Stories on a postcard, please Friday, 25 September 2009

A while ago, we told you about the books-and-storytelling experiment we’re running with a copy of Un Lun Dun by China Miéville.

The book (signed by the author) is travelling around the world, gathering readers and stories along the way. Each reader – there are 29, in nine countries – will add a postcard to the package, and each postcard will contain a story about their home town. The stories can be true or fictional.

Un Lun Dun is in Austria at the moment and we’ve had a couple of great fictional postcard stories from Wüppertaal and Graz, inspired by Miéville’s book.

To read all the postcard stories plus reviews of Un Lun Dun, take a look at all the journal entries over at BookCrossing.com.

Postcard from Graz by Feloris:

The city of Graz has been referred to as ‘the most Mediterranean city of Austria’. It is famous for its beautiful historical centre, filled with colourful houses and beautiful landmarks. It is a green city, with many parks and places for relaxation.

However, Graz is, due to its location, very often a viction if smog.

Also, sick trees need to be cut down regularly.

This doesn’t make the inhabitants of Graz very happy. In fact, it makes Graz feel like a dreary place, oppressed by clouds and car fumes. Kids get sick. Little dogs cough. People file protest with the city council for cutting all those trees down. Some want an underground system installed to take the traffic off the roads.

Things would be much easier if only they knew…

…that underneath Graz there lies the beautiful abcity of Grass, the crass opposite of other abcities. All the trees, all the flowers, all the grass that are cut and disappear from Graz end up in Grass. There are towering halls under each town square, held up by columns of long-ago May and Christmas trees. Oceans of flowers flow under the Mur, Graz’s central river. Everything is being guarded by giant moles and squirrels. Everything is beautiful. The ‘sky’ has been painted blue.

All this was discovered by construction workers long ago. They were digging test tunnels for the tube, but where to dig when giant moles scare you away? It has been kept secret.

We will never get a tube…but wouldn’t it be crazy to complain?

Postcard from Wüppertaal by linguistkris:

The abcity of Wüppertaal (founded some 80 years ago in the amalgamation of smaller abcities such as Anderfeld, Abrmen and Ronsdon’t) has for the last century been the capital of transportation megafauna and remains to this day under the iron rule of its iron masters, the mightiest of which is the fearsome Wüppertaaler Schwebebane, a “steely dragon” (in the words of poet Else Lasker-Schüler) which reigns above the Wüpper river with its fiery breath.

The last appreciable resistance against this autarchy of machines was in 1950, when a herd of elephants under their diminutive king Tuffi I rebelled; alas, to no avail, for the Schwebebane cast Tuffi off after a short struggle and banished him and his kind to the river below, which is to this day their home.

Due to the popularity of its mechanic rulers (or at least the awe they inspire), Wüppertaal is today a city with a steadily growing population of Remade; Remaking is here by no means an act of punishment, but solely an avowal of respect for and emulation of the ruling caste. Apart from the loyal followers, Wüppertaal also boasts climatic conditions that are ideal for the thriving of the steampowered megafauna: the fertile soils and steady rainfalls in combination with advanced forest stewardship ensure a steady supply of fuel for the vast machines.

They are, in fact, becoming so powerful and even presumptious that attacks on neighbouring abcities such as Düsseldon’t, Buch-um or Essnicht have lead to destruction and growing feelings of rivalry in the hotspot of abindustrialisation, the Ruur area.