I’ve been busy as of late. While I wouldn’t say it has led to immediate fruition, I can certainly say it has been helping. I had the urge to share this as I read through Michael Andre-Driussi’s Lexicon Urthus: A Dictionary for the Urth Cycle. So far it’s been brilliant as a fan’s debrief to the insanely complex lore of Gene Wolfe’s Urth Cycle. Beyond its interpretation of the book’s many forking paths, it also features a comprehensive collection of unusual phrases and terms that I would never have thought to use, had I not come across them here. It also reinforces my belief that Wolfe is one of the finest writers to come out of the American SFF scene. I hope to do a blog on him some day, when I can consider myself mature enough to comment on his larger work.
Part of writing this blog came from Michael’s book reinvigorating my desire to expand my repertoire, but it also has to do with what I’ve been working on. Why? Well for practical reasons it helps me explore new ways of portraying concepts and experiences, even tones of language that certain other words simply cannot do. Of course this is essential to writing creative fiction, but it’s helpful when you’re working in other media as well. In my current experience of writing for games, I find myself thinking back to my previous blog on the Elder Scrolls and Michael Kirkbride, and how underappreciated I think his work has been. When it comes to building worlds or enticing people with fascinating stories, you really have to do more than an interesting premise. You have to do your homework. Part of why people find the works of writers like Melville or Shakespeare so memorable is the care and consideration into which every word is taken when put to paper. As Wolfe says himself: “I thought them the best ones for the story I was trying to tell.” It’s important to know that as a writer, your words have meaning beyond what they imply: the very choice of your words can paint the picture, so to speak.
“Why did you use so many funny words?” Because I thought them the best ones for the story I was trying to tell. We who write fiction try to make each character speak in character; Severian, for example, should talk like a thoughtful man whose education has been in a practical discipline. In just the same way, a book should speak like the sort of book it is — and it is, by a delightful paradox, the sort of book that its language makes it.
Lexicon Urthus: A Dictionary for the Urth Cycle, FOREWORD (Gene Wolfe, 1994)
I’ve tried numerous ways of explaining this process before, but I find Wolfe’s quote to sum it up best. Of course, it never quite feels like you’re doing it right, because these certain choices of words can elicit many different reactions, from confusion to downright irritation. To be honest, I find it comes with the territory — especially when it’s to do with my own topics and ideas for engaging fiction. Moments of surreal and fantastical origins call for the right signification. All you can hope for afterwards is if the readers can understand – maybe even appreciate – this necessity.
How does one wrestle with their vocabulary in order to improve it? Well the simple answer would be along the lines of “read a book” or “consult your dictionaries”. All well and good, but sometimes memory doesn’t serve you as well as others, so you have to rely on utilizing what you have. How do you bend these terms into something that exists alongside their intended voices? Some would say having a general level of intelligence might help; experience in the vain of the old storyteller; emotional maturity or deductive reasoning. They all seem viable to me. What is my answer? No idea, that’s why I’m still at it.
scottsthoughtson 