AN ESSAY ON WRITING 01: BEIJING METHOD WRITING or The Method To My Madness

A talented, skilled and experienced novelist can make the reader believe any story. In principle, it is quite possible to write an astonishing novel without even leaving your desk. Through thorough research and penetrating insight in the human psyche, the seasoned novelist will add details and make observations to such a degree, that if the reader was to be told the author himself had experienced the story, he or she would most certainly believe it.

However, no matter how skilled the author may be, personal experience is unsurpassable, and on-the-spot observation superior.

In the theater, there are two extreme approaches to acting:

*So-called method acting, as theorized and institutionalized by the great Russian director and actor Constantin Stanislavski (1863-1938). The essence of method acting can be described within the framework of terms like empathy, identification and even experiencing. The actor immerses himself or herself in another personality, "becoming" that person.

* Classical acting, in the tradition of William Shakespeare and Henrik Ibsen, where an actor develops skills. Or, as the seasoned and gifted Norwegian actress Anne Krigsvoll commented once in a private setting, upon being told by somebody that she seemed to identify strongly with her character in a particular movie: "Identify? Me? Ha! I am a classical actor, I have technique." If a character is sad, then the actor uses her or his technical skills to express it.

As in theater, so also in literature. I subscribe to what can be called method writing.

CHARACTERS

I do not write about my characters. I become them, I live them. I walk like them, I eat like them, and gradually I start to understand them, maybe even getting to know them.

I do it literally. I go to the mall as them, as if I were an actor. I "enjoy" their favorite ice cream, even though I personally may be allergic to those walnuts. I go to MacDonald's and eat their sloppy burger, while I as a private person never eat anything whatsoever from or at a MacDonald's. I don't equip my characters with hobbies or idiosyncrasies, they find their own, often on pure impulse, like normal people. I never write about The Teacher or The Nurse. I write about actual people, about individuals. I do not design them, they grow themselves like plants.

While the more classically inclined author will do "normal" research, i.e. read stuff, talk to people, go to the library, interview somebody, draw from personal experience, and develop a character by means of assorted semantic character development tools, I start from scratch. I let the characters develop over time, and on their own.

In his 1881 lecture “Norwegian literature” , the Norwegian Nobel Laureate, Knut Hamsun, said about his colleague, the playwright and poet Henrik Ibsen:

“Ibsen‘s persons far too often have been just vehicles ("apparatuses"), who come forward, representing concepts and ideas … Priests are hypocrites, the common people are being violated, Latin and Pontoppidan murders little children fervently to death, merchants seduce young girls.”

Nowhere within the vast field of literature is this more obvious than in contemporary crime fiction. The private investigator or policeman is usually constructed over the same last: He is single or painfully divorced, he drives a particular car, he may have or may have had a problem with alcohol, he has an interest or a hobby, he has a neurotic trait (claustrophobia is currently trending, but fear of heights, water, open spaces, crowds will also do), he may have a disease etc.

These characters are not real, they are templates, cliches, card board characters with no depth, just a mishmash of characteristics. Their makers have snatched the measuring stick of Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler and others, making the format universal.

There is an army of crime hacks out there who build their characters as if people are sets of Lego bricks. And I will never, ever read "a relationship novel", unless you count Murphy or Le Bleu de Ciel as one.

PLOTS AND STORYS

When I wrote my second novel, “Kongen av København” (The King of Copenhagen), I knew the character “King” from my first novel. But, hey, I hadn’t associated with him for 10 years. Surely, he would have changed?

The most frustrating questions I get from the press are: “What do you want to say with this book?” and “What is the story in the book about?” Morons! It is a story. My books “say” nothing, they have no purpose other than telling a story, creating a coherent text.

No, I am not "Brent". I always try to distance myself from my characters. If I write something autobiographical at a later stage in my authorship, I'll let you know. On the contrary, I enjoy writing about The Other.

Most readers were fooled by The Mustard Legion. Droves of people, including reviewers, thought I was expressing opinions, that I "was" the main character, "TT", or at least that I was sympathetic to him. In King of Copenhagen he is exposed as a liar and a coward. What a jerk. I never even liked him.

