See, this is why I lurk on your journal. Some days I get a sense of, whew, okay, there's hope. This post especially speaks to those of us who believe something should be left for the reader to do, to fill in the blanks, in some ways. Not fully interactive, but as close as you can get with the printed page. One reader told me once, "you make me work." With several introverted main characters, the communication isn't in dialogue but in tiny details and the rest is unsaid.

Most of the time such teasing comments from readers doesn't bother me, but on a bad day? I start to get worried. So it's nice to be reminded that published authors consider this, too, and that it's still possible to expect the reader to figure some stuff out on their own--and still get published.

Err, it is, isn't it?

sGreer,

yes, it is possible to write novels that ask the reader to work, and get published. The trick is, a novel that asks the reader to work has to pay reward the reader, too, for the effort expended by delivering on other levels -- a really good story, great characters, atmosphere. And you've got to make them buy into the deal in the first few pages, which are really all about setting up a contract between you, the author, and the potential reader. More about this tomorrow, I think.

and good luck with your work.

I totally agree with all the earlier comments about the unsaid, the spaces. As a reader, I don't want to everything laid out for me. Its boring. There is something in mulling over points, going back, rereading, waiting, putting the puzzle together yourself. When I do any kind of story writing, I try to apply this but I think sometimes for the amateur, the beginner, there is that potential to be too vague. So it is a fine line. By the way, I think the "unsaid" worked really well in Homestead. The spaces were not empty and if anything I think they gave the story/ies their heart. And I loved Simon too.

Yeah, but your professor was talking about presentations and papers - not novels, I hope? When you prepare information for a presentation, you definitely need to consider the audience, completely. And you have to consider how you will carry off the presentation. So, I include info and do research into the background of my topic, so that I can respond to that odd look in the audience's eyes when they are starting to drift. They are in need of something, and it's up to the presenter to be prepared for that. To never underestimate the ignorance of an audience. I think what the professor said could have been said better. Sounds arrogant, put that way. And I don't think of making presentations as an arrogant act. You put yourself at the service of the audience, know the audience, and then deliver your presentation. Weird to write for, if you don't know your audience at all.

It makes me wonder about speechwriting - I haven't had to do much yet, although when I have had to, I find it's like writing fiction, because I am imagining not just the audience, but how the audience will respond to the speaker in question. It's important to consider that, so that you make allowances for the reaction the speaker will generate. Is that anything like writing fiction though?

Pam, yes. He was talking about professional presentations and university level lectures. And yes, you're right that a novel is a very different animal.

Maybe 'never underestimate the ignorance of your audience' is just a poorly phrased reminder to keep track of the way people are following you, or if they aren't. It does sound condescending, and that might be why it drove me nuts. And of course the big difference is that with any kind of presentation, you can watch your audience react, whereas with a novel, that whole process is removed in time and space.

I have to say, though, that even as a professor lecturing to 300+ undergrads, I always set out the groundrules, and made clear what degree of background and knowledge I was taking for granted. Because sitting through pablum-consistency lectures really irritated me as an undergraduate, and I didn't want to be that kind of lecturer.

One problem, for me anyway, with Hemingway and similar authors is that on the surface their works are frequently dull and unappealing, and it's only when the reader works hard to dig deeper into the subtle themes that s/he gets anything out of the story (this is especially bad for stories like Old Man and the Sea which are forced on kids who aren't willing to make the effort to find the unspoken meaning, and who really don't care).



Stories like yours, however, are multi-layered; the characters and events are interesting in and of themselves, the words are put together in an appealing way, etc., which makes for an enjoyable story, so it's OK if it's only on re-reads (or with, uh, prompting from the author) that we get the more subtle underlying ideas. There's the added benefit that when we do figure things out, we feel like we've found an easter egg, and aren't we clever, and most of all aren't YOU clever to hide that under our noses that way.

Drat! And here I was hoping the sex scenes every other page would do the trick! Blast. Must come up with new plan for world domination. (Don't mind me; I'm revising a fight scene right now and realized I had my guy throw a punch with his right hand at the same time he's blocking...with his right hand. Sure.)

As for the differences between novels & academia, it's a world o' difference. My advisor got on my case repeated times about my thesis, and finally said, "look, you're used to introduction, conflict, resolution, but in a thesis, it's very simple..."

Introduction: I'm telling you what I'm going to tell you.
Body: Here I tell you what I told you I would tell you.
Summary: Now I tell you that I told you what I told you I would tell you.

Me: "But...where's the tension?"
Advisor: "The tension is in whether I'm going to pass you if you don't write it like I say you should."
Me: "Gotcha!"

;D

Of course you realize that I did "Hills Like White Elephants" in your class... then did it again in Dave's class and Maya Sonnenberg's class before actually having to read it for a lit-crit class at the UW.

None of which is to suggest that it's not good, in addition to being an excellent example of its type. I was just continually (like, four times over the course of two years) amazed at how ubiquitous it is.

Still thinking about the unsaid. Though I am no writer I think there are different techniques that one would use when choosing to leave in or out events ,parts of conversations or pieces of action ....and when you are choosing to leave out one WORD here or one WORD there. Leaving out telling the reader perhaps that a certain character knows something or not. I cant be specific right here and now but that has happened in your books. I am following along with the action of some scene while of course some of other character just a little later on find out what we the reader have already been told. That kind of thing must be hard to construct. A novelist's crafting. Here's one....how about the wedding of Simon and Lily.....
I have read that Hemingway would work very hard rewriting and editing his things searching for "Le Mot Just" saying in one letter I read recently that the balance of the whole passage could be altered with the omission of one word. Reading about "The Sun Also Rises" where Scott Fitzgerald told him to take out the entire begining of the novel and start further in. Anyway.... I do like to read mostly instead of reading about writing but this kind of thing fascinates me.
Cynthia in Florida