Apologies

Will get back to blog posts when I have pain and other things under control.

Interior Dialogue

I'm happy that my limited edition (20 copies) booklet/novelette has been delivered. Printed at TDC3 in Richmond, it has a 240 gsm, cream covered Envirocare cover with 100 gsm uncoated insides and contains 36 pages/approximately 15,000 words including preface. I consider it a piece of speculative fiction. I'm giving it to people I see on a regular basis, however in the future I may turn it into an ebook or send interested people a pdf.

Update soon

 Update soon, as I have been busy.

Artist page on Facebook

Did you know that I have a Facebook page called Julie Joy Clarke Artist Richmond? Many of my drawings, paintings and lino cuts I've done over the past decade are there (sorry, not in chronological order) and many are for sale - price range $50-$400. I am also happy to negotiate price. If you are interested in purchasing any artwork please contact me via Messenger.

Please note I am not interested in selling artworks as NFT's. I state this because I've been contacted by a few American folk who want to make money from my artworks.

Book decisions

Call it a novelette or a novella? It matters not except that I'm considering the cover design and deciding whether to print my little book in a limited paper edition or turn it into an ebook. I'll keep you updated. 

Novella update

My novella is currently 15,000 words and I'm in the polishing up process, whilst rereading Brave New World, which I read about 35 years ago. 

Winter has been hard on my body, pain wise and I'm looking forward to Spring and the warm of sunshine. 

HUMAN

Humans have been called death machines, genetically programmed to self destruct through a disposition to the onslaught of particular diseases. Our history tells us that we have inflicted death and damage on other human beings and creatures in our environment. Our bodies ~ more bacterial than human are periodically invaded by dangerous viruses. We create death machines capable of destroying individuals, populations and the environment. We elevate the notion of the human ~ its intellect and achievement and yet many see human life as worthless, viewed purely in terms of its use value, as pure commodity. What is this hu(man) then in this world in which the female is still the poorest of all individuals; subject in many countries to rape, abuse, under-age marriage and slavery, where they are still the primary object of the pornographic imagination and the object in cinematic as well as game play scenarios, of attack, mutilation and humiliation? Some individuals and cultures elevate animus (spirit) above the human (homo-sapien ~ of the earth) and the value that they place on the notion of the afterlife inspires them to suppress, oppress or attempt to eradicate those who do not value their values, especially the beyond human expression of another worldly state. Likewise, those who do not applaud the notion of the resurrection of the spirit, adhere to and promote longevity as a mark of the contemporary human and one which we should all aspire to, one that finds us entering into an alliance with non-humans (animals/machines/technology) in order to enhance or extend human life, thus valorizing the human’s relationship to land/place/the environment. Philosophically the human is perceived as a ‘work in progress’, however some would argue that evolution of the human ended as soon as individuals mastered genetic engineering and became capable of altering the human genome, creating a synthetic evolution of life on earth. Life takes on different currency in virtual space in which aspects of our lives are played out in social media and other internet forums that proffer our (selves), selfies and other images as code. Traces of our lives, strange phantoms that stand as avatars of our imagination, together with electronic footprints of our monetary and other transactions form a picture of the human as information that can be circulated ad infinitum. Indeed these ephemeral and ghostly aspects of self continue long after the demise, decomposition or cremation of the material body. Our ‘humanity’ then, alive or dead, material (actual) or virtual, animus (spirit) or of the earth, a conglomeration of hybridity is a hotly contested zone of enquiry. The question remains: how can we be ‘anything but (except) human’? Might we inspire to be anything beside (outside) the human, indeed, how may this otherness be imagined? Is this quest to be beyond the human pure fantasy, simply a desire to be different from, an escape from the pleasures and perils of being such?

Speculative Fiction attempt

Having written in several genres - an MA and PHD thesis, academic articles, essays, art criticism, poetry, prose, a play and a memoir (both unpublished) I am now continuing to write a piece of Speculative Fiction that I began but abandoned in 1993 and added to in 2013. The title has not been changed. It's called The Interior Dialogue of a Minotaur and is currently 10,000 words classified as a Novella. I plan to distribute it to anyone interested in reading it at a later stage.