Wednesday 28 September 2011

Writers without borders

So I wrote 1,000 words a day after I came back from my holiday, sometimes even more (good -girl-patting-my-own-shoulder-thing-going-on-at-this-moment). I felt good about writing too.

I entered three competitions, started a new short story and went on with my "novel".

The thing is, although at the beginning writing became easier, I now find it extremely hard to go on with my stories. It's like a spell has been lifted or the effect of some kind of drug is wearing off. So I don't write. But I find that writing about not writing is quite idiotic, so I'll try not to write about not writing.

Instead I'll write about why I think I don't write, which is far more interesting.

The problem is, I have a context issue: My stories seem to be lacking a sense of place and this is due to the fact that I come from country A, live in country B, but write in language of country C. Get my predicament here?

I have no idea, where my heroes come from, what language they speak, where they lead their lives and what kind of events or cultural influences have shaped them, because I am a freak of contemporary open geographic borders that allow you to move anywhere in the EU and the necessary language mixing that goes along with that. Anyone else have that problem? Cause I could really use some help here.
Seriously.
Pretty pleeease.

Don't get me wrong, I think the fact that I have so far managed to combine all of the above is pretty damn cool. BUT! It does get confusing sometimes...

For example: When I write in English, what should I say when my heroes want to - say - measure something. You laugh? I don't. Because I use the metric system and I find miles and inches and feet and stones and whatever other sorts of measurement units there are, pretty irritating.

But say I use a converter for this sort of stuff. That is something I can actually solve. What about education systems? What if my hero doesn't go to college? Or doesn't eat peanut butter sandwiches?  Or starts drinking alcohol at the age of 18? The writing-language thing tends to get in my way in these issues. Is English just the medium I use for the story, or is it part of the story itself?? Do I even make sense?

Seriously, if you can throw a bone my way, even a teeny-tiny one, I would reeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaly appreciate it. 

Until then, I will assume the fetal position and cry myself to sleep.

2 comments:

  1. OK, on an unrelated note, this was written in September but my google reader just picked it up...wtf? As far as your predicament is concerned, let me just say that I totally understand where you're coming from. If I now may offer an opinion, and I don't know if it's a good one, I would simply say...forget what language you speak, where you live, and what language you're writing in. Construct your characters from scratch, take nothing for granted, and assume that even they (your characters) may be as multi-cultural as you are, or for that matter, completely ignorant :-)

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  2. Listen to the poet, "τη γλώσσα μου έδωσαν ελληνική".

    Your way of writing in English is excellent though.

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