The World, The Voice, and The Event: Turning 'Then' Into 'Now'
Recently I participated in the Greensboro Bound Literary Festival, a new author and reader fair produced by book-lovers and book-sellers in central North Carolina. I taught a workshop there to a brainy bunch of not-yet-published writers whose particular interest is historical fiction, sharing with them my own methods for crafting a novel set in the past.
In order to transform 'then' into 'now,' making the past a vivid reality for modern readers, I believe it's necessary for the novelist to focus on three spheres of awareness. These three interlocking and overlapping areas consist of: the WORLD of the novel, the VOICE of the protagonist and the voices of other characters (as well as the Narrator's voice, if he/she is not the protagonist), and the key EVENT upon which the novel turns.
I'll explain these three spheres in more detail in the next blog; for now, let me say that the tools I use for crafting the World, the Voice and the Event are simple, and these tools are "turned on" and are active at all times. I read. I listen. I inhabit, with all five senses. And I record.
More to come!
In order to transform 'then' into 'now,' making the past a vivid reality for modern readers, I believe it's necessary for the novelist to focus on three spheres of awareness. These three interlocking and overlapping areas consist of: the WORLD of the novel, the VOICE of the protagonist and the voices of other characters (as well as the Narrator's voice, if he/she is not the protagonist), and the key EVENT upon which the novel turns.
I'll explain these three spheres in more detail in the next blog; for now, let me say that the tools I use for crafting the World, the Voice and the Event are simple, and these tools are "turned on" and are active at all times. I read. I listen. I inhabit, with all five senses. And I record.
More to come!
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