RESEARCH

Before I started physically writing The King of Copenhagen, I travelled to Copenhagen. I had absolutely no idea what the storyline would be. I planned next to nothing.

From my publisher J.W. Cappelen AS I acquired a generous amount of money down, sufficient for me to travel as “King” to Copenhagen for a fortnight. As “King” had always been a heavy drinker, it was evident to me that he, ten years after, would have become somewhat of an alcoholic.

So off to Copenhagen I went, with enough money to be drunk for 14 days, carrying a tape recorder and a camera, as I knew I would spend parts of my time there in a haze. And, just for the record, I am unable to write if I drink.

I did not enjoy it. Growing up, I was surrounded by drunks, my father a junkie, the continuous use of alcohol has always been a no-no to me. Even as a notorious punkrock madman in the 80ies, I rarely drank any alcohol at all for more than two days in a row, or three times a week, even though I can assure you I know how to party hard, and in spite of the fact that I certainly don't mind ten pints of Guinness on occasion. But when my friends drink beer in the afternoon, I tend to stick to coffee.

Not only that. I told people my favorite liquor was Jack Daniel's, a liquor I have always detested. The fact that I managed to pour into my sensitive gullet this disgusting, syrupy substance for 14 consecutive days, and lots of it, too, is only due to my total and uncompromising dedication to the craft of the novelist. Seriously.

Did I have to do it? Yes, because I wanted “King”’s hangovers, and nothing, except maybe very old cognac and bad moonshine, gives you a worse morning after than a 40 % proof liquor containing lots and lots of sugar. Well, couldn’t I have leaned on my own hangovers? No, I wanted his.

Robert DeNiro put on weight to play Al Capone, while Christian Bale lost 60 pounds before he became Trevor Reznik in The Machinist. Both method actors, of course.

So there I walked Copenhagen as if I was “King”. Things happened. Scenes I never could have constructed took place, but because they developed originally in the real world, acted out by real people, the story got just that little bit of extra edge, an element of unpredictability.

The Method always adds some obscure detail, some inconsistency, a lack of linearity; it strengthens the credibility of the text. A surprising smell, a cameo, a dog, it can be anything.

I went home to Oslo and wrote the book, and 90 % of what is depicted in the book, is more or less exactly what happened during my stay in Copenhagen.

HOW TO LIE, MANIPULATE AND IMPRESS PEOPLE ... NOT!

Yes, I involve other people. I manipulate, I lie. I posed as “King” in Copenhagen, introducing myself as him if need be, telling strangers that I had been awarded ten Norwegian Grammys. I behaved like an idiot at times, on purpose, to get unique and unpredictable reactions, and most of the embarrassing situations in the book, are the result. I acquainted people whom I would never have approached as a private person. I hit on girls that did not appeal to me. At all.

MORAL ANGUISH AND LIMITS TO MY MADNESS

Naturally, there are limits to what I’ll do, and lines I will not cross, either for personal or ethical reasons, or both. These borders will be severely tested while writing Brent, as Brent is as story of criminals and crime.

Not only that, but there are villains in the book. It is not exactly pleasant to be inside the minds of psychopaths, mass murderers, pedophile cannibals, or serial killers. Being a method writer can be extremely hard on the psyche.

It can also be dangerous. Before I wrote the death scene in "Sennepslegionen" (The Mustard Legion), in which Brian II dies of an overdose, I bought myself half a gram of heroin, which I smoked. I felt that I had to. I haven't touched it since, and I did not like it. But I had to know, I had to understand.

A METHOD NOVELIST IN BEIJING

But now, as I am headed for Beijing on research for my forthcoming novel Brent, I don’t expect to "suffer" all that much, or put myself in danger. There will be other research travels for Brent at a later stage that are bound to become substantially more hairy. And when I write the mid section of volume 1 of Brent, I expect to become a social recluse for a period of time. I don't want other people around me as I walk with the mind of the proverbial homicidal maniac.

