| Author | Message | ||
| Tina Hoffman
Senior Member Username: tina_hoffman Post Number: 3826 Registered: 05-2007 |
As a poet, writer or reader, what would you say defines an original voice as a poet, writer or a reader? Didn't someone at one point say that everything has been done already...? Have some thoughts - first and foremost, that I better not to think too hard about reading, poet-ing, or writing. Maybe not. Maybe so. Doesn't mean I will stop doing any of the above or none of the above. But at the very least, still love the proliferation of reading and writing. Mathematics and Science might be another thing. At least for me. Psychic physical physics might be something else to consider. Hmmmm.... Wow, what's in the water these days? ;-) Best regards, Tina "It is one of my rules in life, never to notice what I don't understand." ~~Gabrice Betteredge (from "The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins) | ||
| MV
Senior Member Username: michaelv Post Number: 1163 Registered: 11-2003 |
Immediately in response, I'm hearing the lyric of Stevie Nicks: So we make our choices When there is no choice And we listen to their voices Ignoring our own voice from "Sister of the Moon" (1979) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmBYxb74wG0 God made each an individual - like snowflakes: So many different kind of people Trying to be the same "No way," baby He said Baby there's no way from Buckingham Nicks' (1973) lyric "Races are Run" There is no Vision without The Light! There is always something new under the Son. sharing not what I know, but what I believe,  Michael (MV) | ||
| erwin fernandez
Valued Member Username: darkdatu Post Number: 103 Registered: 07-2009 |
I don't believe everything has been done as well: Technology advances everyday as well as the social fabric of humanity. It is true that much has not changed but many things have. Could Shakespeare have envisioned Twitter, Facebook and Nuclear Weapons? Maybe but he didn't write about them. Maybe Baudelaire would have gotten hooked on Ecstasy instead of opium if he were alive today. All I know is - as long as the voice you use is your own, even if nobody appreciates it, then that is poetry. | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 6523 Registered: 05-2006 |
I believe we are in the grips of what might be called a Cult of Novelty. What this has led to is people madly trying to "out-novel" one another -- and not just in poetry, but broadly across our culture. In Feminism, this created a cult of radical feminism that blamed the plight of women on the oppression of men, and worse -- eventually led to arguments the men should be hormonally neutralized (or neutered) to combat their natural oppressive tendencies. In religion, this created nonsense like the Pope's assertion that condoms cause AIDS, and the fundamentalist argument that 911 was God's punishment for America's tolerance of homosexuality and abortion. In painting: Jackson Pollack et al. And the point of view (Ortiz) that painting over graffiti disrespects folk art. In identity politics, the tendency to blame every slight or wrong on racism, along with the irrational assertion that lack of evidence of racism implies latency. In personal economics, a whole class of Americans living farther beyond their means than any large population in history. In poetry, an avant-garde that writes poems that are unintelligible to the typical educated citizen, and which abjures any objective aesthetic criteria. In medicine, a mania for discretionary surgery and self-improvement, which I predict is so close to eugenics that within a generation we will have vast numbers of designer children and "screening" abortions. The number-one word in marketing is NEW. What we learn about daily affairs in our own city and around the world is NEWS. And here I sit, with an iPod on my hip typing on a laptop computer . . . FrNEWed YOUR FOOTNOTE ADVERTISEMENT HERE. Call 1-555-555-5555 and ask for Fred. 10% discount if you mention Wild Poetry Forum. | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Intermediate Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 767 Registered: 07-2007 |
"Voice" is a frame of mind, I think. New voices can appear. Take the Beatles phenomena in the 60's, for example. Even though something like 90% of their recordings were love songs, which have been around forever, they presented them in a new way which took the world by storm. Poets such as William Carlos Williams, Bukowski, Richard Brautigan, ee cummings, etc. in my view had fresh, new voices. I'm sure someone else will come along with a new recipe sooner or later. "People who believe a lot of crap are better off." Charles Bukowski | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Intermediate Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 768 Registered: 07-2007 |
Also: I seriously doubt anyone who doesn't or hasn't read tons of poetry by many, many poets has any chance at all of coming up with something new. Also: I doubt the next popular new voice will be in the form of sonnets or indecipherable gibberish. "People who believe a lot of crap are better off." Charles Bukowski | ||
| M
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 34927 Registered: 11-1998 |
