At first, I was annoyed by Elizabeth Strout’s use of perspective. A confused reader is never good. As I studied her use of third-person omniscient Revealing the character's thoughts and emotions allows us understand the purpose of the story.
Most of my experience as a writer is nonfiction. (The book cover is one of the studies I wrote for a woman's group I taught). As an inexperienced fiction writer, I began telling my only story from the main characters point of view. It is easy to see how using a first person narrative can stop a story. I will experiment with the use of this god-like point of view to involve more characters in the story. I may use the first person narrative as a way of getting the story out and the point, but switch once it becomes too self involved and claustrophobic.
In the end of Strout's book the reader feels something. Anger or regret are valid emotions even if in the end you dislike the characters - but you feel something. That is why people read fiction- to feel something. Spending so much time writing and the reader finishes the book with no emotion would seem to be a waste of time.
My reflections may seem simplistic to other fiction writers in our class, but they are honest about where I am at as a writer. I have learned so much from all of you. We learn so much from other writers. In an interview Elizabeth Strout made these comments about her mother (who by the way is not Olive Kitteridge. The author confides that Olive is a composite of her many Maine relatives):
Strout knew from childhood that writing was her future. Wasn't that what her mother was encouraging? Didn't she teach writing in high school? Wasn't it clear that she herself wanted to write?
"It was just in the air," Strout says. "She was always talking about writing." Yet she never wrote. Strout doesn't know the reason. They didn't discuss it. Still, she ventures a guess: The act of writing "requires some element of revealing oneself," she says, and that was something her mother "probably didn't want to do."
(http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/03/AR2009080302901_4.html?sid=ST2009080302989)
Strout told about an experience in a writing class where she had to write one page and be completely honest. (Maybe inspired by "write one true statement" from Hemingway) She confessed how hard it was to complete that assignment. She discovered that we write the things we feel ashamed about feeling - that is why honesty is hard. Once you do write this way, the words will "read like magic and it will be universal." This blog is a priceless opportunity to write honestly to those who would understand the most.
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ReplyDeleteLisa, I appreciate your post because I'm on the opposite end of the spectrum. Fiction writing is difficult, yes, because of the truths you are forced to tell. Sometimes, I see too much of myself in a character and realize that as I continue to write, I'm trying to make him or her more likeable, and in turn, make myself look better. However, I'm deathly afraid of non-fiction. Like reading it, but I don't think I'm ready for the truths behind the fictional versions of my stories. Even when writing non-fiction about someone else's life, I feel too close to the actions and emotions. Maybe this is a fear I need to face. Your post got me thinking about it, and I thank you for it.
ReplyDeleteThe only reason I wrote fiction at all was because the pain of the situation was too hard to deal with. I understand totally!
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ReplyDeleteI guess I am one of those people who believes that fiction and non-fiction are two sides of the same coin. When I write fiction, elements from my real life sometimes make their way onto the page. When I write non-fiction, I am writing about events or people as I remember or perceive them, which may or may not be as they actually were.
ReplyDeleteCan we say that everything in A Pearl in the Storm was absolutely true? I don't believe we can. Can we make the statement that everybody in Olive Kitteridge was 100% fictional? They almost certainly were not. I guess we could call them hybrids, but whatever name we give them, they were both good reads.
Lisa - What a great post. And thank you so much for the research on who "Olive" actually is. That was so good to find out.
ReplyDeleteI am learning so much as well. I completely relate. I really connected with the statement you drew from Strout about writing what we are ashamed of and how that helps the universality of our writing. I'm keeping that one in my pocket! Nice indeed.
I agree about the emotion as well. Yes. It is good to feel emotion from a book. Funny way to personal insight for you--I read books according to my hormones sometimes, so I just laughed and nodded when I read that. If it is that time, I read suspense or mystery or I'm a bucket of tears and no good to anyone. If not, then good emotion driven fiction it is. I love a good ride with Nicholas Sparks especially. Funny how we are drawn to different genres for different reasons and the underlying reason connects with our current emotional state. Intriguing.
I like this assignment you mention --- one page of honesty.
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