Day Twenty Five - Tim Winton in Ely!
Tuesday, 27 May 2014 10:31 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
byslantedlightIt made me very happy today that Tim Winton, one of my very favourite writers, was in Ely this evening, giving a talk for one of my favourite bookshops. 
I almost didn't go - I didn't think I'd be able to cos it's the week between Job 1 and Job 2, and true to form both are a bit frantic right now, but an email popped into my box from the bookshop, and I'd just got back from holiday, and I thought Well... - and bought a ticket. And I'm so glad I did! I don't often go to author things, partly because I want them to be my authors, and who they really are might be disappointing, but in this case it absolutely wasn't! Winton seems like a totally decent bloke, who thinks about people, and worries about the world, and if I still lived back there he's just the kind of person I'd want to know. He wasn't at all full of himself, he was funny and clearly smart, and worried a few times that he was sending us to sleep - which he wasn't at all!
He also said some author-y things in replies to questions that made me think yes! cos that's how things feel for me too (only without being Tim Winton, obviously... *g*) I scribbled things to remember on an envelope, and here are some of them that made me happy because they reminded me of what writing feels like.
He talked about writing as being like surfing, because surfers spend most of their time sitting on boards staring at the horizon, waiting for something that's made up of events that took place somewhere completely different, and a long time ago, to finally come together and be something that you might just be able to catch hold of for a moment. But there's an awful lot of staring and waiting. *g*
He doesn't plan his books, he discovers what happens and who people are as he writes (Yes!). When he does try to plan, it ends up feeling like painting by numbers. (Yes and yes!)
Someone asked if he wrote books based on his own experiences, and his answer was - "I'm a fiction writer, I'm making it up." Yes!
"Celebrate the wonder of being a creature." (which reminds me of a quote from one of his books that I kept for a while - aha, found it online, of course I could! About a character watching a group of surfers: “How strange it was to see men do something beautiful. Something pointless and elegant, as though nobody saw or cared.”)
When asked if he edits much - "I throw away alot, because there's alot of crap." (!)
"I'm a craftsperson..." (bliss)
His dad also did the ironing when TW was growing up!
And finally, when the Australian government came up, and the state of society in general: "Prosperity breeds smugness and moral blindness..." to which, sadly, also yeah... And he described some things that worry him about people, though he ended on an upbeat note and said that there were also wonderful things out there too...
So Tim Winton's existence makes me happy tonight - and the fact that I have two new books of his to read... *eyes book mountain with much happiness too*
I almost didn't go - I didn't think I'd be able to cos it's the week between Job 1 and Job 2, and true to form both are a bit frantic right now, but an email popped into my box from the bookshop, and I'd just got back from holiday, and I thought Well... - and bought a ticket. And I'm so glad I did! I don't often go to author things, partly because I want them to be my authors, and who they really are might be disappointing, but in this case it absolutely wasn't! Winton seems like a totally decent bloke, who thinks about people, and worries about the world, and if I still lived back there he's just the kind of person I'd want to know. He wasn't at all full of himself, he was funny and clearly smart, and worried a few times that he was sending us to sleep - which he wasn't at all!
He also said some author-y things in replies to questions that made me think yes! cos that's how things feel for me too (only without being Tim Winton, obviously... *g*) I scribbled things to remember on an envelope, and here are some of them that made me happy because they reminded me of what writing feels like.
He talked about writing as being like surfing, because surfers spend most of their time sitting on boards staring at the horizon, waiting for something that's made up of events that took place somewhere completely different, and a long time ago, to finally come together and be something that you might just be able to catch hold of for a moment. But there's an awful lot of staring and waiting. *g*
He doesn't plan his books, he discovers what happens and who people are as he writes (Yes!). When he does try to plan, it ends up feeling like painting by numbers. (Yes and yes!)
Someone asked if he wrote books based on his own experiences, and his answer was - "I'm a fiction writer, I'm making it up." Yes!
"Celebrate the wonder of being a creature." (which reminds me of a quote from one of his books that I kept for a while - aha, found it online, of course I could! About a character watching a group of surfers: “How strange it was to see men do something beautiful. Something pointless and elegant, as though nobody saw or cared.”)
When asked if he edits much - "I throw away alot, because there's alot of crap." (!)
"I'm a craftsperson..." (bliss)
His dad also did the ironing when TW was growing up!
And finally, when the Australian government came up, and the state of society in general: "Prosperity breeds smugness and moral blindness..." to which, sadly, also yeah... And he described some things that worry him about people, though he ended on an upbeat note and said that there were also wonderful things out there too...
So Tim Winton's existence makes me happy tonight - and the fact that I have two new books of his to read... *eyes book mountain with much happiness too*
