Disaffected, Disconnected…
Often it seemed that the individuals in these cases were considering suicide as an option, but what actually happened was that rather than take their life they quite literally just kept on walking – I was fascinated by this, and I wanted to work with this in the novel, not being able to cope at all, not being able to tell anyone, and the idea of leaving the house one day and walking, not to work, not to the grocery store, but to some as yet unknown, unplanned destination. In fact, there often isn’t a destination, what seems important at that time is the need to just keep on going, travelling, moving away in the physical sense from all the emotional distress of their current situation. In that sense, I wanted to chart the main character’s journey through the underground and parks, wandering the streets of London absently as he steps out of the fast lane of life.
Jayne Joso talks about her preoccupation with space, transience, and issues that surround the themes of disconnectedness and disaffection in her first novel Soothing Music for Stray Cats.