The only thing I dread in Beijing, is that I have to eat dog. Dogs are my friends. I love dogs, and I still miss Basse (RIP). But I need to eat dog, I must. “Tasted like” or somebody else's taste buds is not good enough. I shall eat dog in the shape of “Brent”, and I have no idea how he will react. (I hope he pukes, but he probably won't.) I will have to prepare myself psychologically, just like a soldier before his first battle, or a parachutist before her maiden jump.

I have done some Beijing research, and I have friends that have been to Beijing, or lived there. But I am trying to keep my knowledge down to an absolute minimum, as Brent comes totally unprepared to Beijing. He has never been there, he speaks absolutely no Chinese, and he does not know a thing about the China he is visiting, a China that within a few decades will be the dominant global economic power. What Brent knows about China, is what is publicly known among those who on a regular basis read magazines like Time, New Scientist and National Geographic. High school knowledge, plus news watched and read on a daily basis through life. But "Brent" has no idea how to ask for directions, or how to board a subway. So no Chinese glossaries for me before leaving, no reading that contains too much details. On the other hand, when Brent takes place, most Chinese are fluent in English, as Brent is a novel from the future.

I shall be a stranger in Beijing. A somewhat shy entomologist, completely on his own and absolutely out on a limb. I shall eat what Brent eats, I will choose his kind of movie, I shall buy his clothes, I shall blush, I shall be modest, I shall only listen to classical music. I may cry in my hotel room, I may let myself be intimidated, I may embarrass myself, loyal as I am to my character.

Other authors have their ways. I am not saying that my method is superior to others, or that I am the only one to work like this or in similar ways. But this is how I do it. It's the method to my madness.

And, sure, I also master the classical skills. My previous novel Bank (German edition: Rache auf Raten) was written in six weeks without any research. But that was the whole point, it was why I wrote it: I wanted to prove to myself that I could write entirely from my imagination.

And as most of Brent will be written in my imagination, it is imperative to me to balance the bulk of Brent with something which is very earthy and real.

In Beijing, I will most likely spend no time whatsoever in libraries, I'll go method writing. It will be a blast.

I will be blogging from Beijing on BRENTBLOG, and you will also be able to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Gowalla and other social media.

POWER TO THE READER or The author in a world of digital media - Part 1

Or ”Good-bye, press!”
Confessions of a cyberjunkie

by Morten Jørgensen

Authors have for the last hundred years, and particularly the novelist, often been, not only a scribe of entertainment, but also a catalyst, an inspirator, an instigator, an investigator. Not all authors, of course, and some authors not at all, but books tend to interact with society. Whether it be Vladimir Mayakovsky or Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Mikhail Bulgakov or Anaïs Nin, authors as a collective have usually not been confined to just writing books, we have been an active element in society, discussing language and politics, sexuality, war and drugs, and in return we have been honored or buried in roses as ”the world’s consciousness”, or labelled as outrageous, for political, moral, religious or other reasons, even jailed or executed.

In Norway, the country’s writers – novelists and poets alike – have always been an integral part of the social discourse. Henrik Ibsen and Knut Hamsun, Jens Bjørneboe and Georg Johannesen, Johan Borgen and Amalie Skram are influential authors that have taken part in the formation of Norwegian society or influenced it from the sideline. In the 70ies the whole thing even took completely off as authors became politicians; the Norwegian Writer’s Guild taken over and for several years controlled by the Norwegian Mao-communists: All writers ”should”, as an imperative, be a ”socially conscious” or ”political” writer. (The result was, btw, library dust collectors a.k.a. crappy books.)

The author has been visible in the papers, later on TV and even on rostrums, on gallas, fund raisings and rallies and seminars. She or he is supposedly a master of language, and many authors have some kind of special field of interest that makes them excellent lecturers and participants in public debates. Besides, we usually simply know a lot of stuff, right?

