#desire without expectation

[jacobwren]

. I don't remember being this impatient when I was younger. Does aging make you impatient? Two things on their way to being finished , an

I don't remember being this impatient when I was younger. Does aging make you impatient? Two things on their way to being finished, and yet I still have to wait.

[jacobwren]

. Somehow my life has organized itself into one big project per year: 2026: The very first record by The Air Contains Honey 2027: My

(All of these projects somehow make me very nervous for very different reasons.)

[jacobwren]

I've never had one of these before. Coming to a bookstore near you in May 2027.

[jacobwren]

Writing dystopian literature is a losing proposition, since the dystopian reality of the world always outpaces me. I didn't realize it at the time, but this is probably the subconscious main reason I've been writing a utopian trilogy.

[jacobwren]

"I seem to be working on a trilogy of novels that’s not exactly a trilogy. Maybe not a trilogy at all, yet all of the books are loosely structured around questions concerning the desire for utopia. Apart from that they don’t share any settings or characters. The three books are: Dry Your Tears to Perfect Your Aim, Desire Without Expectation and Faithful Unbeliever. I guess, more specifically, I’m working on the third installment Faithful Unbeliever. I’ve been working on it for about two years and already it’s gone through so many false starts and dead ends. My first idea was that it would be a detective novel set in a world without prisons. Also, that the book would be a cross between a poem and a novel. Over time this idea evolved into a more diary-like exploration of my chronic health problems, which also included me trying, and failing, to write a detective novel set in a world without prisons. Writing about my health issues brought me toward writing about faith (or how an unbeliever might approach faith.) How when, in my early twenties, my chronic pain first became severe, I looked for some sort of spiritual poetry or approach to help get me through. How “when things take a turn for the worse there often arises some newfound desire for belief (or hope.)” This led me to the question of conversion experiences, how was it possible for someone to believe one set of things and then, quite suddenly, end up believing an entirely different set of assumptions? And how maybe, if I could have a conversion experience of some sort, it might give me a greater inner strength to deal with the ongoing chronic pain. Also, bringing in larger political questions, how “the world needs to change and I can’t help but feel that in the end it will be changed by people who believe, who possess a great deal of conviction.” Then I decided all of this wasn’t working, set it aside, and started again from scratch. Once again, I’m attempting a cross between a poem and a novel. Many of the previous themes are still present but more beneath the surface. In the new version, an unnamed narrator is drawn from one difficult collective situation to the next, in a kind of confused spiritual quest, following a possible string of secret messages that may or may be a lost artwork celebrating the necessity of treason. “A story about a soldier who, when ordered to fire at the enemy, instead turns around and shoots his commanding officer dead.” I’m not certain if this new version will continue or, not so long from now, I will once again set it aside and start from scratch. Unlike the other two books, this one is more a 50/50 split between utopia and dystopia, a split I find intriguing. As well, most of my previous books haven’t had quite so many false starts, which possibly means I am in some kind of artistic crisis, or possibly means nothing at all." - Jacob Wren, Writer's Block at All Lit Up