Of course, everything has been done before, e.g., West Side Story = Romeo and Juliet. But what defines an original voice is a little something called "reframing." Take the same old stuff, dismantle it, and repackage it in a different box. We all have the same words to work with, plus a few others, if we're inclined toward making up new words. It's the order and the situations that you put them in that makes them new. And the unfamiliar revelations/connections they might expose that makes them fresh. That's really all it takes. Love, M | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Intermediate Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 769 Registered: 07-2007 |
That's what I said, ~M~. You just "reframed" it. Hee hee. "People who believe a lot of crap are better off." Charles Bukowski | ||
| M
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 34930 Registered: 11-1998 |
See, Dan. It works!  Love, M | ||
| Lazarus
Senior Member Username: lazarus Post Number: 5384 Registered: 10-2005 |
Good topic, Tina. And one I've been very interested in lately. I believe voice is an aspect of the empathic mind, where the identity is able to shift from “the other” to “self” rather seamlessly as long as the vehicle is well constructed. The job of voice is to connect. It’s like a telephone conversation, the voice you use has to be rational and understandable, or the other person is going to hang up. Within the narrative, they have to be able to say “that could be me.” Even if the narrative is of someone who has done terrible things, there will be something about their humanness that makes the reader empathize with them. So it's not a matter of coming up with a unique voice, in fact, if the voice stands out too much, it will not find an empathic route and interest will not be developed. -Laz | ||
| Tina Hoffman
Senior Member Username: tina_hoffman Post Number: 3846 Registered: 05-2007 |
Intriguing comments, all. I can't tell you how many times I've been told what I've written is "trite" or "done before." It is usually a single phrase in a narrative or poem, but the reader/critic focuses on it. To me, it is a compliment -- that the reader found something they could focus on, perhaps grasping on that single word or phrase they could relate to in some way. They then somehow go on to read or re-read the rest of the piece, and they may hate it or love it, take it or leave it (lol, is that trite, or cliche?) but they still do -- and take the time to make the point that they did, that they didn't approve, or disapprove of that singulary part they could or could not relate to, but that it meant something to them. What more could a writer want? I do not expect that anyone will embrace anything I write. But it is gratifying as a writer to know that I am not alone in some ways, and readers teach me things. Like which words or phrases are too painful, too well-used, underused, defused, disseminated to its deathbed, etc. Or joyful for them. Too. I am nothing without someone to read and react and interact with me, as I do with them. Writers and readers both. All of us, them. Thanks for the awesome comments. I may have a reply or two, but then again, you've already said it all...  Best regards & Love Always, Tina xo (Message edited by tina_hoffman on August 03, 2009) "Do not eat what you can burn and do not burn what you can eat...unless you have to." ~Anonymous | ||
| Tina Hoffman
Senior Member Username: tina_hoffman Post Number: 3847 Registered: 05-2007 |
BTW, I'm taking refreshing courses on the 'rythmatick and sighs and parts.' But parts is parts, right? Err...never mind. LOL xo "Do not eat what you can burn and do not burn what you can eat...unless you have to." ~Anonymous | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 6536 Registered: 05-2006 |
Our culture has internalized a meme that "says" that every work of art must blaze with novelty. Reframing is fine, but reframing only embodies a moderate amount of novelty. To really get with the program of extreme novelty, every work of art must be an explosive departure from the broad corpus of work that has preceded it. Of course this is not really possible. So, one solution to this is to create art that is so obscure, so full of deep image, so vague and turbid, that no one can tell whether it is teeming with novelty -- or not. ********** Sometimes, as in politics, the cult of novelty can result in genocide, as each pundit or leader tries to "outradicalize" the other pundits and leaders. The payoff for this is that the person championing the most extreme view earns status points within the group, and this higher status can be easily defended by branding all those with more moderate views as limpwristed, timid, gutless -- or as lackies or dupes. If you think I'm kidding about this, note the progression in the German political culture prior to WWII. It began with discriminating against Jews, then progressed to Kristallnacht, to segregating or expelling the Jews, and finally to exterminating them. ********** Most people see newness or novelty as an end-in-itself. "Progress" is seen as (another dangerous meme) historically inevitable. When I brought this point up in my comment earlier in the thread, not a single person commented on it, because not a single one of you doubts the value of newness, of novelty, of originality. I am a bit of a philosopher, a bit of a social critic. One of the things I have done is to challenge or doubt most everything my culture has handed to me as gospel. Have you? ********** YOUR FOOTNOTE ADVERTISEMENT HERE. Call 1-555-555-5555 and ask for Fred. 10% discount if you mention Wild Poetry Forum. | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Intermediate Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 772 Registered: 07-2007 |
