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Apr. 2nd, 2009 01:46 pmIt's been a good few days. I'm one-quarter of the way through the first big edit on version six.
I've been working on this novel for three years. The frustrating thing isn't the time it's taking, I think -- most first novels seem to take three to ten years, if all the author interviews I've heard on CBC are any indication. So I'm still on the low end, and not worried. It's been people's reactions.
Most people just assume I'm never going to publish, and it's a little depressing I inspire so little confidence. Increasingly I'm getting comments from people like "Well, as long as you enjoy it, that's what's important." I put that phrase into the same category most people put "He's got a nice personality" and "He's interesting and he means well."
But I have been mastering the elements of novel-writing one at a time, so there has been real progress all this time. I got dialogue first -- it was transcribing what people say in journalism that helped with that. Then characterization, then theme, then plot.
I bring this up because I've made a major breakthrough these last two weeks in one of the things that's been frustrating me through all versions. The tone was wrong. It was something that frustrated and annoyed, like a buzzing sound whose location I couldn't pin down. It felt like there was problem everywhere, but nowhere precise.
It wasn't until I started reading Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell that I understood. The affected Victorian tone that it's written in made me realize I've been using too complex a level of language. Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell uses that same level to comic effect. I've always like that, but in English you get it mostly in comic novels, which my novel definitely isn't.
For successful heavier things in English, we tend to use extremely simple, almost childlike vocabulary, and a matter-of-fact style. The simple style carries interest in a way that affected, long sentences do not. Think Lullabies for Little Criminals. Horrific events generally carry themselves without commentary. Embellishments are kept to a minimum -- it's the imagery, not the language, that carries the beauty.
This problem's been like a bug in my brain for six versions and three years. This is a breakthrough. There's still a moving around of minor plot elements to be done, and some aspects of character to be ironed out, and some aspects could be better integrated. But I don't think I'll be rewriting it from scratch again.
I've been working on this novel for three years. The frustrating thing isn't the time it's taking, I think -- most first novels seem to take three to ten years, if all the author interviews I've heard on CBC are any indication. So I'm still on the low end, and not worried. It's been people's reactions.
Most people just assume I'm never going to publish, and it's a little depressing I inspire so little confidence. Increasingly I'm getting comments from people like "Well, as long as you enjoy it, that's what's important." I put that phrase into the same category most people put "He's got a nice personality" and "He's interesting and he means well."
But I have been mastering the elements of novel-writing one at a time, so there has been real progress all this time. I got dialogue first -- it was transcribing what people say in journalism that helped with that. Then characterization, then theme, then plot.
I bring this up because I've made a major breakthrough these last two weeks in one of the things that's been frustrating me through all versions. The tone was wrong. It was something that frustrated and annoyed, like a buzzing sound whose location I couldn't pin down. It felt like there was problem everywhere, but nowhere precise.
It wasn't until I started reading Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell that I understood. The affected Victorian tone that it's written in made me realize I've been using too complex a level of language. Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell uses that same level to comic effect. I've always like that, but in English you get it mostly in comic novels, which my novel definitely isn't.
For successful heavier things in English, we tend to use extremely simple, almost childlike vocabulary, and a matter-of-fact style. The simple style carries interest in a way that affected, long sentences do not. Think Lullabies for Little Criminals. Horrific events generally carry themselves without commentary. Embellishments are kept to a minimum -- it's the imagery, not the language, that carries the beauty.
This problem's been like a bug in my brain for six versions and three years. This is a breakthrough. There's still a moving around of minor plot elements to be done, and some aspects of character to be ironed out, and some aspects could be better integrated. But I don't think I'll be rewriting it from scratch again.