johnsemlak
First Post
Article from the New York Times...
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/07/books/07DRAG.html?8bu=&pagewanted=all&position=
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/07/books/07DRAG.html?8bu=&pagewanted=all&position=
New Fantasy Author
- Thread starter johnsemlak
- Start date
johnsemlak
First Post
Doh! I hate those register pages 
I'm registered with the NYTs so I don't notice it.
Here's the text:
Finding a Middle Earth in Montana
By DINITIA SMITH
[P] ARADISE VALLEY, Mont., Oct. 2 ? Christopher Paolini, who has never been to school, was only 15 when he wrote his fantasy novel "Eragon," about a boy who finds a magic stone that is transformed into a dragon and then sets out to avenge the death of his uncle and to defeat an evil king. Now four years later, "Eragon," published by Alfred A. Knopf, is third on the New York Times hardcover children's chapter books best-seller list, outselling four of the five Harry Potter books.
Mr. Paolini, who was home-schooled by his parents, Kenneth and Talita, lives with them and his 17-year-old sister, Angela, in a modest beige-shingled house on the edge of the Yellowstone River, which runs through here. He invented a magical land for "Eragon," including a country, Alagaësia, inspired by the jagged Beartooth Mountains and dense forests that surround this broad, sweeping valley.
At the moment, Mr. Paolini, who is eerily precocious but still has echoes of the boy in him, is building a Hobbit Hut in the backyard and digging an eight-foot hole underneath.
He loves Wagner and holds forth learnedly on the "Ring" cycle. His agent's idea of a publication present was a recording of the entire "Ring." He keeps Seamus Heaney's translation of "Beowulf" by his bed. Despite his lack of formal schooling he invented three languages for his characters of dwarves, elves and humanoids, some based on Old Norse, some from scratch. (His sister is no slouch, either. Angela, who is editing her own novel, said, "I will be releasing it to Mom and Dad sometime soon." Meanwhile, she is reading the dictionary, learning words she doesn't know.)
Mr. Paolini began the book with all the innocence and uninhibitedness of childhood. "I decided to try and write something I would enjoy reading," he said. "The first draft came so easily, it was like a dam had broken." The story of the title character, Eragon, who has a mysterious parentage and wields a magic sword, was inspired, he said, by "Le Morte d'Arthur," "Beowulf," Norse and Icelandic sagas, the "Ring" cycle and the fantasy books he loves: Bruce Coville's "Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Hatcher," about a boy who buys an egg that hatches into a dragon; "The Worm Ouroboros," by Eric Rucker Eddison; and the "Dragonriders of Pern" series by Anne McCaffrey.
The key to the children, inevitably, lies partly with their parents. Kenneth Paolini and Talita Hodgkinson met as members of the Church Universal and Triumphant, a survivalist group with a doomsday philosophy. It owned a ranch in Corwin Springs, about 40 miles from here, and broke apart after its leader retired in 1999. There are still some members in the area.
While hiking through the crater of the Haleakala volcano in Maui on their honeymoon, the Paolinis vowed that "one of the templates for our relationship would be that our family would come first," Kenneth Paolini said. "All our financial decisions were based on how we can stay together." They lived in Montana and in Alaska, where he worked for a publishing company. In 1987, they left the group, and in 1991 settled here.
"We weren't willing to surrender our family to the group," he said.
Kenneth Paolini made money doing Rolfing, a form of massage. In 1997 the Paolinis started a publishing company, Paolini International L.L.C., bringing out two books critical of cults, and one on the educational philosophy of Ms. Paolini, a trained Montessori teacher.
Meanwhile, they home-schooled Christopher and Angela, because, they said, the children were precocious and worried that they would feel out out of place in a formal school. Kenneth Paolini said he wanted them to have time "to watch the clouds, to have thinking space." Still, their schooling was exacting.
Talita said: "We were always looking for information. I tried to tailor the lessons around their interests. Angela likes cats. I gave her a book of Victorian cat stickers and she would write stories about all the cats."
Angela said, "They taught us how to think."
When Christopher became interested in pirates, "I made a pirate map," he said, "and soaked it in tea and singed the edges so it looked like a real pirate map."
He said he had read more than 3,000 books but knows "nothing about math." The children watched little television but every night screened one of the family's collection of some 4,000 movies. "They learned all different ways of telling stories," their mother said. Her son said that "Eragon" began as a film idea.
There were also computer games. "No one can beat me around here," Mr. Paolini said.
The children became very close. "Angela and I can hold conversations with one-word sentences," Mr. Paolini said. "Angela," the feisty healer in "Eragon," is based on her.
Mr. Paolini began "Eragon" after obtaining his high school diploma through an accredited correspondence course. He was accepted at Reed College in Oregon but deferred entrance.