"In poetry, an avant-garde that writes poems that are unintelligible to the typical educated citizen, and which abjures any objective aesthetic criteria." That isn't new or original. Are you trying to say that all the possible poetic voices have been done already, so we might as well just give up? "People who believe a lot of crap are better off." Charles Bukowski | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Intermediate Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 773 Registered: 07-2007 |
Actually; I think it's pretty clear that even here at WPF a lot of poets have their own unique voices. If I had 4 WPF poets each email me a poem they have never posted on WPF and I posted them together along with one of mine with names withheld in one thread I bet a lot of WPF regs could guess who the authors are. "People who believe a lot of crap are better off." Charles Bukowski | ||
| M
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 34941 Registered: 11-1998 |
"When I brought this point up in my comment earlier in the thread, not a single person commented on it, because not a single one of you doubts the value of newness, of novelty, of originality." Uh, wrong, Freddie. Speaking only for myself here ('cause who else can I speak for?), I didn't comment on it because I know better. I've learned if I comment on anything you say, I'll only get dragged into a debate that lasts longer than the Precambrian era. And I'll get nothing else done. Maybe I didn't comment because I'm busy doing other stuff?  Love, M | ||
| Teresa White
Advanced Member Username: teresa_white Post Number: 2249 Registered: 01-2005 |
Very interesting thread! ~T | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 6544 Registered: 05-2006 |
Dan, No, what I am saying most emphatically is that there truly is a cult of novelty, and that socio-politically, it was one of the forces fueling the Nazi movement, and that novelty-for-the-sake-of-novelty can be a very dangerous thing. I am also saying that this cultural obsession has infiltrated poetry (and all other art forms with which I am acquainted.) I am NOT saying that we should give up trying to speak in strong, original voices. I myself have a strong original voice. I am saying that, even as an artist expresses him- or herself in an original voice, he or she should recognize that slavish homage or allegiance to novelty can be a very dangerous thing. I am also, frankly, asserting that if a person has any hope of being an intellectual, he or she needs to be able to do a thing while at the same time recognizing that that very thing, in a more corrupt form, can lead to great evil. A professor of mine, now deceased, called it the "irreducible complexity of life." Fred YOUR FOOTNOTE ADVERTISEMENT HERE. Call 1-555-555-5555 and ask for Fred. 10% discount if you mention Wild Poetry Forum. | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Intermediate Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 779 Registered: 07-2007 |
"A professor of mine, now deceased, called it the "irreducible complexity of life."" Captain Al (Bucket) Guest, my mentor when I first went to sea used to say, when referring to modern-day captains and crews: "Ten-thousand sailors and not a seaman among 'em." (Message edited by db_tompsett on August 05, 2009) "People who believe a lot of crap are better off." Charles Bukowski | ||
| Lazarus
Senior Member Username: lazarus Post Number: 5400 Registered: 10-2005 |
re: the cult of novelty. I don't see it. In college we learned to assimilate a whole cannon of predigested ideas. Not one of my professors was interested in original thought. Where is this place that honors invention? IMO It is very hard to get noticed if you are doing something new in the art world. I heard Billy Collins speak on the subject of voice and he said 30 years hammering away at his "voice" is what it took to get noticed. He didn't change, but once his work started to be seen it became marketable. In other arenas it is the same. Popular politics comes about by the recycling of old ideas. New packaging, that's all. A truly inspired idea will always get trashed. I have an etymology of the word news that I think is more apt: not from the base "new" but from the anagram, north east west & south. Fred- I didn't respond to your assumptions because I didn't agree with them, but I didn't want to get in a fight over it. I'm willing to agree to disagree though, for the sake of the children.;) -Laz | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Intermediate Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 780 Registered: 07-2007 |
I don't think "new" or "novel" is what's important. Writing wierd or outlandishly isn't "new" or "novel." It's been done to death. A voice that is recognizeably unique is what I think is important. For example the voices of Dylan Thomas, William Carlos Williams, Marge Piercy, W. H. Auden are recognizeably unique to each of those poets even though they didn't write outlandishly bizzar stuff. The main thing a poet should be concerned about is to not be boring. "People who believe a lot of crap are better off." Charles Bukowski | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 12203 Registered: 12-2003 |
