flâneur
Walking, which is when most productive thoughts come, the thought occurred this morning that there are essentially three kinds of writing. They overlap of course and cut across poetry, fiction, prose etc but are clearly separate. There is writing to express an idea whether aesthetic, political, ethical or otherwise. There is writing as a purely aesthetic concern, based on sound. Or like music like film like painting or dance. And there is writing to convey character. None of these is intrinsically superior to the others but I prefer the last two and find writing to convey character the most challenging and interesting. Though writing as a purely aesthetic concern is easily the most personally rewarding.
Going back to the beginning the usual mode of thought walking anywhere is dialogue. Imaginary interviews or talking-heads exploring positions or a combination of both. Today's subject was writing scripts. The starting point was a belief that when you're writing dialogue and you want it to live or you want to create believable characters then you can't be precious about your words. The character's reaction to circumstance, the essentials of their personality, their environment and circumstances can all be largely settled by the writer. But speech is a tricky thing, better to give your actors the outline of what happens and perhaps what they say and let them sort out the specifics.
The question that followed is what about really skilled writers? What about people who's words are amazing in themselves? Taking dramatists what about Shakespeare, what about Beckett, what about Sarah Kane? Clearly while psychologically convincing characters may sometimes or always be the intention for these writers rendering a documentary record of speech isn't. This isn't a fault. In much of Beckett and Kane especially such an approach would be grossly dissonant and weaken their work if not destroy it all together. It's evidently a personal approach - perhaps shared by others - that isn't necessary to great drama.
So if drama doesn't require improvised and realistic speech what does it require? Well story is one thing, though not necessarily. Political and philosophical ideas are another, but again they're not essential. Character is a third, but not always. If it's a script of ideas or a script that's composed like a piece of music then character can be secondary, peripheral or absent. And so it occurred to me that there were three different kinds of writing that could be mixed in different proportions. Writing to express an idea, writing as a purely aesthetic concern, and writing to convey character.
Interrogation of this theory hasn't been exhaustive yet but it does seem to hold as a way to interpret texts. I'll write more on this, there are aspects of each of the three kinds of writing it'll be interesting to look at in more depth. Keep watching.
Going back to the beginning the usual mode of thought walking anywhere is dialogue. Imaginary interviews or talking-heads exploring positions or a combination of both. Today's subject was writing scripts. The starting point was a belief that when you're writing dialogue and you want it to live or you want to create believable characters then you can't be precious about your words. The character's reaction to circumstance, the essentials of their personality, their environment and circumstances can all be largely settled by the writer. But speech is a tricky thing, better to give your actors the outline of what happens and perhaps what they say and let them sort out the specifics.
The question that followed is what about really skilled writers? What about people who's words are amazing in themselves? Taking dramatists what about Shakespeare, what about Beckett, what about Sarah Kane? Clearly while psychologically convincing characters may sometimes or always be the intention for these writers rendering a documentary record of speech isn't. This isn't a fault. In much of Beckett and Kane especially such an approach would be grossly dissonant and weaken their work if not destroy it all together. It's evidently a personal approach - perhaps shared by others - that isn't necessary to great drama.
So if drama doesn't require improvised and realistic speech what does it require? Well story is one thing, though not necessarily. Political and philosophical ideas are another, but again they're not essential. Character is a third, but not always. If it's a script of ideas or a script that's composed like a piece of music then character can be secondary, peripheral or absent. And so it occurred to me that there were three different kinds of writing that could be mixed in different proportions. Writing to express an idea, writing as a purely aesthetic concern, and writing to convey character.
Interrogation of this theory hasn't been exhaustive yet but it does seem to hold as a way to interpret texts. I'll write more on this, there are aspects of each of the three kinds of writing it'll be interesting to look at in more depth. Keep watching.
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