tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3458341.post5984610905510737809..comments2024-01-06T10:36:04.084-05:00Comments on A Commonplace Blog: All the sad young onlooker narratorsD. G. Myershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10659136455045567825noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3458341.post-81876493977624214392013-05-20T19:45:47.751-04:002013-05-20T19:45:47.751-04:00Brideshead Revisited and The Go- between?Brideshead Revisited and The Go- between?zmkchttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08972549292961948240noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3458341.post-25188793643290372732013-05-16T13:53:21.251-04:002013-05-16T13:53:21.251-04:00What about Lambert Strether in The Ambassadors: th...What about Lambert Strether in <i>The Ambassadors</i>: the big family drama takes place right behind him, almost invisibly, while he's busy telling us about his role in the big family drama. He's the only person in the novel who thinks he's at the center of the action, while the family knows he's just an errand boy. It takes a long time for that to become clear to the reader.scott g.f.baileyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05726743149139510832noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3458341.post-37638333183538522992013-05-16T05:35:36.142-04:002013-05-16T05:35:36.142-04:00Tom's mention of how there are two narrators i...Tom's mention of how there are two narrators in 'Wuthering Heights' reminds me of 'Melmoth the Wanderer' - an Irish Gothic novel about an immortal in which one story encloses by another like a series of Russian Dolls. Just to make things even more confusing, Maturin rarely bothers using multiple quotation marks to indicate which story is a subset of which.Aonghus Fallonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09434527113873901741noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3458341.post-75047519418600808542013-05-16T01:09:17.692-04:002013-05-16T01:09:17.692-04:00I'm so glad to see your kindly reference to th...I'm so glad to see your kindly reference to the now unread and unknown Calder Willingham, in my youth one of my favorite writers, whom Norman Mailer described in ADVERTISEMENTS FOR MYSELF as "a clown with the bite of a ferret." (Mailer also said, "He has written what may be the funniest dialogue of our time.") Willingham's magnificent huge hilarious dirty violent cynical richly colorful pull-out-all-the-stops Southern Gothic novel, ETERNAL FIRE, is the first book I ever read that truly thrilled me. (Newsweek said that it "deserves a place among the dozen or so novels that must be mentioned if one is to speak of greatness in American fiction.") Only on later rereadings in college did I come to appreciate the deadpan humor of its Chaucerian opening paragraph, tornadoes, orbs, and all:<br /><br />"In this peaceful land, pretty birds sing and the woodbine twines. Violets and forget-me-nots bloom in the meadow. The wind is soft as a baby's smile, and as warm and gentle as mother love. Only an occasional random tornado moils the scene and disrupts nature. True, the summer sun is a fiery furnace; it boils the blood, cooks the brain, and spreads a fever in the bones. But that same fearful orb, in collaboration with the sweet rain generated by its power, makes the little flowers grow."Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01749974029881707026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3458341.post-21108438001384244722013-05-15T11:56:14.325-04:002013-05-15T11:56:14.325-04:00My narrator for a novel I'm working upon is th...My narrator for a novel I'm working upon is the editor of the volume. But he also a character and, he admits, a fabricator of parts of the story or history that are missing. I only say this to add a writer's voice to thread: this sort of narrator is wonderfully interesting and produces/reveals surprising ideas about all of the usual assumptions attending narrative/narrator. The process becomes self-inventing and fascinating. There is a new level of motivation.PMHhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01848296275862900483noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3458341.post-83600953243658768872013-05-14T18:39:22.851-04:002013-05-14T18:39:22.851-04:00I know DGM isn't a fan of the book, but what a...I know DGM isn't a fan of the book, but what about the narrator of 'The Secret History'? Aonghus Fallonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09434527113873901741noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3458341.post-77705417688605074012013-05-14T17:40:18.687-04:002013-05-14T17:40:18.687-04:00It's been a while since I read it, but doesn&#...It's been a while since I read it, but doesn't Gunter Grass's <i>Dog Years</i> have this sort of peripheral narrator?scott g.f.baileyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05726743149139510832noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3458341.post-91023037505195402822013-05-14T16:45:21.265-04:002013-05-14T16:45:21.265-04:00I've always been fascinated by the "frien...I've always been fascinated by the "friend who lives on to tell the tale" type. Often it is my favorite character (see, Horatio in <i>Hamlet</i>; the Apostle John; Samwise Gamgee in <i>The Lord of the Rings</i>; Christian in <i>Moulin Rouge</i>). In my own writing, I've twice tried using that character as the narrator. It is difficult to walk the line of keeping that character as the onlooker, rather than the focus, which may be one reason why it is so rarely used. As I tweeted, even when the narrator remains peripheral to the action, to the reader he or she often becomes the "hero" simply by familiarity and resonance.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03761174624651510356noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3458341.post-12361997078258536262013-05-14T14:30:17.770-04:002013-05-14T14:30:17.770-04:00If you are going to write about HJ in this connect...If you are going to write about HJ in this connection, Tom, you need to consider <i>What Maisie Knew</i>, which might be described as a third-person onlooker novel. The narrative consciousness is limited to, well, what Maisie knows about her parents’ terrible marriage.<br /><br />Francine Prose rewrote the novel many years later as <i>Primitive People</i>.D. G. Myershttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10659136455045567825noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3458341.post-23446178373595456082013-05-14T14:27:56.717-04:002013-05-14T14:27:56.717-04:00Wuthering Heights deftly emplys double onlooker na...<i>Wuthering Heights</i> deftly emplys <i>double</i> onlooker narrators. The onlooker who writes the story is in turn told the story by another (closer, likely more active) onlooker. A pretty good trick.<br /><br />Esther Summerson provides another interesting variation. In the legal setting of <i>Bleak House</i>, the onlooker becomes a <i>witness</i>, someone who saw something important to the case at hand. How that results in 400 pages of testimony perhaps requires a suspension of disbelief.<br /><br />I want to borrow some of your argument when I write a bit about Henry James later today. Thanks in advance!Amateur Reader (Tom)https://www.blogger.com/profile/13675275555757408496noreply@blogger.com