This weekend I finished reading a book and realized with horror that I had nothing to read!* In a mild panic, I scoured my bookshelf for something I hadn't read enough times to be able to outline the plot from memory. My eye fell on
Ursula K. Le Guin's book,
A Wizard of Earthsea. That might work. Poking around the author's
website, I ran across a wonderful little article that might be of interest to anyone who is engaged in writing or reading fiction. The article is called
A Message About Messages, and it describes exactly how I look at meaning and message in fiction. Here's a little teaser:
Readers—kids and adults—ask me about the message of one story or another. I want to say to them, "Your question isn't in the right language."
As a fiction writer, I don't speak message. I speak story. Sure, my story means something, but if you want to know what it means, you have to ask the question in terms appropriate to storytelling. Terms such as message are appropriate to expository writing, didactic writing, and sermons—different languages from fiction.
* "Nothing to read" in this case means "no unread work of fiction that suited my current mood."
9 Comments:
I love this article. I so want to become fluent in that language.
Me too, Serenity. It's a language that sometimes gets ignored in modern life. Our text messages, emails, sound bites, passive entertainment, and public relations campaigns tend to focus on messages rather than stories, on ideas rather than narratives, and on proclamations rather than dialogue. I'm convinced, though, that it is the language of the soul, with each of our stories intertwining into the Story of the universe.
I'm convinced of that as well, and it's such a beautiful realization.
I just finished reading Frank Herbert's DUNE. That's some good sci-fi, and it has 5 books after it (Matt is on book 3). If you haven't read it, I think you would really like it.
I've read the first 2--or 3, I can't remember--it got pretty weird as I recall, but it is a very rich and engrossing world. I like it because it is more from the view of sociology/ecology than the typical military/technology focus you tend to get in sci-fi.
I agree. Matt said the 2 books after Dune were kinda hard to read, but the 3rd book was really interesting, even though the main guy is a giant worm as well as some sort of god of the universe. So far I've only read book 1 and really liked it. I figured you had probably read some of them since you like sci-fi.
Hmmm. Maybe I'll have to pick them up again. It's been long enough that I can probably start over without feeling bored!
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini. I recommend it unreservedly, though it will cause you pain.
I'll check it out. Thanks.
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