S.D. Smith blogs about writing advice he heard from Orson Scott Card and whether that advice is universally applicable. How much, if any, should an author voice be heard, noticed, observed, seen, read into as it were. What I mean to say is what place has narration outside observations from the story’s characters?
Smith refers to P.G. Wodehouse as an author whose voice is heard loudly within his stories, but I’m not sure that’s quite right. I just read a short story, similar in style to many other short stories of his, in which a narrator is introduced to the reader and then he takes over the story completely. It was a story within a story. The Oldest Member of the Drones Club (or another one I didn’t notice) tells a motivational story to a young member who wants to quit playing golf. Wodehouse isn’t telling us the story so much as the Oldest Member is, so all of the narrative flourishes come from a character in the story, not really the author. That’s close to the way the Wooster and Jeeves stories are written too. Bertie Wooster is talking to us, not a background narrator.
In this way, I think Wodehouse comes close to following Card’s advice that a writer should remain invisible.
Good point, Phil. You are correct about the Bertie Wooster stories. I have read only one of those novels (though many of the short stories) and had misremembered that he did do those as a main character narration. I much prefer the novels, myself. I’m not as fond of the first person stuff for some (perhaps incoherent) reason. But Plum is irrepressibly brilliant.
I have read only six of his other novels and all were told with a background narrator, not from a main character-first person. So I guess that is what I was thinking of. Even in those novels his voice, descriptions, literary allusions, and jokes are the most enjoyable part of the story (to me). Douglas Adams, as is mentioned over at the RR, is similar.
Yeah, he is brilliant. Thanks for the comment. I hope I wasn’t too disagreeable. I didn’t intend it.
I think I agree with you both. The narrators in Wodehouse’s stories are generally very clearly not Wodehouse himself, and their diction defines them. But it’s also true that there is a very clear and recognizable Wodehouse style overall, immediately recognizable as his and his alone.