Thanks so much, Douglas. I appreciate your having taken the time to read the piece and to have commented.
FYI, I had some help with this, something I can say with all of my writing. I had a 17-year-old girl read it and tell me whether they thought it was believable. She had some nice suggestions for improvement.
And then, when it was performed on stage, it was a 17-year-old actress who did it. From her inflections, her tone I came to understand much more about the character.
thank you so much. I had never made that connection before. Perhaps I should have, as my post on how I came to write that piece shows a darker side to the origin of the character.
I love this narrator. And I love the writing. And the performance is amazing. There's something in the style or maybe the nature of her concerns and expressed emotions that closes any time gap between the late 19th century and the present. ---Margaret Sefton
Margaret, I so appreciate your having read this and responded to it. I only posted this recently but did not send it out to subscribers. I see this site as becoming, if nothing else, a record of some of the work that has gone into creating this novel.
This is/was the beginning. It was, of course, a huge challenge for me, a then 66-year-old man to imagine myself as an 18-year-old girl living in the 1890s. It also led me to get a young woman who I had first met as a sixth grader to be one of the readers of my early draft. Her reaction to this piece was both positive and enlightening and led to a further evolution of the character which is reflected in the book.
I so appreciate that you felt her emotions transcended time. That means a lot to me.
I am not surprised people like this. You have a great voice here and I was really drawn into her story. Congratulations. I'd read more of this.
Thanks so much, Douglas. I appreciate your having taken the time to read the piece and to have commented.
FYI, I had some help with this, something I can say with all of my writing. I had a 17-year-old girl read it and tell me whether they thought it was believable. She had some nice suggestions for improvement.
And then, when it was performed on stage, it was a 17-year-old actress who did it. From her inflections, her tone I came to understand much more about the character.
As a writer, I am deeply indebted to my readers.
That's brilliant!
I enjoyed this. Has a touch of Willa Cather about it.
thank you so much. I had never made that connection before. Perhaps I should have, as my post on how I came to write that piece shows a darker side to the origin of the character.
Thanks again for reading it AND for commenting.
Be well.
I love this narrator. And I love the writing. And the performance is amazing. There's something in the style or maybe the nature of her concerns and expressed emotions that closes any time gap between the late 19th century and the present. ---Margaret Sefton
Margaret, I so appreciate your having read this and responded to it. I only posted this recently but did not send it out to subscribers. I see this site as becoming, if nothing else, a record of some of the work that has gone into creating this novel.
This is/was the beginning. It was, of course, a huge challenge for me, a then 66-year-old man to imagine myself as an 18-year-old girl living in the 1890s. It also led me to get a young woman who I had first met as a sixth grader to be one of the readers of my early draft. Her reaction to this piece was both positive and enlightening and led to a further evolution of the character which is reflected in the book.
I so appreciate that you felt her emotions transcended time. That means a lot to me.