decency Archives - G R JORDAN

Posted on December 23, 2019December 20, 2019 by GRJordan — Leave a comment

A View From Outside at Christmas

This year I am working over Christmas, and not the writing kind of work (although I may sneak a few words in here and there as ever). In my day job, I have been relatively fortunate to have avoided Christmas Day working over the last few years but this time around it’s my turn, and fair enough. This has necessitated the observance of the festival (man, that’s so formal sounding) a few days early so we can celebrate as a family. The upshot of this is that the rest of the family get two Christmas Days and I get a quiet house once I come off shift.

Being a shift worker, at this and other times of the year, has allowed me to see how everyone’s reality is different. For some, life is lived away from those they love with only brief visits home to look forward to. Others have a mechanical nine to five routine that seems to be rarely upset. For myself, working an eight day cycle into a seven day week, things are always fluid. Noone has the same life, work is often different, family is never the same and our own abilities vary vastly.

At this time of year, when we are meant to think about peace and understanding, it occurs to me how quick we are to judge someone else when we have no idea of their circumstances, rather assessing them as if their position was our own. As a writer it helps fuel conflict in stories, but in real life it leads to misunderstanding, anger and so often hate. If we are to live up to the Christmas ideal, we need to try and put ourselves in others shoes. But if we can’t then we need to simply accept other peoples’ struggles as the struggles they see them for, not as we see them.

In the Christmas nativity story, understanding the shock, fear and fortitude of a young mum to be requires an understanding of not just circumstance but also of the make up of the woman herself. To have gotten to know Mary would have allowed a better understanding, but from our dim view, it’s easy to misread the difficulty of the situation and turn the story into a simple fairy tale.

So this Christmas, try to look deep. But where we cannot see, then let’s make sure we are not filling the blanks up with soil from our own field.

Posted on November 20, 2019November 19, 2019 by GRJordan — Leave a comment

Beware the Brandished Torches!

One of the hardest things in writing is telling a story about a place everyone knows, The fact is they live there…, with you…, and like you they know everything about the locale. Except they don’t. And neither do you, the writer. This is because everyone views any place they interact with and contribute to through their own experiences. This is what makes stone-walling seem like honourable defence, one person’s bigotry seem like justified anger and one person’s paradise another folk’s hell.

As a writer taking on the challenge of story telling about the area around you, even if the characters are fictional, though based on various people one knows or has had experience of, you have to be careful. Not in case they come for you in the night, pitch forks at the ready and dipped flaming branches giving the night sky an eerie glow and your feet a hot toasting. Not in case some people don’t speak to you, offend by who they believe themselves to be in your story. No, the part to be careful of is to say what the story wants to say.

Stories are generated from thoughts and deeply held observations or beliefs and therefore deserve to be written in their entirety, not altered for passable consumption. And should the writer fear having caused offense if they are actually describing what is? Surely worse happens. They could simply put the book down in boredom. Now that would be devastation. So write to your observations, your revelations, your take on this life.

And so remember me, when you see the brandished torches, or the small boat with the man, hands tied behind his back and walking a modern day plank into the sea. They will say, he wrote to his convictions, he called it as it was. Short career though!

Posted on September 4, 2019September 4, 2019 by GRJordan — Leave a comment

Who is Mr. Kirkgordon?

As an author I am often asked where my ideas come from for characters and plots which makes me pause and actually think, where have they come from? In response to this feeling, I’m taking a few blogs to discover for myself which bit of this dark mind of mine has produced my main characters.

Mr. Kirkgordon is the one of feuding duo who had their relationship first formed on paper in “Crescendo!”, although a later short origin story, “Footsteps”, takes us back to their first actual meeting under a grave. Agile and a former bodyguard, Kirkgordon can handle himself in trouble and is ideal to look after the volatile eldritch genius that is Mr Austerley.

Kirkgordon comes from that part of us that knows what the right thing to do is, and that we’re going to have to do it despite the hardship that comes from doing it. He cannot walk away, even if the people he’s involved with do the exact opposite to what he would. Having a faith in God, Kirkgordon is not a religious nut but rather is the atypical believer struggling with his faith as well as his behaviour to others he loves and those he loathes.

“Death? That’s it? Indy, everywhere we go there’s a general implication of death. Do you mean death here, in the corridor, or death in a more widespread sense?”
From Ship of Doom by G R Jordan

As a man of faith I wanted to have Kirkgordon put under pressure, both from the outside darkness but also from his own darker sides. He has a wandering eye when it comes to women and when Calandra comes on the scene, they have to fight the immense attraction between each other while working closely together in front of her former lover Austerley.

