An unpublished author

AP Government and Theory of Knowledge teacher Nick Paris wakes up ready on a sunny summer morning. The craziness of his day hasn’t begun yet. The world is quiet. Paris sits down to do what he loves: write.

This last summer, while others were sleeping in until noon and tanning by the pool, Paris was compiling a timeline. He wasn’t paid for it. The final product wasn’t bound and sold at Barnes and Noble’s across the nation. Initiated by a student’s curiosity, Paris put together the timeline of famous literature, art, music, and more coinciding with major events from year 1000 to present for fun.

An unpublished author, Paris has put his passion for writing into six books. Curious students, classic novels, and student suicides are among the unexpected sources in his life that help Paris generate ideas for writing.

Before being inspired for his first book, Paris found a love for writing at KU, where he wrote Rock Chalk Revue skits. He carried this love over when he began teaching at Trailridge Junior High. After writing educational plays for his eighth grade classes, the principal approached him about writing the school’s spring musical.

Though he had never taken any theater classes before, Paris channeled his experience with Rock Chalk Revue and wound up writing, directing, and producing six musicals for Trailridge.

“I loved to see my words come alive like that for the young people,” Paris said. “That kind of fed my desire to write.”

Since then, Paris said he has evolved from middle school musicals to more meaningful books to him. His first attempt was a contemporary parody of Dante’s Inferno. New torture techniques in Paris’s Hell included laser beams, asphalt steam rollers, and dentists drilling eternally on a nerve.

“It was actually kind of therapeutic,” Paris said jokingly. “I put my ex-girlfriend in a circle of hell so she could suffer forever for rejecting me.”

A bachelor at the time of his Dante parody, Paris could simply turn off the television and stereo and be in the mood to write. However as Paris’s family grew, his time alone for writing shrunk. Mornings became the time for him to put pen to paper.

The one thing that hasn’t changed through his years of writing is his technique. Whenever Paris gets an idea, he runs with it, hardly even stopping for plot development, and least of all editing.

“That’s one of my weaknesses,” Paris said, “and it’s probably why I haven’t sold anything. I sort of get it all out there on paper and do a little bit of polishing.”

The only two books Paris has ever attempted to sell were his Dante parody and “72 Lifestyles,” a book addressing the dangers of teenage behavior. But publishers weren’t looking for what he had to offer. Receiving rejection mail from the numerous publishers was an obvious discouragement for Paris. At the time he was ready and waiting for his big break. Now, he realizes the difficulty in getting a book published for a beginning author.

Though few outside publishers and his family have read Paris’s books, those in Theory of Knowledge received copies of his timeline. Paris has even incorporated it into his teaching.

“He assigns us either a decade or a century, and then we have to choose eight events and do summaries on each one,” senior Jordan Dietrich said. “Basically, TOK has changed because of the timeline.”

While the far-off dream of a best-selling book will always stick around, Paris sees the absence in himself of what all publishers want: an appeal to the masses. The fact that the market for his books doesn’t extend far isn’t enough to stifle his love of writing.

“I’m not really an author in the sense of a professional writer,” Paris said, “but i just enjoy writing. I’m proud of it.”