Why Even Do This?

This is a miniature of the office of Sir Francis Beaufort, about whom more in a moment.

What you see above is a thing I think is very remarkable. It is a roombox, about 12-inches-by-24-inches-by-11 inches, created by Cincinnati miniaturist Robert Off. Above the mantel is a painting of sea captain and scientific pioneer Sir Francis Beaufort, and in the words of Off, the roombox is "my rendition of what Sir Francis Beaufort’s study may have looked like in England around 1800. The inspiration for the Roombox that I created was your book Defining the Wind."

I'm going to let that sink in for a moment. An artist -- clearly as good as it gets in his chosen art of making miniature rooms -- created this astonishing piece of artwork. And he did it because I wrote a book.

Well, he did it because Sir Francis Beaufort was an amazing character, whose eponymous wind scale is a thing of scientific and poetic beauty that has been inspiring writers and artists for centuries. It's so amazing -- as is Beaufort's life; among other things, he's the guy who put Charles Darwin aboard the HMS Beagle -- that I wrote an entire book about it, called Defining the Wind, which Mr. Off has read and says he liked very much. He liked it enough, obviously, that he created this astonishing thing. Here's another look at it.  

May I just point out that you see different things out the window depending on which direction you are looking?

I bring this up for two reasons. First, I just heard about it. Off just sent me an email telling me he had made this unbelievable thing and that there was going to be an event at the Cincinnati Mercantile Library, itself a place of almost unendurable awesomeness, on March 23, at which this piece of artwork was going to be unveiled and writer and library director John Faherty would discuss Beaufort and my book. And, anyway would I be willing to autograph and provide three copies of the book -- one for the eventual owner of the artwork, one to be raffled off at the event, and one for Off himself ? Off would gladly pay postage and for the books themselves.

The hell he will. He will have those books from my own hand, and he will not have to pay postage because I will go to Cincinnati and attend the event, you just see if I don't. I'll even talk if they'll let me. (Spoiler: he told me they would. Here's a description of when I did.)

Now, here's the second reason I'm telling you all this. It's because this week, after all the negotiations and discussions and contractual madness, I have signed a contract to write a book about the Lawson Trek, to be called A Delicious Country and to be published by the very wonderful University of North Carolina Press.  SO, yay, right? It'll be a lot of work for not much money, but that's the nature of books and book writing and it's what I've chosen and I'm grateful, right?

Except.

You write these books, and there's a couple years of your life, and one day a truck drives up with a box and you open it up and oh my God it's the greatest day and there's your book, and here or there -- in the best case, sometimes here AND there -- you get a review, or a note, or someone talks to you for 11 minutes on the radio, and you go to a bookstore and do monkeyshines and people laugh and a few buy your book. And, um, in about a month or so, the end. To be sure, there are authors whose books sell like crazy and who get royalty statements that have numbers not in parentheses and all that, and God bless them, but they are not me and I am not them. I write the kind of books that get loving reviews and then not too many people buy.

Which, again, ok -- I get paid (mostly) to do work I love and I'm not complaining. But whatever you say, and however much I do love it, book writing is an unlovely business, and it's wearying and takes a long time and sometimes you wonder why. Here comes a year of just plain hard work, and then eventually a month of pretty much fun, and then it's in the library like it never happened. You get the occasional letter from someone else who utterly shares your passion, and that's wonderful. But mostly the book is out there and that's just that.

So you can understand when I tell you that seeing this piece of artwork is thrilling and inspiring in a way I can scarcely express. 

One chapter of Defining the Wind, in fact, discusses artwork based on the Beaufort Scale. 

There are cartoons and drawings, music and children's books all based on the Beaufort Scale, and I was thrilled to learn as I wrote the book that the 

Here's a very recent piece of Beaufort Scale art, though it's a bit more utilitarian than some others that are more purely decorative.

ideas I found so lovely in the scale were themselves sort of moving forward through time, finding expression through various artists and writers as years went by. The cartoon above, for example, was put up just this January, and new children's books have come out since my book came out (The Rising of the Wind, at left is older; I discussed it in the book), and as a result of my book Robin Harris, director of the wonderful NC State Dance Department actually choreographed a dance based on the scale. So you do get a sense that maybe you're helping these ideas reach people, move forward through time, and find their expression.

But even so, you can feel a little lonely and like the enterprise borders on pointless.

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So I need to tell you: seeing this miniature room is satisfying in a way I can barely express. Especially that Off's room is not a mere expression or illustration of the Beaufort Scale but is instead a kind of love letter to the life Sir Francis would have led. Which is what my book turned out to be, so here it is -- something wonderful, made by someone who was affected by my own affection for Sir Francis and the scale he created. An addition to our world, our culture -- an improvement to the world. In which my work played a small role.

Given which, toiling to write a book about John Lawson's little-known adventure suddenly feels like it might be worth doing. That is, my work might have a point. Can art do anything greater than give us a belief that it might be worth carrying on? Thank you, Robert Off. Thank you.

And guess I'd better be getting on with it.