Everyone has their own original voice unless they are plagarizing or relying heavily on cliche. Writing is like a garden, you can plant the same seeds every year, bean, squash etc, but it's where you plant them that makes the garden new. You can also try different varieties of the same types of seeds, sunshine squash, kentucky pole bean etc., and change up the colors you see. This analogy could go on forever... Don't worry about it, just write! Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Poetry is a way of taking life by the throat.~Robert Frost | ||
| Will Eastland
Advanced Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 1075 Registered: 07-2006 |
Dan, Fred is not saying it ought to be important, but that it is manifestly important to a large group of contemporary writers and editors, especially those under 40 or so(admittedly an arbitrary age). My Exhibits: Absent Coconut lpz I would be quick to add that I do not contend these poems/zines have no value, just that they support Fred's thesis. (Message edited by dwillo on August 05, 2009) Progress is a comfortable disease. ~e e cummings | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Intermediate Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 781 Registered: 07-2007 |
OK; I read some of the poems in Absent. In my view they are written to be read and enjoyed by others who read and enjoy those "voices," which are other poets who write that way. The general public will not be endeared to that stuff. When I write I usually picture an audience of middle to upper-middle class housewives, not my poetry-writing peers. "People who believe a lot of crap are better off." Charles Bukowski | ||
| Lazarus
Senior Member Username: lazarus Post Number: 5403 Registered: 10-2005 |
Ah. yes, for and by those who like it; form play, word play, dialogue play, it's not new. Puzzle poems are thousands of years old, acrostics with hidden messages, Shakespeare's satire, innuendo in "The Trouble with Being Ernest." If there was a reading public of non poets they would like simpler stuff. rhyming and sentimental. I have given up writing for my friends. But a well wrought line will entertain almost anyone. That's what I'm aiming for no mater the voice, which is where this began. Voice can't be designed. That was the point Collins was making. It is the substance between the lines. It's the "why" of a poem, and that has to be determined by the reader. -Laz | ||
| RGCat
Advanced Member Username: rcat Post Number: 1069 Registered: 03-2008 |
Wow, excellent question Tina. Certainly no one round these parts is like this -- but I find male balding thought patterns with cranky over-bloated intellectuality thoroughly “unoriginal” and “inauthentic.” We know that regurgitated crap is straight out of the mass-market playbook. It’s like wow. Earth to fatted cow ego – mommy is calling with warm milk and your blanky. Like I said, it’s refreshing around here because obviously everyone is totally secure in their own highly evolved authentic way. Furthermore, the wonderful open-minded receptivity to new possibilities and potentialities is always an artist’s path to individual liberation and authenticity, or so the credo says. IMO its marvelous “vitality in the now” is openly expressed and respected in these parts, even when the manifestation of vital energy challenges conventional boundaries (i.e., the cliché “box”). Liberated poets know it’s better to suck in your authentic “voice” than be great as a pretender. And of course we all know authenticity is not a primary directive in the combine’s snow-globe terrarium. That’s it! That’s it! Oops, maybe not. | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 6550 Registered: 05-2006 |
Laz, In almost any discussion of economics, the word "growth" shows up. It is not assumed that sometimes growth is a good thing, sometimes it is a neutral thing, and sometimes it is a bad thing. It is assumed that always growth is desirable. Anyone who challenges the value of growth is considered to be a Luddite or reactionary. Clearly, growth is one of those "pious verities" people talk about. It is one aspect of what I call the Worship of Size. Bigger cars, bigger breasts, bigger penises, bigger homes, bigger diamonds on our fingers, bigger incomes, taller people . . . and thus, bigger corporations, bigger cities, etc. (I remember a prominent feminist telling me in 1970 that discrimination against short people was "natural," and that it was a kind of discrimination that could not be considered as morally odious, since the veneration of height was built into the fundamental structure of the human psyche. Of course, in another age, the same was said about the holding of slaves and the lower status of women.) Allied to growth is progress. Whereas growth deals generally with magnitude, progress deals with an improvement in quality. At least personally, I prefer progress over growth. * * * * * Take a step back and look at why we revere the Renaissance -- growth and progress. * * * * * The history of the United States is largely a story of growth and progress. * * * * * The same cultural paradigm, meta-trend, or archetype that finds expression in growth and progress has taken residence in fashion. It has also found a home in the various types of