To many of us, it has been a part of our job, and to some of us it will always be a part of our job, especially among the intellectuals within our ranks, like myself, a university (examless) philosopher, as an intellectual’s calling is to critisize The Power or status quo or whatever you prefer to call it, whether it is the Political Power or the Power of Sports. I tend to prefer alternative 3 on Wiki when defining intellectual: ”An individual of notable expertise in culture and the arts, expertise which allows them some cultural authority, which they then use to speak in public on other matters.”

But now this is all changing. Or rather, we have to move. Leave our old office and resettle. In the virtual world.


1. THE FALL OF THE AUTHOR MONOPOLY

The first novelists, like Victor Hugo of The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1831), Les Misérables (1862) and The Man Who Laughs (1869) fame, were a central part of the collective information grid of their society. A contemporary reader of Moby-Dick (1851) by Herman Melville may find the original extremely detailed, compared to a novel of today. Hugo and Melville would inform their readers fully on almost any topic mentioned in their books. Hugo will tell us what comprachicos are, and Melville will enlighten you on every aspect of seamanship.

Today, why bother, when we all have Wikipedia?

The author has often been the voice of alternative, non-conformist thoughts, and being the masters of language, he or she has spoken with authority in the press, often ”on behalf of” others, whether it be the analphabets of Africa or the working class of Europe, Václav Havel became the first president of a Soviet-free Czechoslovakia.

But now people speak for themselves, through millions of blogs, through forums and postings. Out here in Cyberia, out in the digital world, in the virtual space.

Thus, the author, if he or she still wants to remain the intellectual, the philosopher, the court jester, whatever, will have to enter the virtual world and establish his or her own platform out here. Say something interesting, you know. The author has been an icon in the press. Out here in the virtual world, the author’s voice is just one of many. Because the competition from ”amateurs” is growing, and the author’s voice may easily drown in the growing chorus of voices. In Cyberia we are all authors.


2. THE FALL OF THE PRESS

Up until now, in countries with no or little government censorship, the press and the literary critics have been the sole censors of literature. Not necessarily _censorers_ who officially bans or warns the public against a certain book pertained as subversive or challenging or unacceptable to society in some sense. The reviews may just as well sanctify a novel that somehow fits nicely and smoothly into the social fabric, often reinforcing the prevailing self-image or self-imagery of that society.

The press in general and the literary critics in particular are a filter between the writer and the reader, often being the first to interprete a novel or a poetry collection, thus starting some kind of jungle telegraph or buzz, or even ”killing” the book.

Let me give you two examples from my own experience. In 1990 the album ”Psykedelisk utviklingshemmet” (Retard Psychedelic) by my band at the time, the power punk band Morten Jørgensen og Spekkhoggerne som fulgte etter danskebåten uten å røre spyet som rant fra ripa (Morten Jørgensen and the Orcas that followed the Copenhagen ferry without touching the vomit that poured from the rail), was released. A German magazine called it in a favorable review something like ”the most boycotted album in Norwegian record history”, and although I’m not sure that the magazine’s claim is true, it is at least true that the most controversial song on the album figures as one of the 13 formerly banned songs on the compilation ”Sensurert” (Censored) (1996), which covers 30 years of banned Norwegian music: The entire Norwegian press trashed it totally at the time of its release. Today, some of the same media have started to call the album ”a classic”. Well, fuck that. I lost 30 000 NOK on it at the time, as radios stopped playing it and record shops refused to sell it; almost only a handful of alternative records shops had it on sale by the end of 1990.

I’m not saying this to justify the album. You could call it shit, for all I care. Judge for yourself, there are Spekkhogger songs in my Boxes on Facebook. But it is a fact that back in the good old Kazaa-days, more than 10 years after the album had been released, I had up to 50 downloads a week on songs from the album, it also appears more and more frequently on lists of ”great” or ”good” or ”favorite” albums by people who were toddlers or not even born when the album was originally released, but they do not usually appear in the old school press, they pop up on the net.

