I love this, Leslie! As usual! Thinking about your choices as a writer in 1985 40 years later takes some pluck!! But did you tell us the last line that your friend liked??
Yes...the quoted section about being like where the water and sky blur at the horizon. Guess I didn't make that clear! I so appreciate your continued interest in my ramblings. XOXOX
Interesting thoughts/questions about writing outside one's experience. This is an extreme example since you weren't gay or married or a mother, but you write outside your experiences a lot, don't you?...when you include men and kids in your stories and describe their actions. For my story, I wrote dialogue for 30-somethings (female and male), 50-somethings (female and male), and a 90-something woman, and I worked hard to keep in mind how the 30-somethings in my life talk, how my mother spoke in her 90s, and I what I sounded like in my 50s. I also thought about how my 50s stepson talks and about what I see/hear on TV, at the movies, and at the gym. Is this different from what you're talking about? P.S. I have a writer in my story!...but so does The Great Gatsby, so I think I'm good:). There's also a dream, but I think it works.
I'm referring more to the current and ongoing conversation about the bigger picture of writing outside one's life i.e. whether a white writer cam/should write a Black POV character or, more so, a Black story. (This is just one example.) In the story I talk about here, a more modern view might suggest I "shouldn't" write a gay woman's POV. The issue is really too vast and complicated and nuanced to cover in a Substack comment box but if you want to read more, Google <cultural appropriation in literary writing.> Also...who's the writer in Gatsby??
I love this, Leslie! As usual! Thinking about your choices as a writer in 1985 40 years later takes some pluck!! But did you tell us the last line that your friend liked??
Yes...the quoted section about being like where the water and sky blur at the horizon. Guess I didn't make that clear! I so appreciate your continued interest in my ramblings. XOXOX
Oh, thank you, I expect it was just me not reading closely enough! I love ramblings! Keep up the great work! ♥️
This is such a lovely post. I love that last line!
Thank you for reading!! XOXOX
Thank you for including the last line! I was going to complain if it was omitted - LOL.
And congrats to you and your book--!!! So fabulous!
Interesting thoughts/questions about writing outside one's experience. This is an extreme example since you weren't gay or married or a mother, but you write outside your experiences a lot, don't you?...when you include men and kids in your stories and describe their actions. For my story, I wrote dialogue for 30-somethings (female and male), 50-somethings (female and male), and a 90-something woman, and I worked hard to keep in mind how the 30-somethings in my life talk, how my mother spoke in her 90s, and I what I sounded like in my 50s. I also thought about how my 50s stepson talks and about what I see/hear on TV, at the movies, and at the gym. Is this different from what you're talking about? P.S. I have a writer in my story!...but so does The Great Gatsby, so I think I'm good:). There's also a dream, but I think it works.
I'm referring more to the current and ongoing conversation about the bigger picture of writing outside one's life i.e. whether a white writer cam/should write a Black POV character or, more so, a Black story. (This is just one example.) In the story I talk about here, a more modern view might suggest I "shouldn't" write a gay woman's POV. The issue is really too vast and complicated and nuanced to cover in a Substack comment box but if you want to read more, Google <cultural appropriation in literary writing.> Also...who's the writer in Gatsby??
I see—and I’ll take a look:). Isn’t Daisy’s cousin a writer? I just rewatched the movie a few months ago…the narrator?…who I think is her cousin…
That's the Leo DiCaprio movie...in the book no one is a writer.
Thanks! I read the book so long ago, I forgot:).
F. Scott did break a "rule" or two in GATSBY, but not the "don't write about writers" rule!
Love this trip down memory lane, and that is cracking me up about the mailing addresses ;)
I know, right??!?