Below is a memorial piece that I had added as the thirteenth chapter of my fanfiction, The Intrepid Artefacts, currently on hold. Soon, however, I wish to return to writing it, so, instead of deleting the memorial chapter, I have decided to present it as a separate document.
/
IN MEMORY
Not that long ago, acclaimed children's author Brian Jacques, the creator of the fantastical world of Redwall, passed away. At the age of 71, when most people of his profession have already retired and taken advantage of the seeds they sowed throughout their life, this man was of a rare quality, who had found pleasure and delight in a job that he loved and performed to the end of his life. With an abounding adoration for the timelessness of childhood – something that he seemed to epitomise in person as well as in his writing – he created a world in which many have lost themselves. A world that has been equated to lands slowly becoming legendary in their exposure, such as J. R. R. Tolkein's wizened and war torn Middle Earth and C.S. Lewis' awe inspiring and biblical Narnia. Maybe, in another few years, Mossflower Country will become as highly regarded and just as prolific as its predecessors.
I had the inaudible pleasure of meeting Mr Brian Jacques once, many years ago when I was but a young whippersnapper of 11. It was just over ten years ago now, so forgive my poor memory of the month or the year, but the event itself was highly memorable considering my terrible memory. My father and I were early to the book signing at Plymouth Library, but soon the other children and their parents arrived, and then, the man himself. He greeted his audience with a grin that we'd all only seen so far on the sleeve of our hardback editions, and seated himself down in a chair to start the signing process – a process that I found myself first in line for, clutching, surprisingly, not a Redwall book but Castaways of the Flying Dutchman. I am still trying to work out how that is possible (the tour was in 2001, though I definitely had a hardback edition, with the US cover, which was released in March that year, so that could make sense), but whatever the book, he signed it and made one-sided conversation with me, who was so absorbed in the momentum of the occasion that I hardly said a word. My dad took a photo, which apparently didn't come out properly, which prompted a second photo opportunity after the long line had abated, in which Brian Jacques told me to hold a fist under his chin whilst he held his hands aloft, explaining, 'this is how my publishers get another book out of me!' If those photos still exist, I wonder why they are not now pinned up on my wall somewhere. My second, more embarrassing memory of that event was in the question and answer session, where my question regarding the origin the word "Salamandastron" was quickly asked by somebody else, but it was made up for by my dad's cheeky response to a rhetorical question regarding the best football team in the world: "Plymouth Argyle!" he had shouted, which, if either of them had been slightly less jovial or Jacques himself been a little less absorbed in his natural surroundings, could have prompted a debate about which team was better: the continuously moderately successful club that had once been the best in the highest English league, or the team three divisions below it that would only get promoted twice concurrently in the next few years based majorly on luck.
It is with a weight upon my now literary-bound heart that I bid farewell to my childhood hero. Not only did his writing warm and console me whenever I needed to escape from the realities of my schoolboy life – pockmarked with nothing but the quest for learning, the occasional indifference offered to me by various other nobodies, and glances from the girl I was madly in love with – it also inspired me to become the type of man I am today. Although often criticised for its black and white morality, I feel all the better for being allowed to use those stereotyped bases to develop my own mental picture of how the world should be and how it should be viewed: a vast palette of colours and hues. I consider myself a writer at some professional level, and I owe that career path and my early attempts at novel writing in no small way to that bearded Liverpudlian who illuminated my imagination, regaling my mind with stories of valiant mice, dastardly foxes, courageous otters, villainous sea rats, and warrior badgers.
May you rest in peace, "Gonff".
JAMES BRIAN JACQUES
15TH JUNE 1939 - 5TH FEBRUARY 2011