Somebody asked about rhythm, Dad explained it me like this -
Our first experience of stories is when they are told to us by others, mother, father, sister, brother - or whosoever read to us as children. The voice of the reader had a certain flow to us, and it was this voice that took us from the conscious to the subconscious, there was a point when we were hearing the story, and then, somehow, we were magically inside it. It's same thing that sends us too slip on trains, or as passengers in cars.
Each writer has a certain rhythm. a beat, which that writer sets up in his text. Readers follow that beat. It enchants then. And just as you wake up when then train enters the station, or the car leaves the motorway, a change of rhythm will pull you out of your relaxed slumber, or the story.
In fiction, this rhythm borders on poetry. Each line balancing with another.
Ex.
This passage.
She licked her lips.
He looked across.
She looked down.
He looked away.
She looked up.
He laughed while looking.
Her feeling of shame returned.
The slap of the paper on her bare thigh caused the man to ogle. His look was blatant and unabashed. Resistance was futile, defeat inevitable.
She covered her mouth as she cleared her throat. Her lips were no longer dry.
His eyes tracked the movement of her hand partway, they stopped to dwell on her breasts.
- This one of my dad's.
Look or looking is repeated in four consecutive sentences.
In the exchange, a similar number of syllables are echoed. This sets the beat.
Daisyfitz, a woman of questionable morals, met Frank.
Frank, a man of impeccable breeding, became obsessed.
One sentence is balanced against the other.
This probably doesn't make sense to you. The only way to know if you've got it right is to ask somebody else to read it aloud. If they read it in the same rhythm and beat which you used to write it - you have imparted the voice well.
Posted: 08/02/2012 00:06:47
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