Debate about Voice

He comes off a bit condescending, but really, writing that's "all about meeee" bores the hell out of me, which is why I can hardly stand to read the majority of blogs. Unless you have a wicked sense of humor and a really unusual take on things, which is to say, unless you're David Sedaris, I probably don't want to read about you. (That's the general "you," not you personally, Duck.)

I'm not really clear on what all this "finding my voice" business is about. Maybe because I've been writing my entire life, I almost can't help but write in my own voice - whatever that is. Finding my voice would be like "finding" the color of my eyes.

Someone who is more interested in themselves than they are the world at large probably won’t make it as a writer. You have to be insanely empathetic to be a writer. To be a writer you have to think everything is more interesting than you.

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I agree with this. Self absorption is boring. Being able to make a reader feel what a character is feeling is interesting.

I get really tired of the hey-look-at-me-I'm-so-clever-and-funky-and-quirky approach to writing. He's right. It isn't about you.

Would you tell any new writer that they should write what the readers want or write what they want?

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Of course you should write what you want, write about what interests you. But if all that interests you is the fuzz in your own navel, don't expect a lot of other people to be fascinated by it.

DonnaDuck said:

So what say you? Would you tell any new writer that they should write what the readers want or write what they want? Would you say to a new writer, 'screw your own voice, write with the voice of your perceived readership'? Would you tell your budding new writers to channel their non-existent readers because they're the ones really writing the story, you're just a tool in which to put words on paper?

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I'm not sure that's what he means. I think he means, don't try to make your prose special and interesting, just tell your story -- and your story had better be about something bigger and more universal than simply you and your issues.

That's how I read those quotes.

Having now had a look at this guy's blog, it appears he doesn't actually know what "writer's voice" means.

I think most of what he says can safely be ignored.

It seemed to me that he wasn't talking about writing the story you think your readers will read, but rather advocating invisible prose. He makes a big point that you can't pay attention to both your inner voice and your readers'--they're two opposing interior monologues, it's like watching TV and listening to the radio. I don't agree with him, because I like to marvel at the way a writer phrased something or described something, even if that does technically take me out of the story.

What's worse, he's a published writer and NOT with PA (even though he is Christian).

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That's not really the kind of thing you say when you want people to agree with you...there are plenty of intelligent Christians in the world, and lots on AW.

I still don't get the whole "trying to find your voice" thing. To me, your voice is your voice. You don't "find" it, it just is. Or if you can't find it, it's because your "looking" for it instead of just writing.

By way of analogy, your voice is as unique as your handwriting. If you're consciously trying to make your handwriting "stand out" and look "unique" and "special" it's going to have a very studied, contrived, unnatural look to it - kind of like what you see with 6th grade girls dotting their i's with hearts and adding extra curliecues to their capital letters. It's obviously phony. Writing is the same. If you're struggling to "find your unique voice" it's going to stands out like the handwriting in a 6th grader's mash note.

Your voice is what happens when you get out of your own way and just write. That's what I think he meant.

To me, the very idea of "finding my voice" smacks of an exercise in navel gazing. Here's what voice is to me: If I started posting here under another username, I think, unless I was deliberately trying to mask my personality, people would easily recognize me by the kinds of things I say and how I say them.

I was looking at it more from the perspective of him saying people don't care what interests you. They care what interests them and they only want to read that. Why can't I write a story that's both interesting to me and to the reader?

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I would say that if it's interesting to you (not to be confused with all-about-you) it will interest some other readers. I didn't get that he was saying write about what bores you just because you think it will sell.

Willowmound said:

I'd say that depends entirely on which people you are trying to attract.

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Meh, I'm an atheist yet I'm basically supporting what the guy said, I guess. I couldn't care less what his beliefs are. He makes a point that the sort of writing where one struggles to find oneself is best left to bedside journals.

What an effing moran.

Sorry, invisible prose is fine for novels you read in an airport, but despite all the animosity towards art, especially on here, there is still such a thing as "literature".

