Blog 43
I received an unexpected letter
earlier today. It was from a former colleague I haven’t seen in forty-five
years though we have remained in touch – exchanged cards at Christmas, the
decreasingly occasional letter, kept up with extended family developments.
Apparently, Sandy had purchased and read my latest publication, the story collection,
Uplift:
Sunrise Stories. The thrust of her letter was to share the impact of
the stories.
Her subsequent critique was
sobering, leading me to reflect upon my writing, never a bad idea. As a young
writer, feedback – especially unrequested – left me nervous, ill-at-ease,
likely defensive and possibly even prickly. This time, I leaned into it, able
to digest her feedback with minimal anxiety. An advantage of age? Maybe.
Overall, her impressions were positive as she indicated how several of the
stories had affected her. Knowing her, I was unsurprised at the stories she was
most comfortable with.
What struck me most was the
difficulty she reported with my vocabulary. This startled me. As an incipient
writer fifty years ago (likely more than), I had a tendency to deaden my
creative efforts with turgid vocab. My initial effort at a novel was so
over-weighted, so swollen, so wordy,
as to be unreadable. It has remained (and will remain) unpublished. Gradually,
with dedicated effort, I’d worked assiduously to sand away the weighty words
for the sake of the reader’s reading rhythm. Anything that interferes with
reading comfort has the potential to flatten a story. Remove the pleasure of
reading a story and you are left with what? I thought I’d put that tempo-destructive
problem behind me.
It is my belief that chosen
language must always be appropriate to the type or genre of writing and the
reading audience. Without language sensitivity appropriate to the expectations
of one’s readers, exactly who is the writer writing for? At essence, language
is what it is all about, the tool for effective communication. And who decides
what is appropriate? The reader. The reader decides. Sandy decided.
I plan to write Sandy, to thank her not only for purchasing my book, but for her generous feedback. I will be more closely examining my most recent efforts under the lens of her experience. I also plan to check with a few fellow writers as well as other readers to see how Sandy’s experience compares.
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