ethics and dialogue

As long as I'm writing about ethics, I might as well get into another area where writers do have to make decisions. It involves use of obscenities, curse words, foul language, and being politically correct for the time in which we live. What was acceptable even five years ago may prove very offensive today. The problem a writer faces is staying true to the characters but what about when that would offend today's readers? How to deal with that?

 photo taken at Oregon High Desert Museum, January 2013-- doesn't relate to the topic but will be a factor in the historic romance I am currently writing.

To illustrate this, I can't even use the words that are most coming to my mind because this blog is PG rated. Some of them I have never used. A few I used to never use but now once in awhile do in discussions because they have become so mainstream. I can think of one that I didn't learn its meaning until I was in college and my aunt explained it to me after a boyfriend had used it. My daughter asked to have that word explained to her when she was in second grade.

When I write dialogue for men, I know most of them use far rougher language than I give them. Sometimes I get around that by saying they cursed crudely or something that lets the reader imagine what that meant. And a lot of young women today talk that way also, and it's not the shocking thing that it was when I was a young woman.

An example of a word regarding the politically correct or incorrect, that is a good example, is squaw. That was a word which was taken for granted for years. To many people, it was just a word for American Indian women (which might should be Native American women instead of Indian but that's not a given as it varies with tribes for what they prefer. Safest is to use their tribal name if it's required in a book). Squaw though, commonly used back in the 1880s or not, I wouldn't use today in any book I wrote as it is a very offensive term regarding women-- showing total disrespect.

Throughout the west we have all kinds of geographic places with names that have had to be changed as our world became more sensitive as to how they were perceived. It's a tough one for a writer as not many people want to offend others, but writers like to use dialogue in way that seems fitting to the character. 

It's something each writer has to work out for themselves. I have several swear words I do let my characters use, varying with their personalities, which I know offend some people; but I feel they are needed-- even knowing I might lose readers over them.  If I used some of the rougher words, it might seem more realistic to the times and characters-- but I don't for my own sensitivity as well as that of readers.

I also run into this when I write sex scenes also and yes, I do write sex scenes. I don't want to go too graphic but I do want to make it feel like it was what happened and give the reader an enjoyable read which for me means nothing crude there either.  I also avoid euphemisms used more frequently in the older romances when they first began to write about sex. This isn't because they offend me but because they make me laugh instead of think about a romantic encounter.

Ethics and fiction writing

When writing a story from ideas in your head, a lot of things come into play that will vary with genre. Readers expect certain things from a mystery that will be different than from chick lit. If you are writing in a genre that is action oriented, a lot of emotional reaction isn't required. Some stories barely give you the motivations of the main protagonists; and you see what they are by what they do-- if the writer stays consistent.

Romances have action, dialogue, and the inner workings of the character's thinking. These books resolve how people will do certain things, what their reactions will be, how they will feel after they make choices, and that's an important part of any romance from Jane Austin to Nicholas Sparks. There might be different styles involved, some with more emphasis on dress and behavior and others with even violent actions, but in the end, a romance (the best of them) will be about emotional reactions and even ethical choices.

When I have the most problems reading someone else's romances is when they ignore ethical actions. They might let a hero or heroine behave in a way that is an abomination, but it's supposed to be okay because they are the hero/heroine. Say what! I suppose some with male heroes has come from the rise of the anti-hero. But even an anti-hero has to have an ethical code to find sympathy from most readers/viewers.

So when I am writing a story as I am right now, ethics is an important aspect with which I off and on wrestle. Sure I need to get tenses correct, spelling right, sentence structure making sense (although perfecting of that comes later with editing), but ethics are big to me. I want my characters to act logically-- even when they sometimes make mistakes. And when they have acted unethically, I want them to be aware of it at least eventually.

 Image rights purchased from CanStock

On the current book, I have a lot of this kind of thinking going on as there are some big ethical questions for the hero and heroine. She faces hers not only because of her period in history but from those any culture puts onto its people. Cultures encourage obedience and punish by different methods disobedience of its rules. Some of this probably is human nature and some about power and survival. The more options a culture permits, the more confusing life can be.

As a woman of the 1880s in the West, my heroine has lived by rules and pretty much edged around what isn't okay-- like visiting an occult shrine or going to a psychic. She is 25 and unmarried by choice, again something a genteel lady would not be doing unless she's staying home taking care of aging parents. Obviously by her choices, she is going against the stream but how far is she willing to go in doing that?

She might have been able to avoid resolving that question except life isn't letting her on several levels. A big one is when she is attacked (won't go into details of what happens but it's not a rape), and she must decide whether to bring charges against the perpetrator or hide what happened to save what's left of her reputation. It's not exactly a problem unique to her times but made harder when women had less rights, couldn't vote, certainly not hold public offices and even the right to own property hadn't been held all that long.

