Principles...

You’ve probably heard of the old saying, ‘in the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king.’ I’d like to nick its underlying principle and apply it to a saying of my own;

‘In the household that is skint money is king.’

Of course I took the Libya job, and no, it was not because they doubled the rate of pay. I’m a flexible kind of bloke and I’m happy to say, my principles are too. I meet him this week to finalise the details, and agree dates.

Libya, of course, isn’t actually called Libya. It’s the Great Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, or GSPLAJ for short. Catchy eh? It may have a creative name but that creativity doesn’t flow over into its flag design, which is plain Green. No insignia, no design, nothing, just green.

Other than that, and the obvious (shootings, bombings, etc.), I know very little about a country, that is, in square footage terms, the 17^th largest in the world. Which, of course, means nothing unless you intend to walk around it. And I don’t because a lot of it is Saharan desert where temperatures rarely dip below 40 degrees.

And it’s not only the desert that’s dry. The whole state is. They don’t even sell wine gums. This is good, because unless I want to watch the latest Libyan soaps, my evenings will be free for writing. By the end of my secondment I might just have finished my first draft.

But in reality editing the first draft is where the work really begins. That’s when I am forced to dispose of sentences, (previously hours spent in the crafting of), for the sake of a coherent book. I’ve lost some of my favourite words in this culling process, but you have to consider your readership. Take the ones that pitch up here for example. I like the word ‘Quidnunc’, but what would be the point in using it, because most of you have no idea what it means, even though, I know for a fact, most of you indulge in it.

So you see I’m not writing this book for me. I’m writing it for you. I’m sure you already feel a moral obligation to buy it.

I’ve now written enough material to send to potential publishers. Although I am likely to take a self-publishing route, I still haven’t given up on mainstream publishers, who to date seem determined to turn a blind eye to my efforts. On receiving a proposal on my train book, with sample chapters to indicate my writing style, one very famous travel writing publisher put it to me like this;

            ‘The thing is Mike, it’s a good idea, and I like your style, but you’re just not famous, and without that celebrity angle I just don’t think it will sell enough books.’

A sad indictment on their view of their readership don’t you think? I mean, I’ve read travel books that have turned authors into celebrities, but I’ve never seen it work the other way around.

So, my route to mainstream publishing may mean I have to grow a pair of 40EE bosoms, date a footballer, and have children that are photogenic enough for Hello! Magazine. Or perhaps I can get away with swearing my way to winning Big Brother, a show so inane, the OED are busy inventing a word that can adequately reflect the mindless drivel that it is.

So you see the English language, as rich and flexible as it is, doesn’t yet have a word that can illustrate a programme that assumes filming someone asleep is interesting.

I have a few suggestions, but I’m not going to tell you. What do you think I am, a Quidnunc?