In last month's WN, you were treated to the first part of an interview with our favorite author, Jasper Fforde. He took time out of his busy life of writing, playing on his website (and of course flying his 1937 DeHavilland biplane over Wales) to answer questions posed to him by members of the Fforde Fforum. Reader response to Part 1 was phenomenal and many Fforumites were amazed to see that Mr. Fforde had, indeed, answered their questions. How exciting! So, did he answer your question in Part 2?
And here are the questions from the Whatever Next team;
Q: Do you see yourself always writing in this genre (whatever genre it is), or do you have ambitions to write in other fields - an account of your adventures in the film industry, for instance?
A: I jokingly refer to a book that I haven’t written yet as ‘My Serious Book’ but I don’t know what will be in it. I have a sneaking suspicion that no matter how serious I try to write, something inexplicable will start to happen by chapter three. If you turn to page 370 of your Hodder copy of TN-2 (397 in the US copies) you will find this passage:
“As I wandered down to sub-basement six, Exchange Programme docket in hand made out to someone named Briggs, I felt more relaxed than I had for weeks. I found the correct book sandwiched between the first draft of an adventure in the Tasman seas and a vague notion of a comedy set in Bomber Command. I picked it up, took it to one of the reading tables and quietly read myself into my new home.”
Well, since she is on floor six that must be ‘F’ for Fforde, and since the book she stays in is unpublished and is mine, it follows the ones next to it must also be mine. The adventure in the Tasman sea is a semi-finished book titled It Was a Dark and Stormy Night, and is set onboard an ex-Q-ship in 1924. The ‘comedy set in Bomber Command’ relates to a notion I have - a sort of Harry Flashmanesque thing but during the second war. Reluctant hero causing unintentional mayhem around the theatre of war sort of thing. Keen eyed readers will also spot Thursday talking to Antonio from It Was a Dark and Stormy Night when she tests the footnoterphone for the first time. Curiously, in Thursday’s world I am a much more published author than I am here ...
Q: Speaking of films, if TEA and/or LIAGB were to be made into movies, who would you love to see in the main roles? Especially Thursday, Acheron, and Jack Schitt? (And Twila suggests that you write the screenplays as well! Even if it means we have to wait a little longer between books (GASP!) - I think she’s on her own there).
A: I’m really not sure. Since I can make films, I would insist on doing it - but collaborate on the scripts as directors filming their own material is seldom a good idea. I’d like to use all unknowns or even create a Thursday Next world in the still-young art of high-res animation. If you have seen a film called Final Fantasy, you have a vague idea of the creative freedom that such a project will allow. But, y’know, when it comes to making movies there is nothing quite so fun or exciting as putting actors in front of a camera. Perhaps it’s not a movie. Perhaps it’s a high-quality 6 x 1 hour for TV. Could I condense TN-1 into 90 minutes? Probably not. We’d have to lose Landen or Thursday’s Dad or Spike or something and the fun of my books, I think, is the multitudinous storylines.
Q: How did you get into flying? Do you get to fly much these days?
A: Dad flew in the war and assailed myself and my brothers with total silence over what he actually did. I think that made it seem very exciting when in fact it probably wasn’t. When I finally got him to talk about it the most exciting and hilarious episode was when a student selected ‘undercarriage up’ instead of ‘flaps up’ on the ground, digging an expensive hole in the ground with the propeller. Much of the war was, for him, as it was for many people, tiresome and occasionally very frightening. He was never frontline and despite numerous bombing missions over Burma, was never shot at once - but the squadron lost an average of one bomber a month (eight men) due to engine failure, fuel exhaustion or navigation problems. One aircraft was lost in the jungle thirty minutes after takeoff and they never found it. When I gained my pilot’s licence he gave me his old RAF wings. He bequeathed me his logbook and dog tags when he died.
Q: We don’t know of many writers (all right, we don’t know of any) who have such a fan-oriented website. Is this part of some deep-laid marketing plot, or is it just because it’s fun? And if the latter, is it fun?