I really don't get guys like this and why they're trying so hard to destroy art and make people who experiment feel like idiots. This is the worst kind of conservative nonsense and it ruins the art. If you don't like it, fine, don't read it, but just because you won the commercial fiction lottery doesn't give you a licence to come down on people who want to push the envelope. I hope I'm reading this wrong and he's talking about something else, but I don't think so.

Jackasses like this are the reason literature is going the way of poetry. They make my blood run cold.

depends on what your definition of voice is. how i read those quotes is 'leave your ego at the door, don't try to be shakespeare.' by that, i get 'don't think you're so special that you can inflict such suffering on all readers and expect them to bow to you.'

i think it's put absolutely brilliantly in the statement 'people want to read about themselves.' that's entirely true, imo. true, few of us will ever be james bond, but the audience, those being guys, share enough of the same philosophy and interests as that character to make him relatable, even if it's a bit of roll-playing on the reader's part. the whole idea of making readers identify with your characters is based not on your ego and how that character should be, rather how to make the reader see himself in that character. it's the width and breadth of a character named harry potter. it's the cornerstone of romance, even with a touch of wish fulfillment tossed in.

okay, so we don't see the same conclusions from those quotes.

but, since you brought it up, how can a person live with themselves after they've decided to stand on the proverbial corner under the streetlamp in a vinyl mini-skirt and fishnet stockings while running the question 'hey, baby, want a date?' by every car that goes by?

i'd say most writers are more of a whore than they give themselves credit for. or like to think of themselves. do we not all run the same loose story structures of introduction, rising tension, and resolution/conclusion? of course we do, some of us do it a bit differently, but we all have this 'intuitive' storytelling method. duh, eh? it's not like we can get around that.

but, then we look at the genre we want to write in. it's got its conventions and rules and cliches. here's where the car starts to slow down and the guy starts eyeing us, wondering if we're worth the trouble, trying to determine if we're relatively disease-free enough to take to a motel with hourly rates. he drives around the block, wondering if he should spend his money, unsure if his fetish is something you're willing to do. after all, it's his money and the whore's job is to satisfy HIS desires. he doesn't give a damn if she has the best orgasm of her life. he doesn't care if she gets off at all. the best she can hope for is that he has a good enough time to return to her. even in the whoring game, perhaps especially in the whoring game, repeat customers are money in the bank.

satisfied that your main goal for the night isn't earning enough cash for crack, he's going to make another pass. he likes the genre you're in. that's why he's looking in the first place. he's not looking for a mystery cozy, he's needing his hard-boiled crime fix.

and your job is to give it to him. his fantasy involves whips and chains. you can dress up as a nun or a schoolteacher, your choice. a cop outfit if you have one. he may go as far as a french maid, but that's stretching credibility of the fantasy. leave the scuba outfit in the closet, it doesn't fit with the fantasy and it's not what turns the guy on.

so, okay, you've got him interested. you've promised him a genre and a sub-genre. he's coming back again, time to hook him. he slows down as his window is lowering.

'hey, baby, want a date?'

he smiles, but you know you've still got to reel this sucker in. it's his fantasy, you have to make it all about him. after all, you've got college loans to pay off. he knows what he wants and his money is still in his wallet. all you have to do is promise him his fantasy will be taken care of. it may not be 100% of what you had in mind, but, hey, you can still have a lot of creativity within the confines of his parametres.

this is where you make the character relatable to the reader. this is where you can fiddle with the plot. you can do a lot of things within this space. however, you're selling yourself here, and in the end you have to provide the customer with the service he expects. your satisfaction is last on his list. HIS satisfaction is what he cares about.

'need a ride?'

'thought you'd never ask, big boy.'

okay, so he wants you to dress up like his mother. weird, but whatever. and he wants to call you cherri. uh, okay. and he's got this 'ultimate sex toy' contraption he made in his basement -- uh, we'll pass on that. that's a niche market thing, pal, find someone else for that.

are we whores? you betcha.

The main issue with his post is a terminology problem. He thinks a writer's voice is the voice (or voices) in their head. In that context, it makes sense that he doesn't think you can use your own voice. Writing out an unedited version of your thoughts wouldn't make for a good read for someone else.

