June 11th, 2010 / 2:32 pm
Snippets
Snippets
Alec Niedenthal—
How important is the presence of specific clothing/architecture to your writing? Do you write about them well? Do you ignore them to some extent? Are you scared of them, like I am?
I love using clothing as a detail in fiction. I read an essay once about the ways that Alice Munro used fashion in her writing. I can’t remember where I read it, so that’s no help, but I do remember that it was interesting.
A wall.
I love using clothing as a detail in fiction. I read an essay once about the ways that Alice Munro used fashion in her writing. I can’t remember where I read it, so that’s no help, but I do remember that it was interesting.
A wall.
I first learned to write by describing clothing and various aspects of architecture – the key to writing about them is knowing the nomenclature which most writers/people do not. However, I scarcely use either unless it is going to drive a part of a character or the story. When it will be useful – I find photos of what I see in my mind so I have an actual visual reference to relate to. Clothing almost always something I have or my wife has already so what gets written about is more the texture than anything. I love the mouth feel of touch words.
I first learned to write by describing clothing and various aspects of architecture – the key to writing about them is knowing the nomenclature which most writers/people do not. However, I scarcely use either unless it is going to drive a part of a character or the story. When it will be useful – I find photos of what I see in my mind so I have an actual visual reference to relate to. Clothing almost always something I have or my wife has already so what gets written about is more the texture than anything. I love the mouth feel of touch words.
Well Munro is the shit. I had one of her collections on my shelf for better than a year and then I went to a birthday party for a reader and took the book and meant to leave it and then started reading one of the stories and she wrote about this guy hacking phlegm in such restrained yet lurid detail that I couldn’t leave it. Which is to say, Munro does details well.
Well Munro is the shit. I had one of her collections on my shelf for better than a year and then I went to a birthday party for a reader and took the book and meant to leave it and then started reading one of the stories and she wrote about this guy hacking phlegm in such restrained yet lurid detail that I couldn’t leave it. Which is to say, Munro does details well.