The examples of misguided or libertophobic reviews that I have been exposed to in the Norwegian press are many, but the second example is from 1998, when my second novel, ”Kongen av København” (King of Copenhagen) was published, and thus reviewed in Norway’s largest morning paper Aftenposten. In the novel we are given several indicators that imply that King, the front man of the band Sennepslegionen, is somewhat of a titty man. Yes, boys and girls, he likes’em big! But in addition to the usual outcry of ”attention-seeking” and ”speculativeness”, the woolhead ”critic” of Aftenposten slams the novel and me (!) for being ”fixated on big tits”! Shit happens. It is a sequel, and I still meet people who have read with enthusiasm the first volume, ”Sennepslegionen”, that do not know of the second volume’s existence.

This is serious business, folks. We can laugh at the stupid reviews today, but I try to make a living out of this, and I write books that I want people to read, and you want to read them too. When ”Brent” is published in 2010, was it will be 12 years since the publication of my previous novel ”Bank” (German edition: ”Rache auf Raten”, 2003). I can assure you all that the ”exile” has been most involuntarily, and debt and money has been, if not the most important reason, at least a major contributing factor to my writing pause.

Today the author can communicate directly with her or his audience. The author does not need the press anymore. These days, all kids under 20 years of age in Norway are on Facebook, as well as most of the 20-30 years olds, in fact 25 % of the entire population is. In ten, twenty, thirty years time, all Norwegians that are less than 90 years old, will have gone digital.

In the past, the reader had to rely on the papers when deciding what books to buy. When ”Brent” is released , I will have several Friends on places like Facebook and Bebo. I can Message them directly, I can have a publicly streamed release party Event, a net meet - not a press conferance, but a reception for you all, where journalists have to que up like the rest of you. And I can – and shall – establish a blog for your reviews.

So I don’t want professional literary critics, right? Sure I do. But the critic, just like the writer, will have to establish himself or herself by the power of his or her skills, not because of the fact that the critic is employed in a ”major” or ”respected” newspaper. There will of course be a link option on my ”review blog” for literary magazines and newspaper critics, but their monopoly will be broken.


3. THE FALL OF THE PUBLISHER?

The eBok has so far not taken off, but it won’t be long. Screens are getting better, weight is going down, a growing number of employees in the publishing business have started using it, and they seem to like it, and they live in and for books, so they don’t work with crap gadgets.

You will soon get your own personalized ”book”, a screen board the size of a normal book, clad in leather if you like, comfortble to hold and easy to read, even in the dark on a boring trainride, maybe a hip designer has made it, it can play music, with or without earphones, it may contain an alarm, like your car keys, you can get a picture of your favorite writer on the cover if you like, it will tell you which of your Facebook friends that are reading it or have read it as well, you can get your reviews or write a stinging ridicule of a review in a forum; you can check a fact in the book that you doubt on Wikipedia, or you can find out what the hell wolfbanging is by going on urban.com. You can check the etymology of the main characters name, and the best of all, you can stash your entire library in your eBook, or you will have all your books online, all available to you all over the world through a bookshelf server, your personal portable library that you pay a monthly fee for, just like you do for World of Warcraft and other games, and you will never have to go to the post office to fetch your monthly club book, it will be downloaded automathically to your eBook without you even asking, being paid for by automatically connecting to your bank as well. Click OK.

Will the printed book of paper dissapear? I don’t know. You tell me, will vinyl records disappear entirely? What about motorcycles running on petrol? Coca-Cola?

I sincerely doubt that the generation who are teenagers now will give up their .pdf files for paper, so personally I think the printed book will most likely die, or maybe survive in niches, like vinyl do today and maybe vintage cars running on petrol. But, frankly folks, there are not being sold many newspapers to the teenagers of today, you teenagers get your news on the net, whether it be on YouTube or on The New York Times. When these kids start working, they will not read the paper in their lunch break, they will read their laptop or whatever we shall call that device.