art. You mentioned the university. The purpose of a liberal university education is to acquaint the student with the corpus of validated culture that has accumulated prior to the "educational moment," not to foster creativity or innovation. But one soon discovers that, whether one is sculpting, writing stories, painting, or penning poems . . . your work stands the best chance of getting recognized by the artistic community if it evinces significant novelty and innovation. My first published poem in a reputable journal was in 1968 -- my version of a Metaphysical Poem in the spirit on Donne, Traherne, Marvelle, etc. Today, now that the artistic community is more in the grip of the Cult of Novelty, my poem would be laughed at. * * * * * You see . . . what originally conferred value -- i.e. reframing (as M states) or respecting the tradition while achieving a certain strangeness (as Harold Bloom states) -- in other words the form of innovation that makes art better . . . eventually becomes an end-in-itself. Novelty is pursued for the sake of novelty, and an artist earns status points by out-noveling other artists. I am reminded of the desire among some women to have breasts a little larger than their friends, to wear blouses that show a little more cleavage than their friends, and that are tighter and reveal a little more nipple-relief than their friends. I should not have to argue that this confers status within the community of women, but I will because inevitably some disenchanted woman will feel compelled to chime in that "breast-appeal is just male-chauvinist bullshit" -- which she affirms (ironically) in an effort to out-feminist HER friends. * * * * * Now, any of you can be as innovative as you want, and I will admire and appreciate much of your originality. But I will also try to kick you in the butt, hoping you will see that progress, growth, and artistic novelty are all expressions of something very deep within the collective human psyche -- and that these deep forces are NOT always benign, and therefore should not be forever taken for granted. * * * * * Ralph -- this is for you -- I'm not sure what exactly you mean by "authenticity is not a primary directive in the combine’s snow-globe terrarium" -- but I think the langauge sizzles! * * * * * YOUR FOOTNOTE ADVERTISEMENT HERE. Call 1-555-555-5555 and ask for Fred. 10% discount if you mention Wild Poetry Forum. | ||
| Lazarus
Senior Member Username: lazarus Post Number: 5409 Registered: 10-2005 |
Fred- I've been following this premise for a while in your writings here at Wild and I think I have the gist of it. But I do respectfully disagree. What we see as novelty looking back at the big ground breakers like Whitman, Elliot, Williams, is merely the staying power of quality over novelty. I'm sure there are quite a few writers that were popular and different that have gone into obscurity because they did not bring something true to what they did. But if you assert that this cult of novelty is newer, newer than 1969 when your poem was published, then I suppose I can only argue based on the last 20 or 30 years? But that is not enough time to know whether what we are reading now will have that staying power and be of interest to scholars for a long time to come. Leaving that argument aside for a moment. I also don't agree with this concept of bigger is better in all situations. There is an evolutionary precept built into some human choices, yes, but some things, like fashion and romance, are just a matter of taste and trends. We like doing what other people are doing, until everyone is doing it and it starts to lose that shine, then we think it's time for something new, and we notice something else we like (except if we're married, then we have to stay put!) And I don't think girls look at other girls boobs and say I want mine bigger than hers. Anyone doing that is seriously damaged. Whatever happened to the idea that people just want to better themselves, feel good about themselves and relate better with others. And why not give writers the room to write clearer truer closer to their subject in order to get something important across. How they do it is not what matters, if they prefer linguistic challenges or dramatic situations or sticking to obscure forms. If people like it, I say that's a good thing! Much love, -Laz | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 6552 Registered: 05-2006 |
A great many people liked National Socialism. A great many people like to watch grown men in snazzy costumes slowly and painfully murder bulls. Many people like the notion that HIV does not cause AIDS. Many people like the Book of Revelation, which states, among other things, that devastation of the Earth is a necessary precursor to the Second Coming of Christ. Many men like beating up women. Other adults like molesting children. Need I go on? -- the liking of a thing confers popularity and internal pleasure; it does NOT confer either virtue or quality. * * * * * Staying power and novelty have some correlation; but yes, novelty does not assure staying power. Tonight, while I took my daily walk, I listened to a Beethoven violin concerto on my iPod, with Perlman as the soloist. The piece is about 200 years old. It is a sublime composition. At the time it was written, it was very innovative, while at the same time respecting the late-Classical and early-Romantic