(The end of) A Journey Without Maps
I have no idea whether anyone out there in the seething morass we call the internet will have any interest in reading this. Still, I’m writing and sharing it just in case. The same can perhaps be said about a book I’ve spent the last few years creating. I’m writing it, but I’m unsure whether there is an an audience or if in fact it has any value whatsoever. The three years that it has taken to write can be divided up as follows. The first year was mainly spent thinking about the idea. The thing is, it’s quite a novel thesis; “a journey without maps” to use a phrase that I first encountered in a Graham Greene autobiography. This is why I needed such a long period to think about exactly how I was going to approach what was then the germ of an idea. A few false starts were made; one was perhaps too academic, another too casual, another still too personal etc. By the following year I’d finally found the motivation to put pen to paper (literally in this case!). It was a bit like sending out a stream of consciousness. I was putting down my unedited thoughts - my best, most honest and primitive thoughts (words you might recall if you have ever seen David Cronenberg’s wonderful Naked Lunch movie). And now in this the third and final year of the project, I am now polishing my roughly hewn text into a smooth and finely shaped thing. Jenny Diski taught me this lesson. Simply writing is only a stage. To produce a book worthy of the name one needs to laboriously and repeatedly buff up the text.
So what is this book about? Well, it is focussed upon all the things I write about here. Consciousness, spirituality, music, dancing, sociology, psychology, philosophy. Jazz. Hip-hop. Afro-diasporic culture. Well, I did say it was a journey without maps. It has been a deeply satisfying activity and I’m looking forward to sharing it with you. I hope at least some of my small number of subscribers might read it.
It’s a little way off though. The polishing work is never ending. However, at some point soon it’ll be ready and I hope the publication will open an interesting and new little chapter in my life.
I have just read this. I’m moved by your honest expression of vulnerability to admitting that your efforts to bring your book to life with the acknowledgment that in the end it may never be received by many. As a voracious reader of mostly philosophical content I also have a “project” in mind. I’ve collected copious--mostly jumbled--notes that have so far not been stitched together into anything coherent, never mind readable. I often feel dismayed that everything I’m trying to express has already been eloquently put out there. Yet I persevere, perhaps only out of a wish to curate my evolving thoughts. Perhaps one day I’ll find the courage to take my notes and start the first draft writing process. You encouraged me with the idea to just let things stream out and to worry about the polishing and refinements later.