Could I simply skip the publisher? Yes, I could! I could print ”Brent” in Hong Kong, sell it on Amazon.com when it is due for release in 2010 and hope that the buzz I make will make it sell. Maybe even the eBook has had its breakthrough, so I can sell it in JørgensenShop as a .pdf file with extras and take-outs? I could publish ”Brent” as an audio book (read: file) that I have recorded in my very own living room as well, couldn’t I? In 50 years time, what will a bookstore be? Will bookstores even exist?

The digitalization of the book, as well as print on demand, makes the author independent of the publisher. So the publisher must change too. If not, the industry will be facing a ”Coldplay crisis”. Coldplay simply skipped their record company and sold their album directly to you, their audience. Obama won through Flickr, Twitter, YouTube, Bebo and MySpace.

Will the publisher survive? It will all depend on whether the publisher manages to adapt to the new forms of publishing, distribution and marketing, and whether the publisher will still have something to offer that makes the authors happy (editing, proofs, marketing). If not, the publishing empires of today may crumble in 50 years time.

To sum up:

Some of you joke with me and say: ”You’re just on Facebook and YouTube, you are not writing! You’ve got writer’s block? Are you giving up on ’Brent’? Hey, you wrote on your wall that you were out having a beer last night, not writing!” Well, you could not be more wrong.

These are my new offices. I don’t go to libraries as often as I did before, I go online instead, I have in fact not been to a single library yet for ”Brent”. I don’t have to travel to the minor places in my books anymore, I go Google Earth instead. I read scientific papers, I go Wikipedia, I read .pdfs, I watch vids. I answer mails from people who like my books and/or my music, like I always have done, but I don’t have to buy stamps and envelopes anymore and I don’t have to go to the post office. I talk to my publisher via chat or mail (they are a bit old-fashioned), and two of my main scientific advisory experts are on Facebook, and my editor is on underskog.no as well. See?

So let me end this little proclamation by stating that the reader is the sovereign ruler of her or his interpretation of all books, including mine, also when it comes to ”Brent”.

I hereby transfer the initial evaluation power of my books
from the media to my readers.

Hope to see you on YouTube, in the ”Brent” Group on Facebook (coming soon), here on my blog, on Twitter, Flickr, Bebo, ReverbNation, Delicious, MySpace and other places, as well as in the coming Folkets Poet-thread on underskog.no. (Only in Norwegian.) And who knows, maybe I, and maybe you, my dear, beloved readers, shall expand even further into cyber space together, singing ”Power to the reader”.

Morten Jørgensen
Oslo, Friday January 9th, 2009.
Edited for Blogger February, 24th, 2009.

POWER TO THE READER or The author in a world of digital media - Part 2

On nostalgia and autonomy.

Upon entering cyberspace as an author, leaving the world of old school media behind me, I wrote an essay, a Personal Digital Manifesto (PDM), called POWER TO THE READER or The author in a world of digital media.

Now, 7 months after I moved my activity as an author into cyberspace from the world of old school media, resettling here in the digital universe - opening office, so to speak - I am more than ever convinced that I have chosen a path that leads to the future. The eBook will soon be upon us. The new Kindle reader is closing the gap to the good old books of paper. When mp3s and other downloadable formats arrived, some claimed that people would want the cover, the vinyl, better sound; the mp3 was bound to fail.

They were wrong. Downloads, both legal and illegal, are, as I write this, closing in on the competition. iTunes and mp3 are taking over the charts, and and Spotify or last.fm and YouTube are our new radio and TV.And the pocket book, the second edition, the reprint, the thriller, the romance novel, they will most likely be downloaded onto a Reader, illegally og legally, but it will come.

Some might perhaps suspect that my enthusiasm is due to the fact that my entry into Cyberia as an author has been very fruitful indeed, it's been very good for business. For my writing as well: I have "recruited" a handful of experts for minor areas of my forthcoming new novel, just to mention one example. But the number of Friends; the Pages I have made and the Groups that others have made in honour of books I have written and records I have made; the gigs I have been offered; the jobs I have secured; the contacts I have made ... It has been a little overwhelming, actually. It is called spin.

