Date: Sat, 13 Jun 1998 17:36:05 -0600 From: Gary Chambers Subject: Re: [WRITERS] INTRO Gary C. was Chris V. Chris Vaughan wrote: >> >>Hello. My name is Chris Vaughan. I was a member of WRITERS for a few >>years and I thought I would like to come back and see how things are >>going. I'm not published. Worse yet, I haven't been writing much in >>the last year and a half. I'm not sure why. I used to feel a strong >>compulsion to write, but now inspiration comes in small trickles at the >>most inopportune times: when I'm in the drive through at McDonalds; when >>I'm neck-deep in code (I'm a computer programmer in my spare time); or >>when I'm standing on an old section of the C&O canal with the nearest pen >>and paper over three miles away. Maybe you can help get my creative >>juices flowing again. If not, maybe we can have a few laughs. Hi Chris, I think I remember your name. I'm in a similar writing mode, and I too just returned to the list after a long absence. I've been mainly lurking here for about three weeks. Last time I was on the list I never got around to writing a proper intro for myself, so this time I'll fix that. I was a journalist for about twenty years, with a few interruptions along the way. I've also had some fiction published, but not a lot. Then again, I never submitted a lot of fiction to publishers, and I still don't. In fact, I now try to write only for myself. That doesn't mean I never submit anything. It just means I write to please myself, and if others enjoy my work that's great, but if not that's okay too. This is not a good frame of mind for the commercial world of journalism, and may not be very good for fiction either. As a result of my new attitude I have almost entirely given up commercial journalism. My most recent completed project was a one hour radio play which is still out in the mail. I've always got some short stories or book ideas in various stages of progress, but few are ever finished. I only complete what I think are the very best projects. The rest are abandoned along the way. Two of my favourite quotes are: "A work of art is never completed, it is abandoned," and, "Chance is beloved of art, and art of chance." I can't remember who said either. Lately I've been thinking of publishing a little cyberzine, or ezine, or...(on the web, so I guess it would be a webazine> and that's why I signed back on. I knew there were many very good writers here, and many others who work hard at getting better every day, so I thought I might scout some talent for the publication. But even if I never finish the zine project, I'm still enjoying the list. So far I've done one CRIT privately (I meant to post it to the group, but I hit the wrong button), and one short series of disastrous FILL postings about an outdoor Allen Ginsberg shindig, which, by the way, I understand was eventually rained out. The next story I have planned will be non-fiction about free trade, globalisation and so forth, but then again it might be something else entirely. Like Chris Vaughan, ideas come to me at the strangest and most inconvenient times, and if one happens to come along when it's convenient, then it could become the next piece I work on. The rest of me will have to remain I mystery for now, because ten minutes from now I'll be washing dishes in a Chinese restaurant. Gary Chambers