wit, there is drive and there is compassion. You looked around, and you observed, and your false house became a mirror of those among whom you now live. Always careful – only a small piece from here, a tad from there – just enough that they all believe you are your own, original, colorful creation.

What they don’t know – what they can’t know – is that inside, the lights are out, and the floor is dusty, and on the walls the cobwebs hang thick. Here is where you go at the end of each and every day. And the worst is that, on your way home, you see that bright, friendly house you built, and for a moment – just a moment – you believe in it. You built your walls so convincingly that you have fooled yourself.

How were you to know what was to come? How could you have known that those walls wouldn’t last forever? It almost seemed you could live in that fantasy, and as long as you stayed on the outside, the dark might not actually be real. And then – now – the walls are beginning to crumble. Brick by brick, you see them fall away. There are days when you try to patch, support and rebuild, but it is insidious – like that first, callous tide that pulled you under and changed you forever.

Soon, the walls may fall away, and there, huddling amid the rubble, is you – the true you, the twisted and deformed you, the you that was made, all those years ago. And there will be no hiding, and no rebuilding. And then, the tide will come in again, and it will wash away the ruins…and perhaps, it will wash away you.

Tales of Despair: Eternal Blood

The Vampire – Philip Burne-Jones

I was one of the (probably many) goth kids who grew up obsessed with all things dark; lord amongst the demons and monsters were, naturally, the vampires. What a beautiful romance these creatures held; to live eternally, at the price of the blood of your fellow men and women. The visceral attraction of blood, warm and flowing, the bitter metallic taste, the swoon of the letting – these were the things that captured my mind.

With this came the gloriously evil tales – not only the fantasies of Nosferatu and Dracula, but the terrifying histories of Vlad the Impaler, and the Countess Báthory. Drinking, bathing, delighting in blood – all was dark, brooding, and beautiful. A natural part of this was the romanticism of the vampire, and I will hold my hand up and say that I watched many vampire movies – notably Francis Ford Coppola‘s Bram Stoker’s Dracula, long before reading of the literature.

Gary Oldman as Dracula (1992)

Francis paints a picture of a medieval man, tortured by war and death, renouncing god for eternal life upon the suicide of his one, only, true love – that he will await her forever, fed on the blood of men. And wait he does, until by happenstance, he sees her likeness in Mina, the fiancée of Jonathan Harker, a minor solicitor visiting his Transylvanian castle. Determined to fulfill his prophecy, he abandons Jonathan to his fate amongst the vampires of his castle, traveling to England in a desperate attempt to be with her. He meets with her, charms her, and seduces her – only to be torn apart again as she leaves him to be wed to Jonathan (resulting in one of the most memorable performances by Gary Oldman, weeping in agony over his loss of her).

Yet his work is done; she remembers him, and becomes infatuated, and begs him to transform her as well. And then, as she begins to change, Dracula retreats once more to his home. Now bound to him, Mina can think of nothing else, and Jonathan, now accompanied by the delightful Anthony Hopkins as Van Helsing, realize they must pursue and destroy the count if they are to save her. In the bitterest of endings, the wounded Dracula begs his long-lost love to give him peace, and – having lived to see he beloved one last time – he is put to death by her own hand.

First edition of Bram Stoker’s Dracula

Little did I know how little – and how much – this romanticized tale had in common with Bram Stoker‘s brilliant and seminal novel from 1897. While the characters remain the same, their intentions, motivations and desires could not be more different. Strikingly told from the perspective of journal entries and newspaper clippings, the loose plot is similar – Jonathan Harker, the newly-appointed solicitor, traveling to Transylvania to aid the Count Dracula in finalizing his purchase of land in London, and to teach him the ways of the English. Gradually ensnaring Jonathan in his castle with the three vampiric sisters, Dracula comes to London – for the pure desire to live amongst the great population, and to feed at his leisure.

Dracula does turn Mina, but not out of any romantic desire – it is a punishment, revenge against the men who would destroy him. He uses her, tracks his foes through her visions. In doing so, however, he betrays his own intentions, and is eventually hunted down and destroyed.

By all accounts, Bram’s original text is heart-stopping and gripping; the format of its writing ensures the survival of no character, for there is no narrator. We are left until the very end to know, even, whether the party of vampire hunters have triumphed over the bloodthirsty Count. In some ways, Francis’ version is one filled with emotional torment, anguish and despair – to pine for a lost love for four hundred years, only to be denied a life with her in the final moments is a heartbreak of unsurpassed proportions. Yet Bram’s original tale is by far the most frightening, and reeks of an entirely different form of despair: the knowledge that you are fighting an all-encompassing evil, one that delights in the destruction of all men.