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Metapsychosis

Journal of Consciousness, Literature, and Art

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Prophetic Fiction

September 12, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards discuss a subset of future-looking fiction they call “Prophetic Fiction”. Drawing on different traditions around prophecy, including religious traditions and the writings of E.M. Forster, they explore different aspects of this kind of writing.

Tagged With: anger-grief-hope, future-orientation, prophecy, science fiction, song, stories with scope, story

Interview with Marco V Morelli

August 16, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards talk with Marco Morelli, poet, editor and publisher, about the process of writing poetry and how this process led him to develop a publishing business and take on editorial responsibilities.

Marco V Morelli is the founder of Cosmos Cooperative and Infinite Conversations (infiniteconversations.com) as well as the cofounder and creative director of Metapsychosis Journal. He studied Philosophy and Comparative Literature at Binghamton University, and worked for Ken Wilber’s Integral Institute from 2003 to 2007, co-authoring the book Integral Life Practice, before leaving to follow the pathways of art. He is currently at work on a book of poems titled I AM THE SINGULARITY.

Tagged With: dialogue between creators, editing, poetry, poetry as diruption, publishing, writing

Writing Residencies

August 5, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Authors Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards talk about the benefits to doing a Writing Residency and present highlights from recent residencies in which they took part, including a residency on the Isle of Crete and another in upstate New York.

Tagged With: artistic residencies, research, writing, writing communities, writing residencies

Historical Fiction

July 26, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards dive into the murky study of historically motivated fiction from their contrasting perspectives, exploring issues of veracity and where there is scope for imagination, subjects that are sometimes neglected while others attract interest. Hope you will join us!

Tagged With: arctic exploration, future history, historic expedition, historical documents, journals, logbooks, second world war, writing

Interview with Thea Boodhoo

July 5, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards conduct an interview with writer Thea Boodhoo. Thea (pronounced “tay-ah”) is a science fiction writer based in San Francisco, California. Her short stories ‘Growing Swirling Clouds’ and ‘A Layer Thin As Breath’ can be found at https://tersejournal.com/2019/02/22/g… and https://magazine.metaphorosis.com/sto… and she can be found on Twitter and Instagram as @tharkibo.​

Tagged With: alien life, ecological fiction, first contact, generation ship, near future, science fiction, science writing

Ending Writings

June 22, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards finish up the episode on Endings by switching from talking about how to write endings, to how to end writings – often itself a tricky step.

Tagged With: publish, putting down the pen, stopping revising, writing, writing projects

Writing Endings

June 7, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards talk about Endings across two related episodes. This first deals with Writing Endings. We talk about several contexts, single book endings or endings of series, stories with more or fewer subplots, and other aspects of handling endings.

Tagged With: challenges of writing endings, ending a book in a book series, ending a book series, ending a novel, ending a short story, endings, writing

Writing About War

May 23, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards talk about some of the challenges and issues that arise when one is writing about war and war situations.

Tagged With: military science fiction, second world war, space opera, Trojan War, vikings, war, writing

Writing About Age

May 9, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards talk about some of the different ways that issues of age and aging come into play in writing, with focus on our own diverse ways of dealing with the question.

Tagged With: elderly, epochs, examples, middle age, old age, traumas, youth

Special Coronavirus Episode

April 11, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards talk about how the worldwide pandemic, as well as being in “lockdown”, that is, confined to our homes, has affected our activities as writers. Maybe our experience will help you deal with your own!

Tagged With: anxiety, dealing with fear, distractions, lockdown, pandemic, writing

Interview with Karin Murray-Bergquist

March 29, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Karin Murray-Bergquist is a PhD. candidate in Folklore at Memorial University, Newfoundland. She’s the author of a poem in the upcoming issue of Augur Magazine, and numerous travel essays that can be found at the following links: https://www.travelade.com/iceland/stories/essentials-icelandic-winter-road-trip ; http://arcticjournal.ca/featured/subarctic-lichens/ ; https://thryve.world/everyday-adventures/ransome-notes .

