Lesson 3/9 conversation between me and myself
“"There Is A Voice Inside Of You
That Whispers All Day Long..” Shel Silverstein
That Whispers All Day Long..” Shel Silverstein
“I don’t think you should continue writing,” Ed (my inner editor) said one early morning as I was ticking along on the keyboard, as I do every morning.
“What? You need to raise your voice? I can’t hear you through the clicking of the keys.”
“I don’t think you should write, you are not a very good writer,”
“Excuse me, who are you to tell me? “
“I am your inner critic and the voice of your future readers, trust me, I know what I am talking about.”
“But you always tell me how good my English is, almost as good is as if it was my mother tongue,” by now I am not writing anymore, just gazing at the screen.
“Your English is fine, but not for creative writing,”
“Fine for what then?” I hate that quiver in my voice suggesting that he actually got to me.
“Oh, let me see,” what a smug SOB, I wish he wouldn’t sound so satisfied with himself.
“If you put a lot of effort into it you can, at some point, master the ability to write proper English.”
He stops for a minute as if collecting his thoughts,
“You keep breaking the grammar rules and your punctuation skills are at best, poor.”
“Hey, that’s not fair, you know this is not my mother tongue, you know how hard I work.”
“Hard, does not make up for amateurish writing, just face the truth.”
“I know of many writers who while writing take the liberty of breaking the accepted rules. I can name few if you want.”
“So what, now you’re comparing yourself to well known writers? They can break the rules because they know them.” Again that conceit tone that makes me cringe inside and raise my voice.
“Creative writing is about having something to say,” I try to divert the argument to a safer ground.
“And saying it in a fresh and interesting way.” I continue,
“And not about grammar rules,” I conclude my argument and feel victorious.
“Have it your way,” I hate these words,
“It’s not my way, it’s the way.” That quiver again.
“Whatever, I was just trying to help.”
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Over the summer, as you suggested, I finally read Lolita (in Hebrew) and just loved it, tried some of it in English too. The first two sentences translated a little differently in Hebrew, here they are
לולטה,הילת ימי,להט לילותי. חטאיי,חיי, לו-לי-טה.
The translator gave a whole scholarly explanation to the freedom she took which resulted, in my mind, in a sentence just as magnificent. Anyways, there is a whole long discussion of Nabokov use or misuse of the English language which I found very interesting.
“Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. *My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta.
She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita.” Vladimir Nabokov
She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita.” Vladimir Nabokov
**Nabokov's detractors fault him for being an aesthete and for his over-attention to language and detail rather than character development. In his essay "Nabokov, or Nostalgia", Nabokov's is "a magnificent, complex, and sterile art". Russian poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko said in a Playboy interview that he could hear the clatter of surgical tools in Nabokov's prose…
I think that Yevtushenko is definitely on to something, but what makes 'Lolita' immortal is the sense that here at least, Nabokov's tale overwhelms his aesthetic frigidity.
ReplyDeleteHis other books may be more the clever puzzle than the 'character development' novel detractors prefer, but surely that is not a fault in 'Lolita.'
Glad to see that MS Word's editor is awake and on the job, catching sentence frags each and every time. So let's make the MS editor and your inner editor happy by improving Nabokov's sloppy English prose: "Lolita was the light of my life, the fire of my loins, my sin, my soul."
Much better, eh!
Here's the thing, Ed. After a point writing is not about being a good writer. After a point, we are all 'good writers.' Not perfect in every regard, but 'good.' That is no longer an issue.
The issue is 'what then?' What do you do with your adequate tool? What do you have to say, what new wine can you find for the old bottles, what sort of voice speaks through that prose?
If it makes you feel better, 20th C. classic American novelist Theodore Dreiser was an atrocious stylist who someone once said was the best American novelist not writing in English.
:-) Thanks.
ReplyDeleteI wish I could translate the Hebrew version, the changes due to the choice of words are really interesting.