I really love how Charles Dickens “mutter[ed] to himself, acting out scenes in the mirror, alert and alive only to the world of his imagination” (Ackroyd 561). Perhaps my affinity for such an embodied method of fiction writing comes from the fact that I am both a writer who dances and a dancer who writes. For me, the act of writing is a form of dance, in which the movements I make in the process of creating fiction are rehearsals for pas des deux between reader and writer, writer and text. I move my imagination as much as my pen or keyboard, remembering parts of my own life and thinking of people, places, and experiences I know or have read about. Then I make up things. Once I have written a scene, I act it out in rehearsal. When rehearsing dialogue, I change the sound and cadence of my voice as I move from one character to the next.

The outcome of such actions is a dialogue between body and embodiment. Through the juxtaposition of elements of feminism, cognitive phenomenology, and dance technique, I define embodiment as an interface, in which authors, readers, and texts meet and interact through a variety of models, sometimes contradictory, but always engaging. In this physically based scenario, the participants express a combination of human effort, reflection, and enjoyment through the performance of a written creative work. The embodied author is both writer and reader and must be able to communicate with the self in order to communicate with other readers. Writers and readers engage through their senses, interacting with the world through both inward and outward reflection. No text ensures that such an interaction will occur, for readers have to pick up a book before it has any serious effects. Furthermore, the methods of communication will vary, depending upon the author-reader-text matrix, along with the environment and circumstances surrounding the interface, which may last only a short period but also may have profound and lasting effects.

By playing the role of reader indulging in someone else’s writing, I get the type of exercise I need to better understand my relationship with my readers. When I read a short story by a single author, I take note of my reactions to the text and to the author. I wonder what other readers think of the story, and oftentimes, I get friends and family to read what I’m reading in order to find out. Then I read about the life of the author and imagine myself in that person’s shoes.

Right now I am reading a collection of ghost stories entitled The Dark. Of particular interest is Gahan Wilson’s “The Dead Ghost,” which focuses on the physical interaction between an unnamed protagonist, who lies in a hospital bed with what appears to be the ghost of a deceased patient, ID bracelet and IV tubes still intact. What stands out is the corporeal nature of the interaction, which goes on without any dialogue. The story is told in first person from the living patient’s point of view. The following paragraph is my favorite:

I took several deep and—I confess it—shaky breaths, clenched my teeth, and continued to press my fingers into the rotund front of the translucent apparition, pausing occasionally to wiggle the tips of my fingers in order to estimate the solidity of the phantom’s corporeality. I learned that my theory was correct: the thing did indeed have a kind of gelatinous solidity.

I am both disgusted and intrigued by the interaction between patient and ghost. Wilson, through his word choice, juxtaposition of sounds, and incorporation of point of view, has enabled me to imagine myself as the protagonist—addled yet determined to press the call button, even if that means putting my hand through the body of the dead ghost in order to reach it. I believe Wilson’s artistry is rooted in his ability to embody his writing, from the words he uses to the characters those words portray. Also, Wilson has done what all good ghost-story writers should do: to elicit through writing a Freudian sense of the uncanny—“that class of the terrifying which leads back to something long known to us, once very familiar” (Freud 2)—while adhering to the feminist theory that the body possesses “a wonderful ability, while striving for integration and cohesion, organic and psychic wholeness, to . . . produce fragmentations, fractures, dislocations that orient bodies and body parts toward other bodies and body parts” (Grosz 13). In other words, a reader like me can feel Gahan’s protagonist’s terror because I am like other humans, trying to relate, wondering what it’s like to be dead, what it’s like to be alive and able to experience the physical touch of death. I can just imagine Gahan standing in the mirror “muttering to himself,” “acting out scenes,” embodying his writing, performing a pas de deux with both readers and text (Ackroyd 561).