traditions. The work has endured because it is beautiful, a work of genius. I have written a number of compositions for the piano, and in part because I have tried my own hand at serious composition I stand in utter awe of Beethoven. * * * * * As for the thing about boobs, you have just consigned about a third of all the young women in San Diego to the damage asylum. * * * * * Those who are married do not, for the most part, stay put. * * * * * Most changes in fashion are not, in any deep aesthetic sense, improvements. They are marketed as NEW! NEW! NEW! In other words, even if something is only different, it isn't marketed as different. It is marketed as NEW, because that hooks into the cultural archetype or infra-paradigm. Fred YOUR FOOTNOTE ADVERTISEMENT HERE. Call 1-555-555-5555 and ask for Fred. 10% discount if you mention Wild Poetry Forum. | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Intermediate Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 783 Registered: 07-2007 |
I don't see how this convo got dragged into where it's at. One artist can, and most, of any merit, anyway, do have their own unique styles and/or voices without being earth-shatteringly different than others. I don't want my voice to sound like a bunch of other voices, but I'm certainly not striving for something outrageously NEW. It's like the rock scene of the '60's: The voice of the Beatles would never be mistaken for the voice of the Rolling Stones, but the difference between the two groups wasn't/isn't all that profound. "It's still rock n roll to me." "People who believe a lot of crap are better off." Charles Bukowski | ||
| Tina Hoffman
Senior Member Username: tina_hoffman Post Number: 3864 Registered: 05-2007 |
"I meme, therefore, I am." "Do not eat what you can burn and do not burn what you can eat...unless you have to." ~Anonymous | ||
| Tina Hoffman
Senior Member Username: tina_hoffman Post Number: 3865 Registered: 05-2007 |
"I clean, and do windows too." "Do not eat what you can burn and do not burn what you can eat...unless you have to." ~Anonymous | ||
| Tina Hoffman
Senior Member Username: tina_hoffman Post Number: 3866 Registered: 05-2007 |
"Novelty is newness for the sake of uniqueness itself." "Do not eat what you can burn and do not burn what you can eat...unless you have to." ~Anonymous | ||
| Tina Hoffman
Senior Member Username: tina_hoffman Post Number: 3867 Registered: 05-2007 |
BTW, I never dreamed such a simple question would spark such a wonderful discussion... delete delete delete I need to obtain a copy-write for my stuff... LOL Love always, Tina xoxo  But why bother? ;-) "Do not eat what you can burn and do not burn what you can eat...unless you have to." ~Anonymous | ||
| Andrew Dufresne
Senior Member Username: beachdreamer Post Number: 2821 Registered: 01-2006 |
Wow, those clouds look like duckies and horsies...oh excuse me, were y'all talking 'bout sumthin'? ad I'm too lazy to update my blog so I'm embarrassed to invite anyone to it. | ||
| M
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 34998 Registered: 11-1998 |
Hey, ad -- watch this:  I know lotsa other tricks too! Love, M | ||
| Morgan Lafay
Senior Member Username: morganlafay Post Number: 3806 Registered: 08-2005 |
I don't know from anything I've read, seen in a documentary, been told, etc., but for me, I have my own voice. Way of writing. Don't we all? Or, maybe I've missed the question; no, actually, I think I couldn't comprehend the answers. All I know and feel is I can't duplicate another's voice nor want to. I am a simple writer; but I like my voice. someday I'll find it, the rainbow connection, for lovers, and dreamers, and me | ||
| Lazarus
Senior Member Username: lazarus Post Number: 5421 Registered: 10-2005 |
Morgan- You are right. It is simple. I think what you can say about voice is that you can get in the way of it, but you can't change it. It is what it is, it is you, and you are it. -Laz | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 6558 Registered: 05-2006 |
If voice is an expression of personality, and personality changes, but only very slowly, then I think we can fairly say that short-term alterations in voice are due to "persona assumption" on the part of the writer, i.e. writing "in the voice of . . ." -- but, on the other hand, changes in the writer's authentic voice can change, but only, as with the rest of personality, very slowly. Or to put it differently . . . to say voice cannot change is tantamount to saying that personality and character cannot change, which we know to be untrue. Again, what is true is that authentic personality, character, and in the context of writing, voice, can only change very slowly -- and slowness of change is often mistaken for stasis. Fred YOUR FOOTNOTE ADVERTISEMENT HERE. Call 1-555-555-5555 and ask for Fred. 10% discount if you mention Wild Poetry Forum. | ||
| Lazarus
Senior Member Username: lazarus Post Number: 5424 Registered: 10-2005 |
Fred- I really like that idea of the slowness of change. If fact I would say it is a constant and important factor in creativity. What is more important than discovery in the human experience? And if the discovery causes a slow shift in the person who created the art, there is a better chance of it happening in the receiver. That is the payoff on investment IMHO and the point of, and reason for enjoying creative works. -Laz |
