Literary Music

So, a lot has happened since my last post, mainly on my Music Projects - Books page. Let me explain some things about that.

So first, the layout of the page. I have it sorted by three subjects: book series with multiple authors, single books, and authors. The book series with multiple authors is because most ongoing book series and classic book series have/had multiple authors, who can be somewhat different from each other. For long ongoing series (for example, the Berenstain Bears has over 200 books), I split them by arcs or, in the case of children's books, by type, like reading-focused books, life lesson-focused books, etc. Now, there are some books that don't belong to a series but I still want to make music based off them, hence the single books subject. Finally, a lot of authors write many books series and cover different forms (novels, short stories, essays, memoirs, etc.), so I used authors to sort things.

Now, some authors have may series and formats. Agatha Christie has over 5 different "series" with different protagonists and Stephen King has over 200 short stories and many iconic novels. Because of this, I decided to make different types of music: author, series, and iconic. The author music is the encompassing theme of the author's work, like the common things from their work. The series music is for the series that the author has done and may contribute to author music. Iconic music is for specific books by that author that are important or iconic.

Finally, the actual authors. You may notice some iconic names missing and some names that may be controversial. First, some authors that you may think would be on the list are not because of several possible reasons. For me, I chose not to include some authors because I felt their controversies or personal matters that are public would overshadow the music. Now, you may question why I have some authors that are seen as controversial. For me, time, culture and society are the determining factors for me including an author. We have evolved a lot as a society over time, and things that we realized are not okay anymore were commonplace years ago and in some cultures. For me, an author's controversy is based off that.

For example, J.R.R. Tolkien created one of the most iconic and influential fantasy series, possibly ever. However, some of his characters and writing, we can see, is based off stereotypes that are horrible. Unfortunately, that was normal back when he was writing. Do I believe he was a horrible person because his time reinforced horrible stereotypes? Honestly, no. However, I cannot just wipe away his controversies. So, for my literary music, I plan to accompany each release with a post about each topic, which includes their controversies and modern day view.

As for the authors I did not include, I believe it is because they are aware of the harm their words and controversies or that they did things that I do not and cannot condone. Two examples come to mind: Leo Tolstoy and Lemony Snicket. In the case of Tolstoy, he wrote a book in which the narrator murders his wife, which many took as how he felt about his marriage to his wife. For me, that is not something I can look at and set aside when I make music. Lemony Snicket, which is the pen name of Daniel Handler, is an example of a modern author who made comments that are based off known horrible stereotypes in recent years. When a black female author won an award in 2014, he made a comment that she was allergic to watermelon during the award ceremony. While he apologized for it, it is still uncomfortable to me that he found it acceptable to make that comment, knowing the history behind it. Making music based off something or someone who does things like the above is not something I could live with.

So, now that we have that done, I hope you all will be happy with the music I will have based off these literary icons and that you check out some of the authors I've listed.

Until next time!