Lift Off!

Thursday March 29, 2007

Today, at long last, my novel Cargo Fever will be hitting the shelves. Yesterday I held the book in my hand for the first time, and it looks pretty good. Of course, when I looked through it, there were a few things that I already wanted to change – but that is only natural; and anyway, I don’t believe in perfection, whether human or literary. The novel, I think, will do the job. No doubt it has its virtues and its shortcomings. I wait with trepidation to see whether the reviewers seize upon the former or the latter.

I’m particularly looking forwards to the launch event at Waterstones this evening. It will be an huge pleasure to get together with old friends and members of my family, as well as with the public who, all being well, will be queueing to get their signed copies.

I won’t be partying too hard, however, as tomorrow I’m reading a paper at the British Society for Literature and Science annual conference. The paper is on Calvino and Lucretius, and is a response in part to the Archbishop of York, John Sentamu’s recent claim that materialism (a philosophical position of which, as long-term readers of this blog will know, I am rather fond) is a “demon” that needs to be cast out. I’ll be using Calvino and Lucretius as a way of exploring what I call a “cheerful materialism” that can reconcile science and literature, ourselves and the world. The conference looks like it is going to be both fun and rewarding, although the only down side is that my paper is at an ungodly 9.30 tomorrow morning. Now that’s what I call demonic.

Anyway, with all this going on (and with the submission of the latest PhD chapter, which I sent off yesterday), I’ve been somewhat neglectful of thinkBuddha over the last couple of weeks. My apologies to you all, and after the weekend, I’ll be back in full swing.

Thanks to Alex for the image!

Tags: calvino, cargo fever, christianity, literature, lucretius

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