A: Well, when Hodder mooted the idea of a website they were going to host it which meant a very second-hand link between me and the readership. I wanted more direct contact so Mari and I decided to learn HTML and do it all ourselves. For author website research we looked at the grand total of none, preferring to do what we thought best. The site has evolved slightly but the central idea of the direct link is still there - a sort of ‘after sales service’ for the readership.
Q: Is there anywhere you really want to go that you haven’t been to yet?
A: Writing wise or travel wise? To both, plenty.
Q: What does 'bobbilicious' actually mean?
A: Where does this appear? Is this one of mine? ‘Crumbobbilous’ is an Edward Lear creation, ‘Moggilicious’ is a cat food. Bobbilicious I’m not sure about.
Q: What's the strangest question anybody has emailed you?
A: Do you have room for this? Okay, here we go:
Emailer: intertextuality works both ways. yours sincerely, xxxxx xxxxx
Confused Author: Er .... don't understand. JF
Emailer: intertextuality ... from a Bahktinian notion developed by Julia Kristeva ... wherein, in the post-modern era there is no 'pure' originality, as any given item in a text refers to (at least one other) another text ... and while you [JF] play with characters from sources other than your imagination in your work - e.g.: Jane Eyre - and the beautifully punned Millon de Floss there are others who played that game before you...and still more who may take that notion and run with it ...
Confused Author: Dear xxxxx xxxx, Ah-ha! The intentionally cryptic approach eh? - In that case I failed - Oops, must try harder. Bahktinian, Kristeva ... the names mean nothing to me! - Oh, the clear-headed and innocent benefits of forgoing further education! Imagine being free of the shackles of academia, naming your own animals in the garden of Eden as Adam did - I have the freedom of the fool, the range of the patchily self-taught - a canvas unsullied through my own ignorance! For a writer, it is heaven!
Contrite emailer: dear JFf, yeah - sorry - just one of those 'cryptic' moments that hit you at silly hours of the morning ... no need to try harder at all! hardly your responsibility ... i only know about Bakhtin, Kristeva et al cos i went back to uni after an accident whilst travelling in asia ... for want of anything better to do while i recovered, i thought i'd best try and use my brain ... i'd led that clear-headed and innocent (well ... intellectually uninformed) existence for quite a while.
Q: Are you ever tempted to move all your books to better positions in bookshops?
A: Of course! Doesn’t everyone? I kind of worry I’ll get caught, though and they’ll say something like: ‘Sorry, I haven’t heard of you. Who were you again?’ But I always put my books cover-out on the shelves, though not if that means covering Katie Fforde’s as she is too pleasant a person to do an authorial dirty on.
Q: If there was to be a hideous nanomachine that was either going to eat books or airplanes, which would it have to be?
A: Aeroplanes, I guess. I could live without them (just) but not without books.
Q: How are your bookshelves organised?
A: In my office I have two walls covered by shelves. Six high, 130 ft in total. Just over a thousand books.
Top shelf: Biggles, Worrals and Gimlet collection, then spare copies of my books, then aviation.
Second Shelf: Fiction, alphabetically. From Allende’s Of Love and Shadows to John Wyndham’s Chocky.
Third Shelf: Plays and poetry, film related.
Fourth shelf: Reference books and Biographies.
Fifth shelf: Historical and military, nature and wildlife. Travel.
Sixth shelf: Art and photographic, back issues of Pilot, Fortean Times and National Geographic, early copies of TN, filing.
Q: And, finally (phew), do you have any message for your, er, adoring fans out there? (Other than sign up for Whatever Next now, obviously).
A: Er ... keep spreading the Nextian word? (Purely selfish, you understand. I want to stay an author. You know, I really kind of like it. I hope it shows.)
It does Jasper, it does. Thanks again for answering our questions so fully!
(Answers © Jasper Fforde, March 2003, for Whatever Next)