Most writers talk about their voice as the filter between their thoughts and writing it down. It's how to make the thoughts understandable and entertaining, without losing what the author wanted to say in the first place.

As a result, it means he doesn't understand what people mean when they discuss voice... and other people don't understand what he means when he discusses voice. Generally I skip blog posts like that. There's no point trying to debate something when everyone has a different dictionary. Everyone can end up agreeing but nobody will realise they're agreeing.

Exactly Polenth. This guy doesn't actually know what "voice" means.

As far as what Devil has been saying I would have to disagree. Voice in my opinion can be cultivated. I think it has to come from a personal place, it still has to be you, but it can be altered. Think of it as style. My body will always be my body, what I look like etc. But I look very different in jeans and a tee-shirt than when I am all dressed up. It's still me, I am being true to myself and I like how I look in both looks, but there are times when I have dressed up and others haven't even recognised me at first.

So too is it the same with my voice. The voice I use in my current writing (my MG novels) is very me. In fact when people who know me read it they comment how it sounds just like me talking. My blog again I've been told sounds just like me, but it is a bit more formal, a bit more intellectual at times. And if I write an essay or article, then I become all academic sounding. And yet people still tell me it sounds like something I would say. Now none of these is more me than the other, they just represent different aspects.

To me the key is finding the element in your voice that makes you you, which is very tricky considering we've been taught from a very young age what the "right" way is to write. We may all have a natural voice, but it doesn't mean we all know what it is.

Similarly, I think it is possible to write in very different voices on purpose. To write a detective novel with one voice, a fantasy in another, and a coming of age story again in a voice that is completely different. It is possible to play with voice, to try things out, to change your voice completely, or to emulate someone else.

But I do think it's a process, and something worth being aware about, just as we are aware of all the other aspects of our writing.

Well, it seems to me that there are plenty of posers out there, but people need to learn how to write sometime. Back in the day they would have written literary criticism and newspaper articles. Now its all in blogs and forum postings.

I don't think one's writing voice just is there. When I write things on different days, they can seem very different.

I'm wondering if some of us have not quite understood what he was trying to say. I think he actually means the opposite of what the OP interpreted him to mean. Granted, I think his point could use more clarity. He explains it a bit better in this post #12.

I wonder if I was too abstruse about my point here? What I’m trying to drive home is how UTTERLY anyone who aspires to be a “creative” writer needs to break through the massive, intrinsic, almost instinctive desire to take seriously anything but their internal imperative to create art via the (increasingly archaic) form of printed words on a page. My point is that being a successful creative writer means you have to do what’s basically impossible, which is to never for a moment concern yourself with what anyone but you feels about your work. Because considering the needs, tastes, and interests of anyone or anything but your Inner Creative Genius is tantamount to telling that genius that even though he/she/it is pretty good, they’re not quite good enough — that they need the validation of outside affirmation before they’re really worth something. And that drive toward objective validation of what must be a subjective phenomenon is what rips out the heart of that phenomenon. Worrying about the end of art is what kills the means of art.
I’m totally fascinated by the relationship between art and commerce–that is, the area in which being an artist and making a LIVING being an artist become common. That’s a weird, difficult place. I’m trying to maybe help people not get swallowed up in that particular Bermuda Triangle. And the only way to do that is to ignore everything outside yourself, and go for the creative expression of pure, arrogant, indulgent, child-like, Up Yours art. NEVER worry about what anyone thinks of your work–and take seriously how nearly impossible it is to truly and consistently feel that way. MAKE yourself feel that way. Trust in the integrity of the true creative process. When creating art, pay heed to NOTHING but what that art is TELLING you it needs you to do. Worry about what anyone will think of the result of that art, and you’re hosed.
When it comes to doing the kind of writing that I personally find the most rewarding to do, it’s all about the free fall.

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I'm interpreting him as saying we won't find our true voice until we stop consciously trying to find it. We have to let ourselves write from brain/heart to paper without letting any external forces change how we are saying what we want to say. IMO, this is an ideal, obviously, since it's near impossible to achieve, but it brings us closer to our true voice. Which is, in the end, what he holds as a good thing.