So the story had gone along quite well until I got to this sticky situation. It's easy, as a writer, to turn a major protagonist into a symbol for what is right to do and make it turn out that way... or even go the other way... but better writing is to make it seem inevitable as a choice and that the character would actually do this-- whether it's the best choice or not. That's something I am taking some time to decide. It's not exactly a road block as I know what comes after, but I want to get this part right-- which to me is what good writing is all about.
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Imbolc

Yes, once again we have gotten here, not just past the hump of Winter Solstice but to the Celtic celebration, Imbolc, which I have written about in another blog many many times but perhaps not with the emphasis on what it means for creativity. 

Imbolc (ewe's milk) is when we get our first lambs as it is the traditional time for lambing in the Celtic lands from where the celebration originated. Our ewes are heavily pregnant in the days before February 2. We wait for those first little sounds from the newborns, the crooning of the mothers. We hope to not hear the lost sound of a lamb where no mother is speaking back to it.

See how heavily laden she is-- so ready with the weight of that belly as it has dropped-- photo taken January 31, 2013

Besides longer days and new growth and life, this is a time of creativity in a spiritual and an inner sense or so the sages say. We can dream dreams with these long nights but the gradually increasing day's length means activity is about to burst forth. We can think about what is within and find ways to bring it out. Suggestions for Imbolc are reciting poetry, lighting candles, starting new plants, or gathering in circles.

I saw an interesting topic in the MOA (Meet Our Author's) at Amazon. Well the topic wasn't but something that arose within was.-- how long does it take to write a book? Some asserted that if it did not take a year, then the book wasn't worthy. Others felt that someone who turns out say five books in a year has to be doing inferior work. One suggested that if a person worked a 12-hour day, there was no way there would be time for writing a novel. I put a brief comment there but decided I'd prefer to expand on it  here as it is part of creativity and bringing forth our own light.

Basically I can address this from where it comes to my own writing and what I have heard others say about theirs. Yes, some take years to write their books while others, with equal skill, can bring out several books in a year. Some people have written only one masterpiece and it was finally recognized as such when they were in old age-- thinking Helen Hooeven Santmyer's-- And the Ladies of the Club or Norman Maclean's, The River Runs Through It. Not that it took them a lifetime to write the one great book, but it took that long to have it recognized.

There are traditionally published authors who write under several names to avoid having readers think they are writing too much. They might write under different genres for the same reason or because it's fun to vary what they do.

So my opinion is that if someone has an idea for a book and knows its trajectory, they can easily write 1000 words a night if nighttime is all they have for their own fiction. The catch, of course, is to have that initial idea. Sometimes long hours at work drains the creative juices. It's not the time to write that is lacking. It's the time to work out the fictional plot and characters.

If they wrote 1000 words a day, varying it a bit, they would have their rough draft in a couple of months. Then would come editing, editing and re-editing. If they wish to go the traditional route, they then have to write a query letter, synopsis and maybe outline to interest a publishing house or agent in their work. I won't say it's easy to do this when working long hours but it's not impossible-- if the person has that initial idea and knows where it's going.

As for me, I often go days writing nothing where it might seem nothing is happening on my book idea, but it's going through a lot of phases in my head or in notes. When I am writing, I can easily do 5000 words in a day. But then I need to reread and think about where that got the story and whether it worked. It was not hard at all with A Montana Christmas to write so fast because I knew those characters and where the story was a novella, it didn't have the complexity of a full length novel.

My current work in progress has taken characters I knew vaguely from a prior story but had to get to know them a LOT better. I began writing their interactions, what they were doing, who else they were involved with, when did they laugh, when did they cry, and as that unfolded, so did more and more of the story. Although i have the time to spend a day writing, I don't have that every day. 

On those days I am busy elsewhere, i think about these characters and where they might be at the time. I think about them most especially right before bed as I consider what they did that day and where might that lead them. It's easy in such a time of intense writing to lose track of my own life if I don't make the effort to stay in touch with 'me.'

A lot of what I write has been fully formulated before I sit at the keyboard but I am open to changing something if the next step reveals what came before was a mistake. It's so easy with the computer versus the days when all of what I wrote was done on a typewriter, one of those lovely old black ones where you had to strike the keys hard. If I wanted to readjust things with it, it required cutting apart paragraphs and taping them into new places. Love the modern world where it comes to tools that help creating happen faster and easier.

If you are wanting to write fiction but haven't yet done it, think of the story that is in your head, the nuances, the additional parts you might be able to flesh out, use the darkness of these long nights for that but then start writing. A thousand words a day is not a bad goal as it's pretty easy to do. Even if your ideas don't seem like much, write them down-- one thing often leads to another. You can assess its value later. The main thing for those who want to write is-- write.

Fame or recognition, sales or popularity, that might never come. They aren't what make you a writer. Some might think it's all about the money or being a great artist in your writing abilities. Nope. It's that you write. Now being an author, having that recognition, that might take something else but to be a writer only means one thing-- you are one who writes.

May Imbolc give you some of that light and glow to get your own work going.







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