Tagged With: collaboration, Dartmoor, drama writing, fairy circles, ghost stories, medieval romance, plays, theatrical production, travel writing

Excerpts from our Writing, Part 3

March 14, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards finish reading excerpts from each other’s work in this third instalment of our 19th Episode of “Writing Off The Deep End”. These include a second excerpt from Geoffrey’s novel “Goodness in Small Doses”, and two excerpts from Mary’s novel “The Shell Midden”. Both are works-in-progress, and both are historical novels. “Goodness in Small Doses” deals with a family trying to escape the Nazis in wartime France, while “The Shell Midden” recounts a 19th century voyage of a vessel in the far north, based on historical documents. Enjoy!

Tagged With: Arctic, excerpts, second world war, writing

Excerpts from our Writing, Part 2

March 1, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards continue reading from their work. In this episode, Geoffrey reads two excerpts from one of Mary’s short stories called “The Island Lovers”, which can be found online at Eclectica Magazine : http://www.eclectica.org/v18n3/thaler… This is fantasy. Mary then reads from Geoffrey’s unpublished novel “Goodness in Small Doses”.

Tagged With: excerpts, fantasy, historical fiction, second world war

Excerpts from our Writings, Part 1

February 15, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Geoffrey Edwards and Mary Thaler read from each others’ work as a complement to the other episodes concerned with different aspects of writing. In this first part, Mary is reading from “Plenum : The First Book of Deo”, Geoffrey’s first novel which will be published in March 2021.

Tagged With: Arctic, excerpts, far future, historical fiction, science fiction, writing

Worldbuilding

February 1, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards talk about how they undertake diverse worldbuilding activities, not just within SF and fantasy but also in historical and contemporary fiction. The claim is that worldbuilding tasks for SF and fantasy constitute a continuum with research tasks undertaken for any fiction exercise. If you disagree, let us know, by commenting!

Tagged With: contemporary fiction settings, fantasy worlds, historical settings, research, science fiction, worldbuilding, writing

Writing and Family

January 18, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards talk about the ins and outs of the relationships (some of them!) between writing and family. How does family inform one’s writing? Whose family?

Tagged With: family, relationships, trauma, writing, writing about parenting

Writing and Religion

January 3, 2020 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Geoffrey Edwards and Mary Thaler venture off the deep end to talk about religion, faith, spirituality… and writing. Foolhardy, perhaps, but it makes for an interesting discussion.

Tagged With: faith, religion, religious themes, secular humanism, spirituality, writing

Writing Poetry

December 21, 2019 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards talk about the challenges, and benefits of writing poetry, both for its own sake and as a support to other writing efforts.

Tagged With: poetic influences, poetry, writing, writing process

Dramatic Writing, Part 1 – Writing for Opera

November 20, 2019 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards explore the process of dramatic writing. In this first of two parts, the focus in on writing for opera.

Tagged With: drama, libretto, opera, opera production, team aspect of writing drama, writing

Short Fiction

November 2, 2019 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Geoffrey Edwards and Mary Thaler discuss the strengths and weaknesses of writing short fiction.

Tagged With: challenges of short fiction, differences between short form and long form fiction, short fiction, short stories, writing

Writing Characters

November 2, 2019 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards discuss the process of writing characters. Do you love them or hate them? How do you separate them from yourself as a writer? And other issues as they arise.

Tagged With: alien characters, backstories, characterization, characters, multi-novel characters, relation of writer to characters, writing

Writing Communities

September 14, 2019 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards talk about drawing on larger communities of writers for various kinds of support, both online and offline.

Tagged With: critiquing, sharing writing, support for writing, writing, writing communities

Writing in a Second Language

August 31, 2019 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards discuss some of the issues around writing when one lives in a city that speaks a different language than one’s native tongue.

