Category Archives: Writing Journal

There’s a common misconception that Isaac Asimov’s Foundation saga is based on the Roman empire. It’s not an unreasonable assumption. Asimov was inspired to write Foundation while reading Edward Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Gibbon was a rather inaccurate historian. Mid 18th century society didn’t have very much knowledge of Rome. I’mContinue reading “Isaac Asimov’s Empire of Reason”

I was working on an essay about the swimming pools of J G Ballard. Then the dismal Apple TV adaptation of Foundation ended, and I thought “I’ll just do something quick about Asimov to explain Foundation for all the people who have been disappointed by the show”. Just a short video essay. Two weeks laterContinue reading “The Asimov Essay”

Ursula Le Guin is among the greatest science fiction writers of all time, and one of the hardest to write about, as I realised when the 2nd draft of my Ursula Le Guin essay emerged dead-on-arrival. You can read the 3rd draft, and make constructive comments, as a member of the Science Fiction podcast. JustContinue reading “That Le Guin essay – member preview”

Small group workshops and 1-2-1 editorial coaching Within each of us is an ocean of story. It is the source of every tale, fable, myth and story ever told. The waters of the ocean are inexhaustible. The more you draw from them, the stronger they become. I work 1-2-1 and in small groups with writersContinue reading “Sailing the Ocean of Story”

WOO-HOOOOO! Just started and the crowdfund for The Ocean of Story is already well on the way! This is a big challenge, to create EIGHT x 1 hour episodes, an ENTIRE season of this story, for $8000 That’s 0.0017% of the budget of Fake Tolkien!! Which is a little ironic, as The Worst Elf, seasonContinue reading “0.0017% of the budget of Fake Tolkien”

The Ocean of Story combines the ancient traditions of oral storytelling with the hypermodern technologies of generative AI. But more on this when it launches for real. Today, members can get an early preview of The Worst Elf, season 1 of The Ocean of Story. In fact this is chapter 1, of episode 1, ofContinue reading “The Ocean of Story – MEMBER PREVIEW”

The Science Fiction community on Facebook have been arguing for a week straight about the status of Star Wars as science fiction…or not. So here is my ultimate and final answer (almost) to the question.

This post speaks for itself. But if you enjoyed the month of May on the Science Fiction podcast & community, and want to support meaningful conversations about SF and more, then becoming a member for a few $$$ a month is a great help. Support as a member here https://damiengwalter.com/members/ Or on Patreon https://www.patreon.com/DamienWalter Or via Substack https://damien.substack.com/

I’m working hard to get myself martyred. But whether it will be at the hands of fundamentalist conservative Christians, or transhumanist adherents of the Church of Scientism…well…you be the judge. Members of the Science Fiction podcast community can now read the full shooting script for my next video essay Interstellar Is A Religious Experience. IContinue reading “Interstellar – shooting script”

After too many years having these discussions on scifi forums, I long ago realised that, however bad a scifi tv show might be, someone will pop-up and say “well I quite liked it actually”. So as season 2 of Not Asimov lumbers towards our screens, and as a time saving measure, I have collated theContinue reading “Not Asimov – season 2”

I have the same criticism of Chris Nolan’s movies as many critics. Once you get past the high concept movie making, how much meaning is there in the Nolan filmography? It’s not just the inaudible dialogue that made TENET problematic. When you get down to it is there anything more to Nolan than narrative gimmicksContinue reading “The redemption of Christopher Nolan”