Another coup by BSC this week for our ‘On the Spot’ feature. This week, Mr. John C. Wright takes time out to participate in our feature. Mr. Wright is the author of the critically lauded and Golden Age trilogy, a Space Opera that in my opinion ranks among the very best released in quite some time, and instantly secures Mr. Wright a spot amongst the current elite writers of speculative fiction. It took no time for his series to gain notice as Amazon’s Editors included it among its Top 5 Reads in Science Fiction in 2002. Beginning with The Golden Age, and followed by The Phoenix Exultant and The Golden Transcendence, Mr. Wright’s introductory full-length offerings have drawn comparisons to such venerated names as Vance, Wolfe, and Zelazny. Mr. Wright’s second offering The Last Guardian of Everness kicks off a High Fantasy series ‘The War of the Dreaming’ which was included by Locus in it’s year closing 2004 Recommended Reading List, as well as last month being nominated for the Prometheus Award, which annually honors work of Science Fiction for examining the meaning of freedom, and it’s past winners include such names as Poul Anderson, Vernor Vinge, Terry Pratchett, and John Varley. The sequel to The Last Guardian of Everness was released last month entitled Mists of Everness (and is on my shelf, and absolutely needs to be read!) closes out the duology, and in this interview I was found out he was working on the first installment of his next project Orphans of Chaos, the first installment in another 2 -part arc. From Space Opera to High Fantasy I can attest Mr. Wright’s output has thus far repudiated himself from any notion he is not currently among those crafting speculative fiction at it’s highest level, while simultaneously no doubt creating a product others will look to for inspiration. Without further, (albeit most deserved) accolades, BSC recognizes its good fortune in being able to present Mr. John C. Wright, On the Spot:

Jay Tomio - Please tell the readers that haven’t been introduced to your work what to expect from the ‘Golden Age’ trilogy?

John C. Wright - My ambition was to set a tale in a future as far remote from our own age as imagination could reach, a golden age, when men are as gods. The story concerns a young and idle aristocrat, Phaethon of Rhadamanth Mansion. During a world-wide masquerade, held once every thousand years, Phaethon discovers that his memories are false, his wife not whom she seems to be, his father not whom he seems to be. Phaethon is apparently suffering a self-imposed amnesia for some crime he committed, but the penalty, whatever it is, for that crime will not fall on him provided he lets the matter rest forgotten. Phaethon plans to discover the truth about himself without remembering and turning into his former self.

Jay Tomio - In the same vein as the first question, Mr. Wright. What can readers expect from your Everness work?

John C. Wright - Last Guardian of Everness is a high fantasy set in the modern age: a man who loves his dying wife is offered by an eerie necromancer from the dream-lands the chance to save her. The price is that he must kill an innocent man, a stranger to him. Who would not kill a stranger to save his wife? In this case, however,the stranger chosen by the necromancer is the last of a long forgotten order of Watchmen whose task is to keep the sane and day-lit world of men safe from the creatures of the Night, mythic monsters and fallen angels of whom the necromancer is himself merely the first messenger.

Jay Tomio - Are you currently working on another project? What can you tell us about it?

John C. Wright - My next book to be published is tentatively titled Orphans of Chaos. Due to its length, it will be split into two volumes, the second to be called FUGITIVES OF CHAOS. Five youngsters have been raised their whole lives on the ground of a boarding school in Southern Wales, deserted of students, save for them. They note that the townspeople (whom they sometimes see) grow older, whereas they seem always to be seventeen or younger, never quite old enough to graduate, never quite old enough to be set free. Amelia Windrose, one of the five becomes convinced that the students are not human beings, but creatures from beyond the edges of space and time, and resolves to aid her fellows to escape, and discover the real world and their real selves.

Jay Tomio - In past interviews, you described yourself as a “Space Opera Writer”. In fact, you made a comment that you may be the last such writer. But certain space operas published recently are greatly popular, such as works by Hamilton, and Bujold. Why do you think the genre is moving away from such works?

John C. Wright - My comment was ill-advised. There has been a renaissance in Hard SF and Space Opera since I made that boast, and also it betrays that I am not as well-read as I should be. Stephen Baxter, Alastair Reynolds, Ian M. Banks, Peter F. Hamilton, Charles Stross, can be granted the laurels of having written imagination-staggering cosmic-scale romantic adventure stories after the fashion of Doc E.E. Smith and Edmond ‘ Worldwrecker’ Hamilton. My own contribution to the “space opera” genre, of course, suffers a noticeable defect. If a science fiction story does not have at least one planet destroyed, it does not qualify as a space opera. On the other hand, in ‘GOLDEN AGE’, I do have Jupiter ignited artificially to form a second sun, so I may qualify under a technicality.

Jay Tomio - You mention some well known authors What writers influenced you?

