Category: Writing Workshop

Empathy and resemblance

Un libro es un espejo
A book is a mirror?

On sesion 17 of our Spanish-language podcast we discussed how resemblance generates empathy, while difference creates curiosity: two opposite poles that we can use to attract the attention of readers. Today I’d like to emphasize the first idea with several examples.

For example romantic novels have a mainly female readership, and indeed their protagonist is most frequently a woman. Of course there’s also always a male main character to complete the couple, but the true heroin is, in 99,9% of the cases, the girl.

Similarly, tipically masculine genres like trial or spy novels are always populated by cops, lawyers and soldiers – of the masculine gender.

But we find the most evident examples in cinemas. Aren’t the protagonists in children’ movies always children? Aren’t teenagers, in horror flicks? Or women, in romantic movies? There are exceptions -as with everyhing else in life- but the standard is clear, right?

I am aware that most of my readers don’t write genre fiction or with a specific audience in mind, but rather follow literary fiction and write for themselves. That’s why I won’t advice anyone to “think about your objective audience and try to bring your protagonist as close to them as possible”, even though I could say it – in fact I just have. Instead we can also apply the rule backwards: from your main character you may infer the main body of your potential audience. Such information can be quite useful, for example when deciding what contests or publishing houses to send the work to, or who among your friends and contacts can give you an appropriate opinion, similar to your potential real readers.

As often, just a topic to think about.

Which book should I buy?

Wood or Lodge?

Time for listener’s questions:

I’ve read a couple good books on writing and I’d like to find others that study fiction in further depth. I’ve seen two available online and I’d like to know your opinion on them:

I’m afraid they might be critical articles on classical authors -when I’m not interested in literary criticism- or they may be too general or superficial.

Unfortunately I don’t know any of them. I see on Amazon that Lodge’s is a compilation of articles previously published on The Independent on sunday. Each chapter deals with one topic and illustrates it with quotes from clasics, which is probably a good idea for a structure and might waken up your appetite for further reading.  According to the back cover, Wood is not an author but a critic, and according to the table of contents, two chapters are devoted to Flaubert, which is probably a waste of pages unless you know his work. Both volumes receive generally good reviews, though Lodge’s sem to be slightly better. If I had to choose among those two, I think I’d go for Lodge, but you see it’s only a first impression. If you’re really interested? Get both.

Don’t fool yourself, though: there are hardly any “advanced” manuals for writers. I still haven’t found one that takes for granted that I know the difference between first- and third-person narration and takes on from there. They all stop to explain -and frankly, one gets sick of it. The reason why they all appeal to beginners is because by doing so they expect to reach a wider audience and sell more copies. If you know a book “for experts”, please share it in the comments!

On the other hand, one learns something from every book. Sometimes it’s a detail on structure, or perhaps a new trick for writing dialogue, or a new perspective on things we thought we already knew. As we can’t possibly learn everything from one book, the more we read, the more we’ll know.

But remember: we learn writing through reading, but mainly through writing.

Clear as vodka

Writing shouldn’t come between the reader and what’s being described.  It should be as transparent as possible.

Diana Athill

Say all you have to say in the fewest possible words, or your reader will be sure to skip them; and in the plainest possible words or he will certainly misunderstand them.

John Ruskin

The secret of popular writing is never to put more on a given page than the common reader can lap off it with no strain whatsoever on his habitually slack attention.

Ezra Pound

Second editions

Freddy Astorga sends in a question:

After you edit and publish a book, can you make a reivsion with improvements on your story, or are second editions just minor revisions?

The idea reminds me of the “director’s cuts” we often see on DVDs and even in cinemas, which for the most part are a trick to make you pay twice for about the same thing. Moviemakers have found a range of excuses for not making “their” movie from the start: studio pressure, budget limitations, tight deadlines… Excuses that a novelist cannot rely on.

The only second -and subsequent- revised editions that we find on print are reference works, but there is a reason for this. With the evolution of the world (its techonology, its laws, etc.), the text describing them needs to be updated to reflect those changes. This reasoning does not apply to fiction either.

The author is the only person responsible for their text. Therefore, correcting the finished piece would discredit their own work. A revised version can correct edition errors (like typos, or page numbering problems) but should leave the text and its universe intact. What would be the point of saying “things did not happen exactly that way, but a little more like this”? It would say very little about our capacity as narrators. Incidentally, this highlights the importance of a good editor, who should point out the flaws in you work and make sure that the published text is, from the beginning, final.

Suscription reminder

Since we moved the Writing Workshop here and started off the bilingual blog things are getting busy! Unique visitors for the month of July amount to almost 60,000 – thanks a lot everyone!

To stay up to date with all that’s going on, I recommend RSS suscriptions, for example through Google Reader, so you won’t miss any new Posts or even any new Comments, where debates are getting hot!

Additionally, for Spanish speakers or students wishing to listen to the podcast, there are two suscription options available: RSS o iTunes.

Those with less experience with computers -or simply not willing to suscribe despite my recommendations- simply need to return frequently and have a look at the latest changes.

A note about the comments: unfortunately I’ve been so far unable to separate them by language, so currently all you see are Spanish-language comments. Please don’t let that refrain you from writing your own comments in English – it’s perfectly OK to have them mingle together until we find a better solution for this. (Suggestions are welcome too)

For those who already know all of this and are sick of having me repeat it, here’s the funny trivia/news of the day: I just found out that Placebo are Mrs. Carrington fans!

The reader’s role

I just happened upon this quote:

We’re not as clever as people think. Intelligence is letting the book open so the reader can finish it as they wish.

Colum McCann

It reminded me of one of the epigrams that form the preface to the wonderful The Picture of Dorian Gray.

It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors.

Oscar Wilde

They’re not the only ones who think the reader wirtes as much as the writer.

I see the role of the writer as creating a room with big windows and leaving the reader to imagine. It’s a meeting on the page.

Kevin Crossley-Holland

Every novel is an equal collaboration between the writer and the reader and it is the only place in the world where two strangers can meet on terms of absolute intimacy.

Paul Auster

What do you think?

(Español) Podcast 23