But no, it is neither the sale of backlist nor the many compliments I have received for my work(s), that makes me dead set on sticking to my plan. Because most of all the abovementioned good news is related to my previous work(s), and as such they are yesterday's river. What I definitely am pleased with, however, is the fact that I now have a network of Friends and fans and contacts that make me more or less independent of mainstream media and the old school world of paper.

Not only have I established a rather - at least to me - impressive network, but my relationship to my readers, even though it is several years since my previous book was published, has never been better; one might actually be temped to call it close, even intimate. Those of my readers who are on Facebook and/or other networks and sites, PM and chat me up all the time, asking for information. Two of the appreciation Groups that has been established for some of my works, have been initiated by a guy that lives 50 km from me, that I probably would never even have "met" as a result of old school literary activity. Norway is a small country with a population of just 4.8 million, and if I allow myself to look at my newborn network from a per capita perpective, if Norway was France, England or Germany, all with a +50 million population, I will be able to reach - in some sense of the word or other - as many as 50 000 people, directly or indirectly; in the US, the number would be +250 000.

Now, that is a serious network. And since my network is constantly expanding, and even accellerating in some areas at that, when my next novel is ready, I may have a network for communication and marketing that by the click of a mouse will set me in direct contact with 0,5-1 % of my homeland's population.

http://z.hubpages.com/u/498622_f520.jpg

For an ambitious author like myself, who is contemplating e.g. selling his backlist, i.e. those of my books that are out of print, based on print-on-demand on maybe Amazon.com, it is extremely encouraging to see his (i.e: my) network also expanding abroad. Print-on-demand means maybe, like 250 % more money to me per book.

It smells independence, even autonomy. Maybe it's just me, but I see the author being torn out of his mystical ivory tower, by facing his or her audience directly.

But in order to maintain that closeness to my audience, I will have to serve my readers. I will have to give the reader what the reader used to obtain from the old school world of media: factual information. It also demands of me a certain "objectivity". The reader will not trust me for information if I depict my works with narcissistic glorification, nor will he or she accept mere marketing, spam or censorship from me.

I other words, I will have to surpass, even outshine the traditional media when it comes to information. My readers must be able to feel that the natural place to seek information about me and my works, and reliable information at that, even "objective", is my cyber spaces, whether it be Facebook, Bebo, Twitter, YouTube, blogs or other sites and networks.*

Occationally Friends and fans alike ask me questions like these: "Why aren't you writing on your book, instead of being on Facebook? Why are you making photo series from the past, videos of your old bands, fan Pages for your backlist? What's this nostalgia, are you living in the past?"

I'm not. What I am doing, however, is establishing an archive, an archeology, a "data base" of my previous work, so that any reader, who does not have a clue who I am, has someplace to go for information. There the reader will find thorough and detailed information about me and my work(s). No need for "interpretors". I am taking control over my own biography.

Yes, it smells autonomy, it wears the tantalizing scent of independence, it carries with it the promise of freedom from any middle men or women that comes between me and my readers. My former dependence on press coverage and the marketing efforts and the budget of my publisher in order to reach potential readers has, if not evaporated, been confortably weakened.

Of course, I could also tell them that I have started submitting and contributing abroad, as a result of my activity in Cyberia. I could tell them that the first publication to accept a submission of mine is not just a net publication, but will be printed in no less than 100 000 copies as well, and I have other offers and invitations pending.

So now, as autumn approaches, I will start focusing on submissions and invitations abroad, mostly through my English Facebook profile, as my Norwegian network is more or less complete. The net is the artist's new arena, and the net knows no nationality. We are better off here, dear colleagues. We're free - free at last!

Morten Jørgensen
novelist, poet
Oslo, August 4, 2009.


You will now find me e.g. here:

Facebook (Norwegian)
Facebook (English)
Twitter
Reverbnation (songs for download)
Bebo (dormant)
MySpace (semi-dormant)
Flickr (to be replaced by Photobucket, due to Flickr's unappealing max monthly download limit.)
YouTube (vidz, mostly slide-slow DIY)

My Norwegian blog STOR M (Capital M) is found here.