John C. Wright - I am a great admirer of the work of Jack Vance and Gene Wolfe, and I filch ideas from Poul Anderson, whose body of work remains unmatched in science fiction. I know that partisans of Heinlein, Asimov and Bradbury will scoff if I promote Poul Anderson above the claims of these giants: but Asimov is too dry and intellectual for my tastes, Bradbury too romantic and lyrical, and Heinlein descended into pervertarian polemics in his post-juvenile works. Anderson, even in his latest works, never lost the ability to hammer together a solid, workmanlike story, rich in invention and touched with humanity.

Jay Tomio - The Golden Age is your first full-length novel. How long did you have this story concept in your head for the series? Did the manuscript garner attention instantly?

John C. Wright - I made up the idea for the story when I set down to write it. I am unfortunately an undisciplined writer, who composes as he types. My suggestion to any novice authors reading this is not to imitate my work habits. It took me about nine months to complete a first draft, and there were only minor changes. My newspaperman days taught me to write very quickly indeed. The manuscript garnered no attention for five or six years. I mailed it out to every major publisher and agent, and very few of them even gave me a personal answer. It was rejected by everyone.

It is impossible to find an agent when you have no publisher; and impossible to find a publisher when you have no agent. I was saved from this paradox when David G. Hartwell approached me to have my short story GUEST LAW (published in Isaac Asimov’s magazine) appear in his Year’s Best SF 3, and he casually asked me if I had any novel length work. I told him I would have my agent contact him. The man who was debating whether or not to be my agent, James Frenkel, was able to settle the debate the moment I told him Mr. Hartwell wanted to look at my manuscripts. Note that writing short stories for magazines was the key to breaking into the big leagues in this case.

Mr. Frenkel mercilessly browbeat Mr. Hartwell for roughly two years into settling down to read the manuscripts. Mr. Hartwell must have been favorably impressed, as he bought my two manuscripts and his company hired Mr. Frenkel. My current agent is Jack Byrne of Sternig & Byrne Literary Agency.

So, GOLDEN AGE took me nine months to write and nine years to publish. Note that EVERNESS was written even longer ago than GOLDEN AGE. There was a scene in EVERNESS, slightly innocent and slightly shocking in 1992 (when I wrote it),about a husband and wife having sex in the Oval Office, which by now seems trite and out of date. Both the innocence and the capacity to shock of the readership, even in as short a space of time as ten years, have diminished.

Jay Tomio - Being someone who is obviously possessed of great learning ….

John C. Wright - (interrupting) who, me? I would say great gas-baggy ego and modest learning.

Jay Tomio - (continued) ….Are you aware of Margaret Atwood, and her various stances on Science Fiction regarding her work? Do you have an opinion on them?

John C. Wright - An example of my modest learning: I have never read anything by her. I think I saw a movie based on HANDMAIDEN’S TALE, and I dismissed it as typical Jacobin anticlerical propaganda. My impression is that she writes mainstream fiction set in a science fiction background, not real science fiction. By this I mean she is merely using unoriginal science fiction tropes to make modern commentary about modern issues: but this is only a vague impression of mine based on hearsay. Of her stances on Science Fiction I am uninformed, and have no opinion.

Jay Tomio - What current writers do you enjoy reading?

John C. Wright - Alfred Duggan wrote a series of terse historical novels which I greatly enjoy. He wrote in the 1950’s, before literary standards were corrupted, and his grammar and wordcraft is flawless. I would recommend to anyone moderating a D&D game to read these books for background and realism. I am reading KNIGHT WITH ARMOR, and just finished ALFRED THE GREAT. Stephen Pressmen, author of GATES OF FIRE wrote a book about the Peloponnesian War called TIDE OF WAR, both of which I very strongly recommend to anyone who likes great writing. The man knows his craft, and he knows his period.

I am re-reading the OZ books by L. Frank Baum to my six-year-old. The John R. Neill illustrations give the fairytales a grace and character the books otherwise would not possess. Baum has a penchant for weak endings (Magic merely solves the problems at the end of EMERALD CITY OF OZ and PATCHWORK GIRL OF OZ, for example), but a man would need to have a heart of rusted cast-iron not to admire the childish delight these tales inspire.

Also on my nightstand are WIZARD-KNIGHT by Gene Wolfe, ILLIUM by Dan Simmons, and WELLSTONE by Wil McCarthy. I am also reading AN ESSAY ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE by John Henry Newman, and ORLANDO FURIOSO by Ariosto (John Huntington’s translation).

If you’ve read an interview I gave over a year ago, when I was asked a similar question, you might see many of the same books on my nightstand. I write quickly, but I read slowly.

Jay Tomio - I want to thank you again, Mr. Wright, for participating in ‘On the Spot’, a true pleasure, and I hope you feel inclined to come back again. Good luck with your next work Orphans of Chaos.

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