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Mar. 27th, 2010 05:27 pmI've slowly been ticking things off my long list of to-dos today. I need to work faster, but today is not a fast day. In fact, I've only finished with six of the twenty things that must be done before midnight lest I explode into dark grey dust.
One thing that's been holding me back is that my brain was twitching. I kept thinking of Philip Jose Farmer's Riverboat series (which I haven't read in twenty-five years) and the voice he gives Mark Twain (as a character). Farmer obviously heard Clemen's writing voice as a speaking voice (which makes good sense, because Clemens often used it that way) but he heard it differently to me. I couldn't hear Mark Twain in Farmer's writing. I also couldn't hear it in those Star Trek TNG time-travel episodes, so it may be me. It may be that American writers hear Clemens differently to non-Americans. It may be that neither got the voice quite right. Or it could be a bunch of other factors.
My light reading for the last two days has had a Shakespeare character and I have different problems with that. We don't know Shakespeare's private voice, for one thing.
Anyhow, all these thoughts erupted into a half an article. One day I'll finish the article and then I'll get myself into much hot water. Right now the article is about why these voices don't work for some readers (eg me) and about worldbuilding using historical knowns and about how we receive and interpret our literary culture.
All this made me mumble while I wiped down my refrigerator and put some books away. I want to find more writer-voices in fiction and explore the notion further. I can't. I have fourteen things to do before bedtime and Monday night is Erev Pesach.
One thing that's been holding me back is that my brain was twitching. I kept thinking of Philip Jose Farmer's Riverboat series (which I haven't read in twenty-five years) and the voice he gives Mark Twain (as a character). Farmer obviously heard Clemen's writing voice as a speaking voice (which makes good sense, because Clemens often used it that way) but he heard it differently to me. I couldn't hear Mark Twain in Farmer's writing. I also couldn't hear it in those Star Trek TNG time-travel episodes, so it may be me. It may be that American writers hear Clemens differently to non-Americans. It may be that neither got the voice quite right. Or it could be a bunch of other factors.
My light reading for the last two days has had a Shakespeare character and I have different problems with that. We don't know Shakespeare's private voice, for one thing.
Anyhow, all these thoughts erupted into a half an article. One day I'll finish the article and then I'll get myself into much hot water. Right now the article is about why these voices don't work for some readers (eg me) and about worldbuilding using historical knowns and about how we receive and interpret our literary culture.
All this made me mumble while I wiped down my refrigerator and put some books away. I want to find more writer-voices in fiction and explore the notion further. I can't. I have fourteen things to do before bedtime and Monday night is Erev Pesach.