I hope you do address this at another time in your LJ. Because, of course, it's a process question, and I find process fascinating.
I will -- I'm thinking of little else these days. It's just such a new revelation for me that I don't really know how to address it. Though having a specific person sincerely request that I finish a specific original piece because they want to read it seems to work as a temporary kludge, at least for short stuff.
Pretend I'm a fan who is asking you to write a piece about your thoughts on the writing process in general, then <g>. You will have at least an audience of one, and I'd be happy to read it. Would, in fact, look forward to it.
I find writing to an existing audience vastly more constraining and more stressful.
Wow, we couldn't be more different, could we? That's another thing that makes sense now that you say it but I wouldn't have thought of on my own. I'm learning a lot from this conversation.
It's the other side of the coin. I think a lot of readers approach an original work without specific expectations, so if I write the story well, there's less of a chance that I fail to address a specific need.
The audience that exists for, say, Buffy or Valdemar, has expectations of a work -- and with some reason -- that places the onus on me, as the writer, to get it right. To get the tone right for the audience, as opposed to for the story; I don't have the latitude to shift tone hugely, to change the way characters talk or think, to let them grow organically.
The first and last wouldn't be true for fanfic, BTW -- tone changes are part of what people look for in fanfic because they aren't getting them from canon, and letting them grow organically is the whole point. But I understand that it's not possible in the official stuff. The "can't change the way characters talk or think" is still the same, at least in theory.
Good to know, and more to think about vis a vis what drives people to write fanfic.
I have no idea who my audience is when I write my West novels. I truly don't.
And you find that freeing, yes? I would like to get to that place. Right now I find it paralysing -- like being slapped in the face with my own presumption. This is also where writing process crosses over into therapy process, to my frustration and embarassment.
I find it freeing, yes. Because I can assume that those who like the books will like my particular take on a number of things; I'm not disappointing a preset set of expectations. And it's mine, and can be changed at will -- as I said, I set the canon, and then do my best to make it believable and consistent, which is sort of a pain <wry g>.
I have a freedom in that that probably is egotistical; it's me I have to satisfy first.
I don't think it's egotistical, I think it's healthy. Unfortunately I'm unhealthy enough that when it comes to me it feels egotistical. *wry grin* I still have to satisfy myself first as to whether it's good enough, but in order to write it at all I need to know that someone else wants to read it. Ah. That makes more sense. I wrote the first books with no certain sense that anyone would want to read them -- but as I was trying to write something I thought I would want to read, I assumed that people out there who were like me existed, and that kept me going. More people watch Buffy, though <wry g>.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2004-10-21 09:42 pm (UTC)I will -- I'm thinking of little else these days. It's just such a new revelation for me that I don't really know how to address it. Though having a specific person sincerely request that I finish a specific original piece because they want to read it seems to work as a temporary kludge, at least for short stuff.
Pretend I'm a fan who is asking you to write a piece about your thoughts on the writing process in general, then <g>. You will have at least an audience of one, and I'd be happy to read it. Would, in fact, look forward to it.
I find writing to an existing audience vastly more constraining and more stressful.
Wow, we couldn't be more different, could we? That's another thing that makes sense now that you say it but I wouldn't have thought of on my own. I'm learning a lot from this conversation.
It's the other side of the coin. I think a lot of readers approach an original work without specific expectations, so if I write the story well, there's less of a chance that I fail to address a specific need.
The audience that exists for, say, Buffy or Valdemar, has expectations of a work -- and with some reason -- that places the onus on me, as the writer, to get it right. To get the tone right for the audience, as opposed to for the story; I don't have the latitude to shift tone hugely, to change the way characters talk or think, to let them grow organically.
The first and last wouldn't be true for fanfic, BTW -- tone changes are part of what people look for in fanfic because they aren't getting them from canon, and letting them grow organically is the whole point. But I understand that it's not possible in the official stuff. The "can't change the way characters talk or think" is still the same, at least in theory.
Good to know, and more to think about vis a vis what drives people to write fanfic.
I have no idea who my audience is when I write my West novels. I truly don't.
And you find that freeing, yes? I would like to get to that place. Right now I find it paralysing -- like being slapped in the face with my own presumption. This is also where writing process crosses over into therapy process, to my frustration and embarassment.
I find it freeing, yes. Because I can assume that those who like the books will like my particular take on a number of things; I'm not disappointing a preset set of expectations. And it's mine, and can be changed at will -- as I said, I set the canon, and then do my best to make it believable and consistent, which is sort of a pain <wry g>.
I have a freedom in that that probably is egotistical; it's me I have to satisfy first.
I don't think it's egotistical, I think it's healthy. Unfortunately I'm unhealthy enough that when it comes to me it feels egotistical. *wry grin* I still have to satisfy myself first as to whether it's good enough, but in order to write it at all I need to know that someone else wants to read it.
Ah. That makes more sense. I wrote the first books with no certain sense that anyone would want to read them -- but as I was trying to write something I thought I would want to read, I assumed that people out there who were like me existed, and that kept me going. More people watch Buffy, though <wry g>.