Is this a vision or a waking truth
In which I see thee, smiling on my hopes,
As only visions smile on Jack-a-dreams?
-A Hermit of Carmel, Professor George Santayana
What is this website?
This website is a collection of my writing, both fiction and non, and my thoughts on the subject. Included are over a hundred poems, more than half a decade of fiction, articles, essays, artwork and photography. If it came out of my head since I left high school, there’s a decent chance that it’s on this website.
What is a Jack-a-dreams?
(3) Jack-a-dreams. A man of inaction, a mere dreamer. – Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase & Fable
I’ve always been a daydreamer, a slacker. It’s easy to let life creep up on you if you’re not paying attention. But this year I decided to live for who I am now instead of waiting to “grow up” and become something. And in the meantime, if I’m still a bit of a Jack-a-dreams, I suppose it could be worse.
About the author/Who is the Librarian?
I’m Jack, your Librarian, and I’ve been writing fantasy and science fiction since before I knew what genres were. You really don’t want to see anything that old, though, I promise. Most of my inspiration for writing comes from source materials. Good books definitely make me want to write. I admire the way Neil Gaiman weaves old stories into new ones, the way Neal Stephenson makes my head hurt in the good way, and the way Diane Duane still makes me cry the tenth time I reread So You Want To Be A Wizard.
Where’s the fan-fiction?
I started writing fanfiction during high school and posting it on Usenet groups. It was fun, but over the next ten years I saw it come to dominate my writing to a degree that became frustrating. I posted original pieces alongside my fanfiction, but it was the fanfic that got comments, and so for a long time it was the fanfic I turned to.
I can’t say I’ve given up fanfiction. That would be a blatant lie; I wrote 25k in a single fandom in 2009, and I’ve finished a 30k fic this year as well. That’s nowhere near a record for me, but it’s enough that I can’t pretend I’m not still writing it. I am trying to focus more on original writing, though, and this site is meant to focus that attention back where I want it to be.
Are you published?
I’ve had a poem accepted for Into the Great Below, a devotional anthology.
Alice Brown
Who sits out in the orchard bowers
Blowing bubbles of apple-bloom?
Who washed the cheeks of the baby flowers
And swept the grass with a windy broom?
Jack-a-Dreams, John-a-Dreams, radiant fellow!
Busiest body from dawn till night;
Thrumming his tunes on rose and yellow,
And all the strings in the harp of light.
His are the boatlings low in the valleys,
Cobweb cordage and woven keel;
He lights them over with dew, his galleys,
And rides from the dock on Arachne’s wheel.
Jack-a-Dreams, John-a-Dreams, day’s a-dying!
Take up your brush and dabble the west
Leave us your pennon there a-flying,
Set with stars for a silver crest!
