Oscar Wilde Strikes Again!

According to Oscar Wilde, “Life imitates art more than art imitates life.”

I first came across that classic saying of Oscar Wilde back in my college days. I thought that it was silly and foppish. However, as I have lived my life, I have been forced to accept that Wilde had a legitimate point to make.  I have no idea if the human brain, having seen or heard a work of art, instinctively tries to ascribe causation of a natural phenomenon to art. Whatever the cause, from time to time something happens to all of us which does seem to be straight out of something that we have read or seen or heard.

When Sen. McCain announced his choice of Gov. Sarah Palin as his Vice Presidential pick, I was going out the door.  I really did not know much about her, so my reaction was guarded to say the least.

However, when I came home I caught a replay of her speech in Dayton, Ohio on TV, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gg0darQB7r4 I was overwhelmed by her similarity to Jo, the heroine of my novel, Good Will Win in the End. 

The parallels are striking. Both are tall, self-assured, slim brunettes. Granted, when we left Jo, she was only thirty, while Gov. Palin is a bit older.  But since I left Sean and Jo in 2000 and plan to place my sequel in 2008, the age gap will narrow considerably. The only two other differences that I can see between Jo and Gov. Palin is that Jo has blue eyes and Gov. Palin appears to have darker eyes; Jo has perfect eyesight while Gov. Palin wear eye glasses.

What makes the selection of Gov. Palin seem like life imitating art,is that  I plan on having Jo run for public office. Beyond that I am not going to say anything, because the sequel is still in the works and subject to the delays and vagaries of my schedule and the twists and turns of my mind.

If and when I ever finish the sequel, which I have tentatively entitled, Successions, I will undoubtedly be accused by left wing bloggers and pseudo literary critics as having stolen the idea for Jo from Gov. Palin. Nothing could be further from the truth.