Newsletter 14:Thursday 21st May 2015
Hello again.
Brilliant that you have returned to my Newsletter If this is your first time, you are most welcome.
The Writing Process: Faces and Fiction
One useful thing as we write is to think how we refer to the face in our prose. Clearly the
term face is already loaded with
metaphor and ulterior meaning.
One useful thing as we write is to think how we refer to the face in our prose. Clearly the term face is already loaded with metaphor and ulterior meaning.
Consider: putting a good face on it; facing someone
down; facing it; facing up to things; being two faced; facing the consequences
The physiology of the faces has its own message
system: We refer to the eye being the
window to soul; hollow eyes; haunted eyes; shadowed eyes; bright eyes; folded
lips; wide smile; rigid jaw.
We use faces in our prose to indicate feeling, drama and
action.
His eyes made a person think
that he heard things that no one else had ever heard, that he knew
things no one had ever guessed before. He did not seem quite human. Carson McCullars
Aspects of the face
are part of the action in our prose
Is there an art in finding the mind's construction in the
face? Frowning, raising eyebrows; smiling
widely; grinning, winking, smirking, winking, leering, sneering, glowering,
eyes narrowing. Every micro expression has meaning that you may use.
Of course the face is a
work in progress. It
tracks the passage of time: faces seem to remain the same yet alter through
time: plain faces become handsome, distinguished with time; pretty people
become plain with the passage of years. Faces are the place where the act
of living maps your experience: he
had the look of one who had drunk the cup of life and found a dead beetle at
the bottom. P G Wodehouse.
A child's face is hard to paint and hard to write. How do you
paint or write a blank canvas? Even great painters have problems with children,
Look at the work of Van Gogh! We can portray children more through their
emanations and actions, their wriggling and rolling, their screaming and
chattering.
Distinctive genres do use direct description to
establish the character so that we know very quickly the appearance of the
hero/ine so we can fit them into the shorthand stereotype of handsome
hero, surly but good-looking detective, beautiful maiden, sultry
temptress, dark but handsome villain; or/burly but attractive action man. Guidelines
for purely genre fiction assert quite
rightly that we need to see our
main characters early in the novel. Straight description can be very efficient
for this kind of fiction.
My own preferred way is to use the face in the process of
the story-telling. I prefer not to describe directly but to allow the reader to infer
indirectly as the narrative develops. What happens in the face is part
of the gradual unfolding package of the novel as we get to know the characters,
their age and demeanour, their motivation, their transitory meaning as part of
the ongoing narrative.
Aspects of the face are part of the action in our prose
Distinctive genres do use direct description to
establish the character so that we know very quickly the appearance of the
hero/ine so we can fit them into the shorthand stereotype of handsome
hero, surly but good-looking detective, beautiful maiden, sultry
temptress, dark but handsome villain; or/burly but attractive action man. Guidelines
for purely genre fiction assert quite
rightly that we need to see our
main characters early in the novel. Straight description can be very efficient
for this kind of fiction.
What different things happens in your characters’ faces as
they speak to someone they love, they
hate, they despise, they admire,
they desire, they need?
What happens when your character focuses on a particular
task? e.g. the tip of my tongue shows when I am concentrating on drawing or
writing
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And one from JG
Salinger: - She was not one for emptying her face of
expression.
Of course we don't have to make our characters gurning, grinning
puppets but the use of the mobility of the face to indicate character, drama
and action is available to us and if we use it artfully and with restraint it
will add vivid layers to our prose.
To illustrate: here are
some words from The Pathfinder my very newest title
'... He spoke to them in the old
tongue but both brothers answered in Latin. Kynan grinned at Magnus’s surprise.
‘Our father had us spend two seasons in the house of a merchant in Rome,
an agent who sold our lead right across the great inland sea...'
(In the context of the narrative the word grinned
has much more meaning here than said. See also the significance of the face for the cover design. W)
(In the context of the narrative the word 'grinned' has much more meaning here than the baring of teeth,..,,)
