Shpaltn
Back in my sophomore year of undergrad, in my class with Bill Griffith, I was given an assignment to write a "fish-out-of-water" story. I fudged it a little to write a story about a golem who was moving from nothingness to being wholly alive. That may have been a cheat for the assignment, but it gave me what I consider to be the first story of my current career. It was certainly the first I used to explore the ideas I had gotten from Dostoevsky, specifically from Crime and Punishment, the book I credit with shifting my course as a creator. It's for this reason that I didn't put it on the "School-Time Littlies" page. It's a little story, but I'll be damned it I don't still think of Shpaltn now and again.
Basically as soon as I finished the first Shpaltn story, I was thinking of more stories to put him in. Fortunately, I was given a chance to try one out when I came back to class after winter break. This was a longer assignment that allowed me to explore more of the ideas from Crime and Punishment, as well as some from another big influence at the time, Eric Powell's The Goon. There was also a bit here to hint at a larger conflict in Shpaltn's life. Sadly, however, I haven't written any new Shpaltn stories since this. I think the main reason is I still haven't really decided on an ending place for him. My original idea was to make it an ongoing series, but I've learned since that I'm not really wired for those kind of stories. Still, one day I hopefully will figure that out, and bring Shpaltn back!
Shpaltn and the Dybbuk