At least that's how I'm understanding it. And it makes some sense to me.

c.e.

We've all taken something completely different from this guy's post. And from that, it seems to me...he might not be the greatest writer out there. He can't articulate his ideas well enough for an audience to understand his point clearly, and respond accordingly. That is not the mark of genius. It is a lack of clarity.

So...maybe we shouldn't take him as seriously as he takes himself.

Writing is about writing. The rest seems rather optional, to me.

Yes...voice can be altered, Toothpaste. I agree on that one. I love an author who can spin out books with radically different voice. Michael Chabon (I know, I know...I bring him up far too much!) is a fine example. His voice is different in almost every book he creates. He's a real chameleon. But the part that come from 'his personal place' is always there.

To me, "this guy," John Shore, has a good grasp of honest writing. As to voice, that term to me implies how I use style, diction, syntax, dialogue, how I develop characters, all the choices I make in a consistent manner that a reader can recognize as my "voice." It is not in my head, it has come from years of practice at the craft, editing, listening to readers, and deciding how I want my story to work.

Regardless of my choice of tense, point of view, time period, genre (I hate that word), my interpretation of the story and characters in it should come across with my voice, the way I set it down on the page.

When I read other writers, I pick up their voice. Joan Didion, for example, strikes me as a unique voice I have not found elsewhere. Her style is tight, terse, masculine in many ways, and yet poetic. Her choices of plot device, telegraphing, characterizing, dialog, are crisp and original. I like that style, I enjoy reading it, and when I set down to write my own story after reading hers, some of her voice creeps into mine for a while, but not for long because it isn't me. It's Didion.

This voice business is such an esoteric thing that it really evolves from experience. It's the product of one's practice of the writing craft, and once it comes forth, you realize it was nothing you could engineer or "find" or concoct. It is just there, and it is you and the way you write.

I think this is what agents and editors talk about when they say they are looking for a new voice. It's not some snappy, artsy prose that stretches the language. It's more a way of story-telling that sounds original, moves the emotions. It still has to be a good story well told, but the way in which you express it is uniquely yours and cannot be borrowed or copied without it being recognized as such.

After reading his "clarification", if that was the guy's point, why didn't he say it first instead of 12th?

'We've all taken something completely different from this guy's post. And from that, it seems to me...he might not be the greatest writer out there. He can't articulate his ideas well enough for an audience to understand his point clearly, and respond accordingly. That is not the mark of genius. It is a lack of clarity.

'So...maybe we shouldn't take him as seriously as he takes himself.'

i'm onboard with this sentiment. what's funny here is these guys who try to sound oh-so-smart and *demand* artistic freedom will write the most banal, by-the-numbers trash you can find. that or it's so devoid of anything resembling a cohesive story that you could arrange the pages in any order you want and still wind up with the same mess. i think i smell a philsophy major here. they're easy to spot, but i recommend following them around only if you've got a wide-mouth shovel for all their bullshit.

so, his 'advice' is to write entirely what you want the way you want it with no outside opinion? is that the gestalt of what he's babbling about? if so, then he's got my permission. the slush pile is always hungry for more. if, on the other hand, you've got a brain in your head, then you surely realize that publishing is a BUSINESS that's trying to sell PRODUCT (i.e., your story, marlow). if you can sell a million copies of your book without 'lowering' yourself, great. you're one in a million.

if you realize there has to be a compromize between 'art' and commerce, you'll do good to do your own market research, find out what people actually buy, and do the best job you can. you want to be published, right? assuming for a second people know what they like, the more you can give that to them the more books you'll sell. ohmygawd, what a mean, viscious thing to say!