Tagged With: authors, non native language, second language, writing

Illustrations and Artwork

August 17, 2019 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards talk about (and show!) the development of visual story telling ideas in relation to writing fiction. Shown below are the illustrations referred to within the dialogue.

  • Brulierie St-Denis, Montreal, circle 2350, from The One and Only (G. Edwards)
  • Jonah, from Plenum : The First Book of Deo (G. Edwards)
  • To the People I Loved … Who didn’t feel that way (M. Thaler)
  • To the People I Loved… Who didn’t feel that way (M. Thaler)
  • Pet-stitting in Iqaluit (M. Thaler)
  • Pet-sitting in Iqaluit (M. Thaler)
  • Pet-sitting in Iqaluit (M. Thaler)

Tagged With: artwork, bande dessinée, comic books, drawing, illustrations, visual storytelling, writing

Dramatic Writing, Part 2 – Writing for Theatre

August 8, 2019 By Geoffrey Edwards

Hosts Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards continue their discussion of Dramatic Writing, this time focusing on writing for theatre. This is the second of two parts, the first dealt with writing for opera.

Tagged With: collaborative writing, drama, producing theatre, theatre, writing

Names and Naming

July 27, 2019 By Geoffrey Edwards

Mary Thaler and Geoffrey Edwards talk about how they choose names for characters, places and sci-fi concepts, whether they’re writing about the distant past, the present day or the far future.

Tagged With: names, naming, naming characters, naming worlds, writing

Writing Practices, Part 2

July 13, 2019 By Geoffrey Edwards

Geoffrey Edwards and Mary Thaler discuss writing practices — the habits, daily routines and techniques they use to get words down on page.

Tagged With: authors, daily writing routines, revisions, writing, writing challenges, writing journals, writing practices, writing techniques, writing tips

Writing Practices, Part 1

June 29, 2019 By Geoffrey Edwards

Geoffrey Edwards and Mary Thaler discuss writing practices — the habits, daily routines and techniques they use to get words down on page.

Tagged With: daily writing routines, writing, writing challenges, writing practices, writing techniques, writing tips

Writing as Scientists, Part 2

June 15, 2019 By Geoffrey Edwards

Geoffrey Edwards and Mary Thaler talk about how their careers as scientists—working in fields like astrophysics, geomatics, microbiology, and ocean science—influenced the way they write fiction

Tagged With: astrophysics, engineering, influences, marine biology, science, scientist, writing

Writing as Scientists, Part 1

June 1, 2019 By Geoffrey Edwards

Writers Geoffrey Edwards and Mary Thaler talk about how their careers as scientists—working in fields like astrophysics, geomatics, microbiology, and ocean science—have influenced the way they write fiction

Tagged With: astrophysics, biologist, craft, disability, influences, practices, scientist, smart environments, writing

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Metapsychosis is a project of Cosmos Cooperative, a creative co-op for people with "visionary tendencies." Learn more at Cosmos.coop »

Unless otherwise noted, all rights are reserved by the individual authors. Other website content is licensed under Creative Commons: Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0)

  • Podcasts
    • Chthonia – Worlds of the Dark Feminine
    • Writing Off the Deep End
  • Events
  • Groups
    • Visionary Voices: Sri Aurobindo’s Savitri
    • Synthesis of Yoga Practicum
  • Meta
    • About
    • Authors
    • Submissions
    • Contact
    • Donate

Metapsychosis is a project of Cosmos Cooperative, a creative co-op for people with "visionary tendencies." Learn more at Cosmos.coop »

  • Cosmos Cooperative
  • Earth
  • Journal
  • Conversations
  • Join the Co-op

Metapsychosis is a project of Cosmos Cooperative, a creative co-op for people with "visionary tendencies." Learn more at Cosmos.coop »

Unless otherwise noted, all rights are reserved by the individual authors. Other website content is licensed under Creative Commons: Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0)