Lord and Lady Macbeth are being stung, not by scorpions, but by imagery, the medium by which human beings think at the deepest levels. And the kingdom which they seek to conquer and control is not just Scotland, but the kingdom of the mind. Imagery enlightens, but it also obscures; imagery is loyal, but it also betrays; imagery is visible on the surface, but manifests itself at hidden depths. Their mutual struggle – to live in prose while thinking in imagery – affects the two Macbeths in different ways.

The Project
Together, this novel and the journal and notebook that accompany it, comprise the twentieth installment in an on-going novel-writing project in which the author is exploring the concept of form and meaning in the novel, and of the novel as a form of expression in the 21st Century. All of the published journals and notebooks are available for free download at www.johnpassfield.ca.

The Making of Full of Scorpions is My Mind - a reflective journal
This journal records the author’s reflections on the process of the crafting of the novel as it evolved through the stages of planning, writing, editing and polishing. It constitutes an effort to be as conscious as possible of the process whereby the single idea that suggested the topic of the novel is expanded into a complex work of art. Topics range from the nuts and bolts of novel-building to the nature of the novel as an art-form.

Planning Full of Scorpions is My Mind - a planning notebook
During the writing of the novel, the author kept a hand-written notebook which records the day-by-day development of the novel as it found its shape and style. The notebook - now in print form - reveals how a vast cluster of thoughts was sifted, selected, structured and polished into novel-form.