More quotes about writing (because it's too hot to think)
My brain can't put together more than a few words and hope to make any sense. It's 9:30, the fans are all going and the house is trying to cool down but it is still 85 degrees in the bedroom where I am supposed be slumbering, trying to get a few hours of sleep in before the 5 o'clock alarm starts to ring. It should be mandatory that if you live in the Silicon Valley, you have to have A/C. Alas, we don't.
Ugh. So I offer five more of my favorite writing quotes. Tomorrow, sitting in my air conditioned cubicle at work I will look forward to stronger brain firings.
For now:
"It's a reactive thing, like a Geiger counter; you click whenever you come close to whatever you were built to do." Stephen King
"One extends one's limits only by exceeding them." M. Scott Peck
"All writers are discontent. That's because they're aware of a potential and believe they're not reaching it." William Saroyan
"Surely all art is the result of having been in danger, of having gone through an experience all the way to the end, to where no on can go any further." Rainer Maria Rilke
"Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind." Rudyard Kipling
Write on right now.
Susan
posted by Susan Taylor Brown @ 6/30/2005
Susan Taylor Brown 
5 Comments:
Hello Susan,
Its well over double-digits here in Austin today, and guess what...were going to Phoenix next week. Hot- hot- HOT!
Anyway, I do have a literary question to pose. I'm going to pose it to several authors just to get some variety in the responses. Please don't make fun of a literary newbie brotha here. I'm reading this book. Slowly of course. The author, Rob Thomas, uses a very sophisticated "voice" as he tells the story. Not like I imagine a teenager would speak, very beautiful, somewhat poetic, and very tough language (dictionary in hand). The main character is very smart, however in the story, at least so far, he is not portrayed as a literary-type, poetic speaking with an expanded vocabulary. The book is written as though the character is narrating the story.
Thats kind of confusing, at least I think, because the narrative language doesn't exactly match the person I'm reading about.
The question: When dealing with "voice", a term I've read much about on a few blogs as of late, how important is it that the author's voice match the characters "voice" or language particularly if the character is supposedly telling the story? Did I completely confuse you?
No AC??? Sounds like time for a trip to the mall. Spend money! In the cool indoors!
Hi Don,
Voice is one of my favorite subjects. Check back here tonight after I get home from the day job and I'll have a long post for you on it.
Kim, I wish on the buying some A/C of some kind. This is a rental house and we have funky crank
windows and no way to vent a portable A/C and the owners won't let us punch a hole in the wall.
Write on right now.
susan
Oooo, Susan!
So glad you found me. I love your blog, and must add it to my blogroll right away.
I just started reading the book "The Alchemist" by Paulo Coelho. It's a fable about making your dreams come true, or living your dream life.
Something about putting that book down, and then reading your comment on my site made a "click" go off. Kinda like Steven King's geiger counter, maybe?
Anyway, thanks for stopping by! Hope you come back. I will definitely come back to your site.
:) Mo'
Devast, it sounds like you caught something in this author's writing that jerked you out of the flow of the story, and it sounds to me like a flaw in the story. That character should sound exactly like what he or she is supposed to be
I've checked out a few teen blogs on the net recently, and yeah, I would agree with you, they don't speak polished, poetic. This would "jerk" me out of teh story too. If the author is speaking directly to the reader, the "I" voice so dear to the hearts of YA writers, then his or her voice does need to sound like the character's.
Now, if you read the Narnia books, C.S.Lews interupst the flow of the stories with direct comments to readers. You can see very clearly how his voice is his voice, but how each of his characters speaks clearly with different individual voices.
Hmmm....VERY interesting question you've brought up here. Makes me realize how we, as readers, tend to see the published book as a perfect thing, when often it is not. I hate getting "jerked" out of story. It's like wathcing a western and seeing a jet streak in the sky back ground!!!! (that example courtesy of my husband.
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