"I didn't have too many activities aside from the ones I invented," he said. "A lot of writing is about getting the time and space."
To create the languages for "Eragon," Christopher consulted Web sites. "My sister and I would talk about stuff, like whether or how the possessives should be formed," he said.
He used Old Norse dictionaries for the book's ancient language. Eragon utters a blessing: "Atra gülai un ilian tauthr ono un atra ono waíse skölir frá rauthr" (translated in the back of the book: "Let luck and happiness follow you and may you be shielded from misfortune").
The book is full of odd words. "We had a huge argument about the word scry, which means in the book `to see at a distance, usually through a mirror or a pool,' " Mr. Paolini said. "Then we found it on an online dictionary. It comes from the word descry."
Two years and two drafts after starting the book he showed it to his parents. His father recalled: "Talita read it and said, `Ken, you really need to take a look at this.' I was amazed."
The family began editing it. "My parents didn't suggest changes in the plot line," Mr. Paolini said, but suggested moving sentences, correcting grammar, fixing continuity. "I learned so much. I feel like I had an education."
In 2002 the Paolinis published it. A paperback original, it was $22.95 retail, $14 for students. The Paolinis contracted out the printing and began marketing it. "We have a very acute understanding of marketing," Kenneth Paolini said.
They contacted hundreds of schools and bookstores, setting up readings. Dressed in medieval costume, Mr. Paolini put on a show, "Why Read? Why Write?"
"We went to places that never had an author," he said, "places hungry for this." Soon the house was filled with books for shipment. "We had reached the point where we couldn't handle it personally."
Then, last summer, the novelist Carl Hiaasen was fly-fishing in Montana with his wife and stepson, Ryan. Ryan read a copy of "Eragon." He seemed captivated, and Mr. Hiaasen told his publisher, Knopf, about it. Knopf made an offer. The Paolinis found an agent through a chat group online, and the book was sold. A spokeswoman for Knopf said the price was in "the middle six figures."
Christopher's editor at Knopf, Michelle Frey, left the plot in place, but cut 20,000 words, Mr. Paolini said. As for the money, his father said, "We are operating a family business, and we will all share in the proceeds." So far, the publisher has printed 250,000 copies.
Now Mr. Paolini is writing the second volume of what he says will be called the "Inheritance" trilogy. Only Angela and his agent, Simon Lipskar, know the ending. After the trilogy is finished, "I might go to college," Mr. Paolini said. "Or I might take a vacation and have a nervous breakdown. I have a lot of reading to do, "Ulysses," Dostoyevsky, the rest of Tolstoy."
I'm registered with the NYTs so I don't notice it.
Here's the text:
Finding a Middle Earth in Montana
By DINITIA SMITH
[P] ARADISE VALLEY, Mont., Oct. 2 ? Christopher Paolini, who has never been to school, was only 15 when he wrote his fantasy novel "Eragon," about a boy who finds a magic stone that is transformed into a dragon and then sets out to avenge the death of his uncle and to defeat an evil king. Now four years later, "Eragon," published by Alfred A. Knopf, is third on the New York Times hardcover children's chapter books best-seller list, outselling four of the five Harry Potter books.
Mr. Paolini, who was home-schooled by his parents, Kenneth and Talita, lives with them and his 17-year-old sister, Angela, in a modest beige-shingled house on the edge of the Yellowstone River, which runs through here. He invented a magical land for "Eragon," including a country, Alagaësia, inspired by the jagged Beartooth Mountains and dense forests that surround this broad, sweeping valley.
At the moment, Mr. Paolini, who is eerily precocious but still has echoes of the boy in him, is building a Hobbit Hut in the backyard and digging an eight-foot hole underneath.
He loves Wagner and holds forth learnedly on the "Ring" cycle. His agent's idea of a publication present was a recording of the entire "Ring." He keeps Seamus Heaney's translation of "Beowulf" by his bed. Despite his lack of formal schooling he invented three languages for his characters of dwarves, elves and humanoids, some based on Old Norse, some from scratch. (His sister is no slouch, either. Angela, who is editing her own novel, said, "I will be releasing it to Mom and Dad sometime soon." Meanwhile, she is reading the dictionary, learning words she doesn't know.)
Mr. Paolini began the book with all the innocence and uninhibitedness of childhood. "I decided to try and write something I would enjoy reading," he said. "The first draft came so easily, it was like a dam had broken." The story of the title character, Eragon, who has a mysterious parentage and wields a magic sword, was inspired, he said, by "Le Morte d'Arthur," "Beowulf," Norse and Icelandic sagas, the "Ring" cycle and the fantasy books he loves: Bruce Coville's "Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Hatcher," about a boy who buys an egg that hatches into a dragon; "The Worm Ouroboros," by Eric Rucker Eddison; and the "Dragonriders of Pern" series by Anne McCaffrey.
