When the Ox Mocks the Bull
This is from a conversation between one Damien Walter, professional ignoramus who has continually failed to finish a novel the Queen’s loyal taxpayers in England are forced to pay him to write, and Paul Weimer, who at one time considered himself my friend.
As Declann Finn points out, this announcement, or prediction, or clapping-for-Tinkerbell invocation-by-playing-pretend, or whatever it is, claiming my pro writing career is over, happened on March 19. My latest novel came out for sale on March 17th. I have two more books coming out from Tor, and two more from Castalia House, and five more I am obligated to write.
Not to mention I have just be hired by a magazine publisher to write two more projects of which I have no permission to speak in public (cross your fingers on that one, because, not being paid by the Queen’s loyal taxpayer’s against their will, the finances on that one are still up in the air.)
Pathetic.
However, hearing this child call me and mine craven requires a more thorough dressing down. Allow me to unlimber my spleen in more detail.
Quoted on the same page where Mr. Walter calls better men than he cowards, is this tidbit:
You may interpret this as you will. I interpret it as cowardice. He is afraid to talk to us, afraid of me (or else why bring my name up?), afraid of my books, my career, my growing fame, for the simple reason that, simply by existing, and through no deliberate fault of my own, I show him his whole world is false, empty, stupid, shallow, meaningless. If I can write IRON CHAMBER OF MEMORY in a month, or ‘Queen of the Tyrant Lizards’ in a day, then everything he thinks and says about writing is humbug, and his life is a joke.
And he cannot face the truth. That is why he is a coward.
Damien Walter is the original Morlock from whom all other Morlocks are named. He is not a writer who will not shut up about giving writers bad advice about writing based on his limited experience. He is a non-writer who wants to be a writer and has failed miserably even to start a career who will not shut up about giving writers bad advice about writing based on his utter absence of experience.
Many a reader has chided me for using the word ‘Morlock’ to refer to the crybullies, social justice warriors, leftwingdings, socialists, feminists, hatemongers, antiracist-racists, barking-mad moonbats and CHORFs. The objection is that in HG Wells’ book, the Morlocks maintain and operate the machinery of the decayed civilization of 802701 AD, and therefore put in a good day’s work, which no crybully ever has done.
This criticism, while trenchant, misses my original joke, which was that Mr. Walter combined the work ethic of the Eloi (without their winsomeness) with the diet and grooming conditions of the Morlocks (without their robustness). He is a creature who spiritually dwells in the dark and who consumes the taxes, labor, and life of other men for his own benefit, and Morlocks consume Eloi. He, like them, is a creature devolved to posthuman postrational nature.
I am not sure why he, or any of these loons who are tangentially related to the SF field, or not related at all, think their nod of disapproval can have any effect on a career like mine.
My fans don’t read the callow, cloying, shallow yet pretentious, warped yet freakish, neurotic, man-hating, West-hating, grimdark feminist schlock and dreck that morons trying and failing to sound smart write when they imitate the latest fashion in literature; or triflers parrot when they try and fail to sound deep, or brainzombies reciting hippy-dippy social theories from AD 1960 or socialist political theories from AD 1860 imitate in a shambling fashion when they try and fail to sound original.
If the mad dogs want to eat poop, let them go their way and do their business with my goodwill. Far be it from me to tell a poetaster what to write! If he finds a reader, my blessings on them both.
But my fans want a feast fit for men with hearty appetites, and the wine of joy.
My fans want the stars. Mr. Walter may have the sewers. Mutual indifference is a lovely thing, and I would embrace it with all due magnanimity if the Morlock would return the favor.
For an obvious reason, he cannot.
A writer who lacks the talent and drive to write is a castrato. The gnawing and pathetic envy of the eunuch to the virile man is not less than that of the barren and sterile hack to the fertile grandmaster who fills whole worlds with his lush imagination.
So when the sewer-dwelling coprophagic Morlock ventures his sloped and microcephalic head above the level of the foetid muck to mock the stars, the absurdity of the situation must be noted.
Mr. Walter cannot even write and insult with the verve and brio, the panache and vocabulary a writer is wont to employ when delivering a finely-crafted insult. He clearly wants to say something cutting, but the arsenal of his wit is bare.
I would prefer that public scolds and gossips no longer meddle with me with their tongues, but, if I must play the part of Emmanuel Goldstein inside the Oceania of his unlit and petty mind, Mr. Walter is the nag I would prefer. More amusing to rapier a foe found fumbling on the field of honor only with a length of bologna in his fist.
Having the sneering Pharisees of Filthtown poo-poo and tutt-tutt my work, if anything, brings me greater respect in the eyes of my potential buyers.
It is for that reason that I wish this pronouncement of Mr. Walter to be spread. It is good for business.
Oh, and I think Larry Correia just bought a mountain, or something
*.*.*.*
Let us pause to look at Mr. Walter’s sole anthology (MY LOVESICK ZOMBIE BOY BAND AND WEIRDER TALES) compared to my two latest novels:
- Damien: #510,295 in Kindle
- John: #3,477 in Kindle store, #55,198 in Kindle store.
Also, my latest book has twice the reviews – 16 to 7 – and nearly twice the average rating – 5.0 to 3.1 – as Mr. Walter’s.
As for Mr. Walter, and his rather self-flattering belief that I think on him with bitterness, or indeed (save when he clamors for attention by spitting up in public) think on him at all, let us the observe the reaction of my piano teacher, Mr. Terwilliker, which perhaps many of us share.
IF WRIGHT DID NOT MOCK HIM, WHO WOULD KNOW WHO HE WAS?
About John C Wright
John C. Wright is a practicing philosopher, a retired attorney, newspaperman, and newspaper editor, and a published author of science fiction. Once a Houyhnhnm, he was expelled from the august ranks of purely rational beings when he fell in love; but retains an honorary title.
