“The formal conceit of the novel, in which you have the novel unfolding in the margins of another novel, that seemed interesting to me,” Dorst said.
When Abrams contacted him to share the idea for “S.,” Dorst quickly signed on. He also wrote a well-received follow-up collection of short stories titled “The Surf Guru,” and his work has been featured in McSweeney’s, the literary magazine renowned for its innovative approach to design. It was about following the story through and taking as many idiosyncratic turns as presented themselves because I was trying to write as this other writer who is known for being an idiosyncratic writer.”ĭorst already had earned acclaim for his 2009 debut “Alive in Necropolis,” a dark satire set in California about a police officer struggling to cope in a town where the living and the dead coexist, not always harmoniously.
“After we’d committed to it, it did occur to me what I’d gotten myself into.
“We knew from the beginning that the inner novel would have to stand on its own as a work of literature that people are still talking about decades later,” said novelist Doug Dorst. The book comes in a black case embossed with the gothic capital letter inside is that copy of “Ship of Theseus” with the messages between disgruntled grad student Eric and college senior Jen handwritten in the margins of the novel, which centers on a man who boards a strange ship and heads out on a perilous journey. Opening “S.” does feel like uncovering a literary artifact. That always stayed with me, that idea of getting a book, a packet, that was not just like any other book.” “It had a torn-up photograph in these little wax paper envelopes.
“There was one I remember called ‘Who Killed Robert Prentice?’” Abrams said. He hit upon the idea of “S.” after discovering a novel that had been left behind by another traveler, and he drew inspiration from the murder mysteries of British author Dennis Wheatley, who included dossiers of evidence in his books. His movie projects, too, have been shrouded in secrecy – Abrams disclosed few details about the plot of his coming-of-age adventure/alien-invasion thriller “Super 8” before its release, and this summer’s “Star Trek Into Darkness” identified Benedict Cumberbatch by an alias so that audiences wouldn’t realize the actor had been cast as the famously wrathful Khan.
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