richardmurray

Writing Grief in SFF

6:24  What is your definition of grief?
Grief is pain but in modernity in the anglophone, grief is connotatively, lamenting a death to someone in your personal circle. 

13:54 What is your favorite works about grief?
First to my mind: film-> the leopard 1963 < based on a book> ; music-> strange fruit sung by billie holiday <it was written by a white man for the record> ; dance-> wade in the water by Alvin Ailey troupe< music of the negro spiritual>; animation-> the wind rises 2013 <studio ghibli > ; literature -> The Raven , of edgar allen poe <I admit most of the craft I like or I have made myself doesn't involve grief, but I admit, I enjoyed my youth alot, loving embracing home, and embraced outside of it, I love the adventure so to speak>
I am willing to speak as to these entries, just ask in comments. 

22:53 What unique opportunities if any do you think the science fiction fantasy genre provides for writing about grief?
In generating a cause of grief or creating an environment for a character to grieve or generating a way to diminish /end/or be consumed by grief, science fiction allows a greater flexibility in the identity of such things. 

29:00 Do you have a process in writing grief or what in your crafting does grief influence?
I write everything from my heart. I tend to like adventure, a going somewhere, usually a positive or not frightening place. So it is rare I have grief naturally, but when I do, it is the same process as when I am not. When  I write something that makes me think of a funny memory I laugh, when I write something that makes me think of a sad memory I cry.
A nice film to think about is The Innocents 1961. It leads you up to a place where your own mind will dictate what you sense. We in modernity in the anglophone talk about being triggered, but it is a good example of a film , which is a collective art project, that allows the viewer to trigger themselves. 

30:41 how do you write someone who experiences grief differently from you, the writer?
To be honest, I write out world or character definitions so when I ask a question about them, I follow the guidelines I set. If I write a character like Ryunosuke Tsukue  , Sword of Doom 1966, who is a character based on a philosophy, then his actions need to reflect that. He may be called crazy, but he isn't being written as crazy, but who he is. Don't betray your characters, even if what they do goes against what you will. 

35:28 Do you have a recovery process from writing about grief?
No need but the reason is because my mind has always been a large place. I have places in my mind where my negativities reside or where my positivities reside or where my emotionless reside or where my disorderliness reside and I can go to wherever I want to go. Many people minds tend to be filled with too much of one or the other.

38:22 Do you see an importance of writing grief as a black writer or reading grief as a black reader?
In the anglophone, historically grief has a historical place as a communal while also individual torment at times, sequentially in the arts, it can be a non violent therapy from the artists to the readership/viewership/listernership.

43:19 Where do you see the conversation about black grief going or what authors have done a work that sticks with you in the present?
I recall a film from 2011 called inheritance, Keith David was behind it. I remember it mentioned an elephant in the room in the black community. In it, Keith David and the others in this group take their descendents and offer them up as sacrifice, stating they are not suitable to what the ancestors wanted. I think few films deal with the black community or parts of the black community unsatisfied with the result, ala modernity, to why the community grieved in the past. To rewrite myself, what if the ancestors who lived through enslavement in all forms all their breaths aren't proud or overjoyed at the modern black community? What if the college educated/business owning/integrated blacks in modernity aren't fulfilling the wishes of the ancestor?. I know it has been written before, I have. But, it is rare to see in film, which is one of if not the most expensive art craft.

49:34 Can Dominique speak more on being trans and being associated with death?
After listening to Dominuque....
We all have heard of people saying another person has died equivalent to physical death in their personal circle because of an issue. That is what excommunicado is, a word that means to be out of the community, but functionally a term started by the christian church after the Nicean creed to christian groups that did not abide by the new set of rules, meaning a living death.  A taking out of the community of the living, even though one is not dead. Are you alive if someone can not talk to you, look at you, write to you, touch you. Women in india who are banished from the lowest castes are in similar situations and the caste is ancient. In modernity in the anglophone this comes from some to those in their personal circle who have what is called in modernity  transgender change. 

55:14 When does grief go from science fiction to horror?
Well, science fiction can be a horror, of a fantasy or a romance or other. So, the way in which grief is utilized can or will give specificity to a science fiction work. Dominique said a point and I thought to the following... Sadly, griefully, but truthfully, many people, not all, in some places not most, will rather see those in their private circle whom they feel need to be in a dress , in a dress rather than alive. 

Authors featured
Shingai Njeri Kagunda: https://www.shingainjerikagunda.com/
Voodoonauts: https://www.voodoonauts.com/
Zin E. Rocklyn: https://twitter.com/intelligentwat
Dominique Dickey: https://dominiquedickey.com/

Thanks to:
Erica of The Broken Spine:    / @the_broken_spine &nbsp;
Suzan Palumbo: https://suzanpalumbo.wordpress.com/