Interview Tidbit

David Stockhoff · 28 Nov 2008, 22:50 · from 2008-November.txt.gz

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From: dstockhoff at verizon.net (David Stockhoff)
Date: Fri, 28 Nov 2008 17:50:44 -0500
Subject: (urth) Interview Tidbit
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Often Wolfe's writing reminds me that he's an engineer by training, and as a writer perhaps more comfortable when describing physical objects and relationships. I wonder if that's part of it. 

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Message: 1
Date: Fri, 28 Nov 2008 07:59:10 -0800 (PST)
From: Craig Brewer <cnbrewer at yahoo.com>
Subject: (urth) Interview Tidbit
To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net>
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I'm reading through Wright's collection of interviews, and I stumbled on this:

"What do [I] dislike most about [my] own writing...? That so often it doesn't work -- that I can say X, flatly and in so many words, and later have editors, reviewers, and readers say 'But you never told me X.' I point out that I did, at the top of page twenty-two, or whatever, and they say, 'Well, it doesn't come through.' Obviously it doesn't, and I don't know how to make it." (78, interview with Elliott Swanson)

I don't get the sense that Wolfe is being coy here, but honestly worrying that at times he doesn't communicate what he wants to. And what strikes me about this little bit is that it suggests that so much of Wolfe's "puzzle" style of writing may not be intentional. How much of it is just how he communicates? The downside is that, as we all know and have seen on the list, it can send people looking for puzzles where there aren't any, which leads to some very creative readings of what's going on in a Wolfe story. But it also suggests that the image I think many of us have of Wolfe as a puppet master over the details of his own stories may not always be the case.

I mean, as someone recently joked, he's mortal, so of course some things just don't work like he wants. But this comment was so close to reflecting on what people admire about his style that I thought it at least worth thinking about.

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