The archer in Kirkgordon comes from myself and was a lot of fun to write, although I doubt anyone in the real world has handled a bow like him. One of the sides of Kirkgordon brought out to me by a reader was how harsh he is on Austerley. Constantly pilling on the banter and sometime abuse, his understanding of his colleague takes time to grow until there is a mutual respect and distrust in the same measure. Each knows the other frailties and the trouble that comes from them.

“Nailed to your cross then. I hope you believe in redemption and foregiveness too, Havers?”
From Crescendo! by G R Jordan

Ultimately, I think Kirkgordon is ourselves thrown into the mess of situations with all fears, beliefs, pressures and blind corners, knowing that we still have to get it done. He’s not the most powerful, most clever, wisest or even the bravest of the characters but he always gets it done, fighting his conscience all the way. In that I reckon he’s like a lot of people on this earth, albeit his demons tend to jump out of the ground at him.

Check out Kirkgordon’s psychologist’s report here and see what the professionals at SETAA think of him. Or for the books check out my shop and find Kirkgordon for yourself!

Posted on October 15, 2015 by G R Jordan — Leave a comment

Are you Decent Enough to Show Some Decency?

I have been thinking about the purpose of writing recently. One common thread I hear from some fellow writers is that they are writing for themselves and it doesn’t bother them if they are never read. I find it strange but fair enough, I suppose. It doesn’t fit in with my idea of writing. Making a living with it would be good but I struggle to see why I should write if not to be read. Otherwise why not just think? But if that’s your bag then alright.
For those of us who want to be read the issue remains why? Are we there to just entertain, or are we trying to influence. I believe books influence whether we set out to or not. Like any media, the written word changes people, for better or for worse. The influence of written material from the Bible to Mein Kampf, from To Kill a Mocking Bird to Animal Farm all cause changes in the reader. Sometimes slow, maybe subtle but always a change.

So what are we passing on? Here’s a few ideas:

“I’ve always felt, in all my books, that there’s a deep decency in the American people and a native intelligence – providing they have the facts, providing they have the information.”

Studs Terkel

“I feel deeply my responsibility to teach sacred things. I am so aware that the world is changing and will be vastly different from the one I have known. Values have shifted. Basic decency and respect for good things are eroding.”

James E. Faust

The above quotes show writers prepared to set an example towards decency, one showing what they believe already exists within us and the other trying to pull people back to what is perceived as a better time. Writing is such a powerful medium for engaging someone with a message like this. By taking time aside to read, the person is also taking time to think whether they consciously desire that or not.

“Our scientific age demands that we provide definitions, measurements, and statistics in order to be taken seriously. Yet most of the important things in life cannot be precisely defined or measured. Can we define or measure love, beauty, friendship, or decency, for example?”

Dennis Prager

Maybe the importance of writing is in trying to explain and promote these qualities that cannot be measured but have to be shown. Whether we write non-fiction or fiction we portray these qualities, or lack of, in our characters thereby asking our readers indirectly who they are closest to. Is this not why reading is sometimes uncomfortable. A solemn duty as Prager describes these things as “the most important things in life”.

“Never assume, no matter how strong the temptation, that other people are low-life lying manipulators without a shred of human decency.”

Dinesh D’Souza

Here, D’Souza pleas for hope in all people, saying we all have decency to some degree within us. Is our writing therefore a heat lamp, a drop of water, seeking to grow that seed.

“I’m under the impression that this notion of decency is disappearing from our society where conflicts are made worse on cinema and on television, where people are nasty and cruel on the Internet and where, in general, everybody seems to be very angry.”

Helen Mirren

Helen Mirren relates how she thinks that creative arts can actually create the opposite to the decency we have talk about. It is quotes like this that make me believe we do have a responsibility in what we write in that we know it will influence, for better or for worse. Where your lines of good and bad are drawn may differ from mine but let us never entertain the idea that our work is standing alone in this world. It will provoke a reaction, in manner and belief, not just in words.

Last word to Mary McAleese.

“That past is still within our living memory, a time when neighbour helped neighbour, sharing what little they had out of necessity, as well as decency.”

Mary McAleese

So is your writing decent enough to promote decency whether by showing the benchmark or the poor example, consequence or folly? Or do we just entertain? I don’t believe so.