Inspir'd by Art

Inspiration comes from a variety of places--but one of my great joys as a writer is when I am inspir'd by art. This has just happen'd, with ye illustration above by Dave Felton. Whut is novel about this case of inspiration is that ye art is an illustration from--my own writing. Dave's remarkable illustration, which incorporates a Beardsley "feel" (highly appropriate!), depicts segment two from Some Unknown Gulf of Night. Ye narrator of ye segment looks into a store window and sees a queer mannequin, its head covered by a piece of yellow silk, surrounded by other store mannequins. Dave has depicted ye mannequins in an eerie way, as they resemble a clutch of provocatively posed mummies. When I saw this wonderful piece of art, I knew an immediate inspiration for a new wee thing inspir'd by it. I am going to write it with whut will be, for me, an unusual setting: for it will be one of ye new stories in my forthcoming collection of stories inspir'd by the weird fantasies of Clark Ashton Smith, and I will be setting ye tale in my CASian locality, Khroyd'hon. And there will be evocative mummies.

I am writing this new book in collaboration with another huge Smith fan, Henry J. Vester III--we will each be writing our own separate stories (and hopefully poems) in ye Clark Ashton Smith tradition. I have actually started writing one of ye stories for ye book, a tale call'd "Lady Agatha Passes By". Unfortunately, I am an extremely undisciplined writer, and often have to wait for the "mood" of creativity to fall upon me. At the moment I'm feeling a dearth of inspiration and artistic energy. Gawd, I hate this--I want to write--now!! I don't want to have to wait until my mind clears up and I am suddenly "in the mood".

It helps, however, to have finally finish'd and sold some new things. It feels very good to have completed my next book for Centipede Press, and to have sold a story to a major forthcoming Lovecraftian anthology to be publish'd by PS Publishing. But I am hoping to become very active for ye remainder of ye year, if possible, so that I can then look back on 2015 as a year of intense creativity and productivity.