It's a Good Book, but...

[howeird]

...Steering the Craft by Ursula K. LeGuinn turned out to be coals to Newcastle for me. caprine mentioned it, I think in reference to a writer's group or class, and it indeed is a textbook for beginning creative writers. The format is simple and clear - she starts with a blurb describing an idea about writing, and ends with examples and exercises. It's all good.

But not for me - and I don't mean this in a bad or critical way.

The way LeGuinn presents the material, I get the impression that when she reads, she doesn't actually hear the words in her head. Over and over ad nauseum she encourages the students to read their work out loud, to hear what it sounds like. This is excellent advice, but I don't need it. I hear the words as I type them. I hear myself saying them, or I hear the character say them, and out loud they sound just the same as they do in my head. This may be why I'm such a good cold reader and ace all the auditions where they hand me a script I've never seen before and say "read this".

So I'm wondering about the rest of you. This calls for a poll.

[Poll #1142275]

Comments

[strongaxe.livejournal.com]

While hearing the words can be good, it necessarily reduces reading speed to that of talking speed. With English (and some other languages), I can read much more quickly than that if I don't have to take the extra step of vocalizing everything.