Connecting–a question

David Rothgery
May 9, 2016

In my last post, I responded to a question that had been bothering me. It concerned the value of pointing the reader to a World Two? In it I discussed the concept of a “pilgrim”—a word I use instead of “seeker” to refer to those with a profound dissatisfaction with living in “World One.”

But is there not an irony, a hypocrisy here?

This website and the publishing of the book itself are squarely, solidly, in World One. “Here I am. Pay this many dollars for my novel and read it. Have a conversation with me about it.”

When I first began writing many years ago, I told myself I just wanted to write “something beautiful.” Share it with 100 readers. A 1000 would be better. A writer wants to communicate, be appreciated by others of like mind anyway. He thinks of how it happens. It used to be a teacher or a friend or a parent suggested he or she read this novel, this collection of essays, this book of poetry, or perhaps it was a blurb’s lavish praise on the back cover. It still happens that way. But now there is the Internet—websites, blogs. And the world of putting ideas out there has a decidedly more cynical, commercial cast to it.

Even so, is it not the case that the thoughts readers are asked to share still come in the form of words? You must read the words. Why would you choose to read this book, these words? Any book. Any words. Even words on websites.

So I turn to how it’s done today. And hope for the best. That I get someone to share my thoughts. Appreciate how I constructed the story, how I painted this scene or that. And hope that this “someone” recommends that you too “read this book”—because “it’s not only a good read, but a thoughtful one, one that may disrupt your thinking.”

Or should I think in terms of the Beautiful itself? Art in the quest for meaning is itself meaningful. Perhaps.

Maybe it all ends in silence. You frame the big questions and wait. Stephen puts his questions in a jar and sends them out to sea. To God. For answers. If he gets the answers, they’re probably not from God. God, as in Dostoyevsky’s story, is silent. Stephen’s Silkie, too, is silent.

The novel Silkie: World One, World Two ponders the significance of these matters. Stephen and Silkie are pilgrims.

[NOTE: In my other novel Little Mozarts, Little Kings [see the synopsis on this website], Colin too is a Pilgrim.]