Authorial Voice vs. Character Voice

[ysabetwordsmith]

I was intrigued by this exploration of authorial voice vs. character voice.  These are two different yet related aspects of writing. 

Authorial voice is what characterizes a particular person's writing overall.  Frex, mine tends to use rich description and wide vocabulary, unless I have a reason not to do that in a certain story.  Other writers excel at different things -- some are known for writing stories heavy in dialog, for instance. 

Character voice is what distinguishes an individual person in a story.  A young character will have simpler speech and knowledge than an older character.  Prejudices and expectations also color word choices.  A character's interests or expertise will affect what they notice, and thus, what they talk about or describe and how they do that.

Between the two are regional clusters of varying sizes.  If you look at all the stuff I write in my main fantasy setting of Hallelaine, or my dark fantasy setting of Penumbra, or ellenmillion's shared world setting of Torn World, then you can see how each of those has an overall flavor.  Penumbra, for instance, has very stark writing almost devoid of description -- a departure from my usual mode.  Then if you look closer, characters from the same area sound somewhat alike.  In Torn World, there's a certain worldview and vocabulary shared by the Northerners contrasted with that shared by the Southerners.  So my Northerners sound more like each other than like the Southerners, and vice versa; but together they are Torn World folks who have things in common with each other, as contrasted with my characters from some other world.

Authorial range varies too.  I have an exceptionally wide range when it comes to writing about different people and places, in different voices and tones.  Some of my characters are almost nothing like each other or myself.  There are writers with wider ranges -- such as Harlan Ellison -- but not a lot.  Most people specialize more.  Some writers also have a unique voice that, while it manifests differently in their diverse settings, can be recognized as theirs even beyond the usual authorial choice issues.  An icon of this phenomenon is Joss Whedon.  Compare what his characters say in Buffy the Vampire Slayer  and Firefly  vs. what Joss says in interviews.  He has an incredibly strong vocal stamp whose underlying patterns manifest in wildly different details across his different settings.

What have you noticed about these things?

Comments

[fayanora.livejournal.com]

One of my signature things is that I like to inject humor into even the most serious works when I can, because life just works like that sometimes, and because humor is how I cope with the world myself.

Also, all my characters have to have at least one thing in common with me, or else they never gain any depth, for some reason. Even villains. Sometimes it's something fairly simple, though. For example, in my Lyria stories there is a... well, not really a villain. Just someone Lyria doesn't like, and the feeling is mutual. His name is Jarnion. His alignment is Lawful Good, and Lyria being a True Neutral dark sorceress, he doesn't trust her. What I have in common with him so far is just being out of shape. There might be something else more subtle, I don't know. Oh, and he's intelligent. I daresay most of my characters are intelligent.

Thoughts

[ysabetwordsmith.livejournal.com]

>>One of my signature things is that I like to inject humor into even the most serious works when I can, because life just works like that sometimes, and because humor is how I cope with the world myself.<<

I don't necessarily put humor into all my stories, but I do in many. The flavor varies a lot though. Darker stories tend to have dry or graveyard humor. There's a scene in "Confliction" that's both wacky and poignant, where the main character is talking sincerely and soothingly ... to a doorknob.

>> Also, all my characters have to have at least one thing in common with me, or else they never gain any depth, for some reason. Even villains.<<

Mine usually have something in common with me, for the connection. But that can be all kinds of different things, some quite obscure.

>>Oh, and he's intelligent. I daresay most of my characters are intelligent.<<

Now that I think of it, yeah, so are mine. I strongly favor smart characters, and plenty of mine are downright brilliant. Stupid is a villain trait for me. I do have one utterly, epically stupid character from the Whispering Sands. I also have a couple of favorable characters who are mentally slow but have other commendable traits, one in Waterjewel and then Ularki in Torn World. Mostly I can't abide stupid people, so I don't enjoy reading or writing about them under most circumstances.

Re: Thoughts

[fayanora.livejournal.com]

I have a tendency, when reading or writing fiction, to have a dark humor streak where it comes to villains getting what's coming to them. In one of the Neanderthal Parallax books by Robert J. Sawyer, one of the main female characters gets raped by a coworker. She doesn't know who it was, but somehow the Neanderthal scientist who's her friend found out. The law couldn't help in that situation, apparently, so he took matters into his own hands... by castrating the rapist and raping him. I literally fell off the bed, I was laughing so hard.

I have a Lyria Spellspinner story wherein the life of her daughter is threatened, and Lyria just completly "loses her shit" as the saying goes, and temporarily goes into such a violent rage that over 500 men die as a result, and four men are left wishing they could die. That, and a few other bits here and there have set up a pattern in that character of having anger issues. She loses her temper, does something horrible, and feels intensely remorseful later.

Re: Thoughts

[ysabetwordsmith.livejournal.com]

>>I have a tendency, when reading or writing fiction, to have a dark humor streak where it comes to villains getting what's coming to them.<<

Oh yes! I have such a taste for poetic justice. I love it when the villain fails, not just because of the hero's skill and persistence, but due to the natural consequences of internal flaws. One of my favorite TV shows was "The Pretender" -- partly because of Jarod's brilliant knack for hoisting each show's villain with their own petard.

Re: Thoughts

[fayanora.livejournal.com]

Oh Gods, "The Pretender." I loved that show, but I barely remember it because I was so young. I need to get some DVDs of that show.