FETISH FRIDAY: TRENT JAMIESON

I'm running a new series of guest posts throughout 2015: Fetish Friday. Don't get all sweaty in the pants—I’m going back to an older definition of the word, and asking artists to show us something that helps them with the ritual of creation, some part of their surroundings—physical or mental—that eases the path into the creative state, whether it be a location, a piece of music, person, picture, a doohickey, whatnot, curio or ornament without which the creative process would be a whole lot more difficult.


Today we welcome Queensland author Trent Jamieson:

I have so many fetishes that they circle me in a confused maelstrom of pay-attention-to-mes and you-must-do-thises. But there is one constant, and it's been that constant for nearly eighteen years. The city of Brisbane.

I know it's more a place than a thing. But it fills me with such pleasure. I catch my bus into work, and I'll write there, or I'll write in the office before I start work on certain days, or in a cafe (I have my favourites), or I'll walk around GOMA and then try and sneak a writing session in the Red Box at the State Library. I do most of my writing at home, but so many of my favourite scenes in my books have been written on buses or in those places.

Brisbane is my first city (I grew up in Gunnedah, finished my schooling in Lismore so I'm very much a country child) and it is the ultimate city to me. And it always will be.

When I write here, when I travel through her streets, or look down at the placid Brisbane River (like all rivers given to the occasional rages), or up to the supple rises of Mt Coot-tha I feel better for it. Brisbane is a small city, but it still surprises me, and comforts me, and irritates me - and all those things make stories.

As fetishes go it is a hard one to put in your pocket or on your wall. But Brisbane is generous. She's given me a piece of her and I keep her in my heart.

 

 

Trent Jamieson's Death Works Trilogy of novels is available from Orbit books, and a continuation The Memory of Death is available through Momentum Books. Roil, and Night’s Engines are available from Angry Robot. His latest book Day Boy will be published by Text in June. His webpage is www.trentjamieson.com

Are you a creative artist? Fancy joining in and letting us know about that special item, object, location or cosmic state of being at the heart of your creative process? There's always room for another lunatic in the asylum: email me and make your most excited Horshack noise.