'oh, Preyer, are you saying you should sacrifice your ART to make money?!'

yes. up to a certain point anyway. what, you don't like money? i sure do. and if my editor feels i need to add some beef to the romantic subplot, okay, we can try it your way and see how that works.

what amazes me is how a person can enter into the commercial arena and expect to *not* bend their 'artistic vision.' but it's imperative the dwarf has a limp and the elf an eyepatch! yeah, right, whatever. eight pages worth 'imperative'?

this guy sounds as if what he writes has something to say.

i hate that.

the fact that a publishing house manage to stay in business is testament to their ability to produce sellable product. product, not art. if you can't differentiate between the two, or unwilling to 'sacrifice' a bit of your 'art' if and when you have to for the sake of making a living wage, hold on to that day job. PA exists in part due to 'artists' unwilling to have their 'work' 'tampered with' by money-hungry editors.

sorry, i also don't agree that after ten books you realize you know nothing. if you haven't figured out this writing thing for the most part after deca-books on the shelves, something's wrong.

Hi, I'm John Shore

If I can just say, it is soooo weird to read this sort of dialogue about something you wrote. Which, I know, isn't saying much. But still. It IS ... odd. Kinda fun. Kinda not, too, of course, given the fairly amazing level of hostility evinced by so many here. What in the world is up with THAT, anyway? What are so many people here so royally pissed off about?

I didn't find the original quotes objectionable at all. I also didn't read into them any of what the original poster did. I haven't checked out the blog, so I don't have the context, but the original quotes seemed just to be saying "don't be self-indulgent." I think that's good advice.

I don't see anything in the quotes (which I've copied below) suggesting that writers should ignore their interests and write for the market. I do see advice that writers should expand their interests beyond themselves. Excellent advice. Why would I pull out a pitchfork??

Perhaps the OP read into that advice to expand interest beyond the writer's self to expand interests beyond what actually interests them (ie--write for the market not out of passion). Is that what you thought? I guess I could see getting that, in a very convoluted way, but I don't think it's what was said. I think the advice was that a writer should be interested in the world around them, in all kinds of people, curious about life, willing to challenge their assumptions. To stop, as someone upthread said, navel-gazing.

I honestly don't get the problem.

If you are someone who is trying to find their own writing voice, stop it. Take up a different hobby. Building models is fun. So is gardening. When it comes to pleasurable pastimes, you can’t beat wondering whether or not something growing out the ground is edible. So pick up that trowel and that pack of seeds, get out in the dirt, and stop pondering how to find your own writing voice. Do it now. Or buy a glue gun. Or a crocheting kit. Something. But do give up on finding your own writing voice.

Here’s the bottom line: Someone who is more interested in themselves than they are the world at large probably won’t make it as a writer. You have to be insanely empathetic to be a writer. To be a writer you have to think everything is more interesting than you.

Writing isn’t about exercising your ego. It’s about erasing your ego. It’s about getting out of the way of whatever needs to be said, so that it can be said in a way that does justice to the thing that’s telling you what you need to say about it.

Would-be writers are forever wanting to share themselves with the world. Fair enough; that’s a big part of writing, for sure. But if, in being totally honest with yourself, you find that you are more interested in sharing yourself with the world than you are with, in essence, sharing the world with the world, then save yourself the trouble, and stop imagining you’re a writer. You’re not.

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and........

Few people love writing queries. Most prefer smashing their heads into brick walls whilst standing on shards of glass. When we're writing queries, we're attempting to write to satisfy the needs of the agent/publisher while writing about what we wrote.

For me, tucked in the security of my office, I write and love/hate/like what I've written but I'm the only audience I'm attempting to satisfy. With the query, there's the "other person" whose attention we wish to capture. For many, it's daunting. I wonder if this is what the blogger is addressing; paying as much attention to our reader when writing as we pay to our prospective agents/publishers?

clearrr said:

paying as much attention to our reader when writing as we pay to our prospective agents/publishers?

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What's the difference?

When I'm writing a query, every word is measured to achieve a positive response in the agent, (stumbling along, as I might). When I'm writing the story, the words are tools in service of the story. The MC may have started out as a two-headed dragon with serious schizophrenic tendencies but I change the MC into a flower-loving werewolf. The agent's instructional sheet, his/her requirements, tone, word usage doesn't change and I have to keep aiming for that static target.