The key to the children, inevitably, lies partly with their parents. Kenneth Paolini and Talita Hodgkinson met as members of the Church Universal and Triumphant, a survivalist group with a doomsday philosophy. It owned a ranch in Corwin Springs, about 40 miles from here, and broke apart after its leader retired in 1999. There are still some members in the area.
While hiking through the crater of the Haleakala volcano in Maui on their honeymoon, the Paolinis vowed that "one of the templates for our relationship would be that our family would come first," Kenneth Paolini said. "All our financial decisions were based on how we can stay together." They lived in Montana and in Alaska, where he worked for a publishing company. In 1987, they left the group, and in 1991 settled here.
"We weren't willing to surrender our family to the group," he said.
Kenneth Paolini made money doing Rolfing, a form of massage. In 1997 the Paolinis started a publishing company, Paolini International L.L.C., bringing out two books critical of cults, and one on the educational philosophy of Ms. Paolini, a trained Montessori teacher.
Meanwhile, they home-schooled Christopher and Angela, because, they said, the children were precocious and worried that they would feel out out of place in a formal school. Kenneth Paolini said he wanted them to have time "to watch the clouds, to have thinking space." Still, their schooling was exacting.
Talita said: "We were always looking for information. I tried to tailor the lessons around their interests. Angela likes cats. I gave her a book of Victorian cat stickers and she would write stories about all the cats."
Angela said, "They taught us how to think."
When Christopher became interested in pirates, "I made a pirate map," he said, "and soaked it in tea and singed the edges so it looked like a real pirate map."
He said he had read more than 3,000 books but knows "nothing about math." The children watched little television but every night screened one of the family's collection of some 4,000 movies. "They learned all different ways of telling stories," their mother said. Her son said that "Eragon" began as a film idea.
There were also computer games. "No one can beat me around here," Mr. Paolini said.
The children became very close. "Angela and I can hold conversations with one-word sentences," Mr. Paolini said. "Angela," the feisty healer in "Eragon," is based on her.
Mr. Paolini began "Eragon" after obtaining his high school diploma through an accredited correspondence course. He was accepted at Reed College in Oregon but deferred entrance.
"I didn't have too many activities aside from the ones I invented," he said. "A lot of writing is about getting the time and space."
To create the languages for "Eragon," Christopher consulted Web sites. "My sister and I would talk about stuff, like whether or how the possessives should be formed," he said.
He used Old Norse dictionaries for the book's ancient language. Eragon utters a blessing: "Atra gülai un ilian tauthr ono un atra ono waíse skölir frá rauthr" (translated in the back of the book: "Let luck and happiness follow you and may you be shielded from misfortune").
The book is full of odd words. "We had a huge argument about the word scry, which means in the book `to see at a distance, usually through a mirror or a pool,' " Mr. Paolini said. "Then we found it on an online dictionary. It comes from the word descry."
Two years and two drafts after starting the book he showed it to his parents. His father recalled: "Talita read it and said, `Ken, you really need to take a look at this.' I was amazed."
The family began editing it. "My parents didn't suggest changes in the plot line," Mr. Paolini said, but suggested moving sentences, correcting grammar, fixing continuity. "I learned so much. I feel like I had an education."
In 2002 the Paolinis published it. A paperback original, it was $22.95 retail, $14 for students. The Paolinis contracted out the printing and began marketing it. "We have a very acute understanding of marketing," Kenneth Paolini said.
They contacted hundreds of schools and bookstores, setting up readings. Dressed in medieval costume, Mr. Paolini put on a show, "Why Read? Why Write?"
"We went to places that never had an author," he said, "places hungry for this." Soon the house was filled with books for shipment. "We had reached the point where we couldn't handle it personally."
Then, last summer, the novelist Carl Hiaasen was fly-fishing in Montana with his wife and stepson, Ryan. Ryan read a copy of "Eragon." He seemed captivated, and Mr. Hiaasen told his publisher, Knopf, about it. Knopf made an offer. The Paolinis found an agent through a chat group online, and the book was sold. A spokeswoman for Knopf said the price was in "the middle six figures."
Christopher's editor at Knopf, Michelle Frey, left the plot in place, but cut 20,000 words, Mr. Paolini said. As for the money, his father said, "We are operating a family business, and we will all share in the proceeds." So far, the publisher has printed 250,000 copies.
Now Mr. Paolini is writing the second volume of what he says will be called the "Inheritance" trilogy. Only Angela and his agent, Simon Lipskar, know the ending. After the trilogy is finished, "I might go to college," Mr. Paolini said. "Or I might take a vacation and have a nervous breakdown. I have a lot of reading to do, "Ulysses," Dostoyevsky, the rest of Tolstoy."
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