Reading question

[Kyriakos]

I'd like to ask something about reading stamina. If you read something (mostly thinking of fiction here) and do not instantly understand it, do you persist to read it again?

Is your persistance, in the case it appears, a matter of if the author who wrote it was already known to you?

The question resurfaces since one of my latest published stories is one i consider to be on the cryptic side. It was published nonetheless, but i am unsure what most people will read into it. It is about someone who has a (possible) hallucination of a mosquito, while being in an asylum. It is argued that the probable sighting of the insect is imaginary, and has a symbolic meaning which takes over the person's real past. He is focused on the mosquito and cannot really recall why he is in the asylum.

Now i think in most places (and here too) serious fiction has fewer people reading it than, lets say, romantic novels, or some sort of pulp/cult writing. It is bad enough writing in an old-fashioned language, it is even worse to be hard to understand.

I tried to give enough room for the story to gain some interest even if not all of its meaning (in my mind) was evident to all readers.

 

[Antilogic]

So I mostly read non-fiction (might not be applicable to your case), but if I feel like I haven't grasped the author's point in a passage or a chapter, I'll give it a re-read to try to understand it. Beyond that, it depends on whether the author is engaging or just plain boring and I'm natively tuning out. Kind of hard to put the finger on that one, but I probably would give a known author (and one I regard highly) a little more leeway here than a new one.

 

[Borachio]

The answer, for me, is it depends.

And my stamina depends, generally, on how engaged I am with the book, i.e. how much I care what is happening in the story.

I don't think this is primarily about how difficult the language is. With Riddley Walker, for example, the language was so hard I had to read the book twice. But the central premise demanded it was written that way.

On the other hand, I swear I shall never read another Dan Brown (one was quite sufficient thank you), even though the language is easy.

I think, though, if I have read something by the author before and liked them, I will automatically tend to persist with anything else they write.

But I'm also a sucker for a really well written piece. I find delight in well put together sentences for their own sake. (I wish I could write well) And if something is really badly written, who's going to read it no matter how good the idea is?

Your thing with the mosquito reminds me of Kafka. A bit.

If I'm preoccupied with other things, I often find I can keep reading while thinking of something else, so I have to go back and carry on from where I can remember the plot.

 

[Cutlass]

I think it depends on how engaged I am as a reader, whether I really think that point is something I want to grasp, or whether I think that I'll have enough of a gist of it for continuing on with the story and keeping the narrative flow happening. So I really think it's a situational case. But as an author I think if you feel you have a passage that is difficult to understand in one reading, I think you should seriously consider a rewrite. Try finding someone who will give you honest and thorough feedback, and if they say a passage is unclear, then I think you should try to make it clear.

 

[~Corsair#01~]

I once read one of Chomsky's works on linguistics for more than three hours, before ultimately concluding that anyone who writes books on the subject of interpersonal communication which are utterly incomprehensible probably has little to say on the subject worth knowing.

 

[Kyriakos]

That is just the thing, on the surface it is not difficult to read through it, cause the sentence structure (despite the rather serious tone) is easy to follow. One might read through the story without realizing there are deeper meanings.

Surface of story:

Man is in an asylum. Man is troubled by a persistent mosquito flying in the white wall, and making unbearable noise. Man writes an account of his life with this problem.

Deeper meaning:

Man is probably imagining the mosquito (there are many passages that highlight this as a possible explanation; for example the therapist character maintains it is so) Man has thrown away any and all attempts to recover his past, and is content thinking that all his problems are the mosquito, and the asylum. He dreams of leaving the asylum, whereby he will also, in theory, leave the mosquito behind too.

I must say i was a bit surprised that the publisher picked this story, since i had sent him a collection of two stories, the other being a lot more straightforward.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Why didn't the man just kill the mosquito?

 

[caketastydelish]

If you want the story to be marketable, be sure to include at least one sex scene.

 

[Borachio]

Really? I can't bear sex scenes in literature. Soooo boring. I just keep turning the pages till I know they're over.

(I never understood pornography either. Why would a starving man want to look at pictures of biscuits? Far less would he want to read a recipe. Mind you, I have looked into the subject enough to know what I'm talking about. )

 

[Kyriakos]

Why didn't the man just kill the mosquito?

Because he is afraid that the therapist might be right, and then something other will replace the imagined insect, possibly something more frightening.

 

[rugbyLEAGUEfan]

Welcome back photogenic Greek dude!

 

[Cutlass]

That is just the thing, on the surface it is not difficult to read through it, cause the sentence structure (despite the rather serious tone) is easy to follow. One might read through the story without realizing there are deeper meanings.

Surface of story:

Man is in an asylum. Man is troubled by a persistent mosquito flying in the white wall, and making unbearable noise. Man writes an account of his life with this problem.

Deeper meaning:

Man is probably imagining the mosquito (there are many passages that highlight this as a possible explanation; for example the therapist character maintains it is so) Man has thrown away any and all attempts to recover his past, and is content thinking that all his problems are the mosquito, and the asylum. He dreams of leaving the asylum, whereby he will also, in theory, leave the mosquito behind too.

I must say i was a bit surprised that the publisher picked this story, since i had sent him a collection of two stories, the other being a lot more straightforward.

I think that you are going to have to accept that if you are writing with levels of meaning, then you are going to have a limited audience. And possibly an audience that it's difficult to find. Most fiction readers really aren't looking for all that much sophistication.

 

[Kyriakos]

Hi RugbyLeageFan, how have you been?

@Cutlass: I agree, which is why i always have a surface to my work, which is easy to grasp. Then there are other meanings, but usually it is not that bad if one does not get to them. It is a bit like playing a computer game and not having access to the secret levels which present a subplot to the story.

I have written very little stuff which is entirely allegoric, and a closed allegory at that, and all that was in the past. Now i always provide a clear meaning on one level, and leave some subtle clues for deeper levels. This way i am not only writing the work for myself and a few others, but it can theoretically have a bigger audience. (at least i hope it can)

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Because he is afraid that the therapist might be right, and then something other will replace the imagined insect, possibly something more frightening.

What's worse than a mosquito? Seriously, I have completely freaked out at the thought that there could be a mosquito in my room at night. There was one awful night when I saw a mosquito that was absolutely the HUGEST FLYING BUG I EVER SAW IN MY LIFE!

Damn, that thing was hard to kill - must have taken nearly half an hour because it seemed to almost regenerate like an Immortal, when the smacks and stomps I gave it would have killed any other insect. This happened in the wee hours, and the next day I had to explain to my grandmother what that awful racket was that I was making in my room upstairs. When I explained that I was trying to kill an exceptionally big and stubborn mosquito, she understood completely.

I even remember what I was doing at the time this insect interrupted me: I was reading The Mists of Avalon.

 

[Kyriakos]

Well, a lot of things can be worse, but no need to go very far: in the story the narrator/protagonist at one time near the end is imagining what the mosquito, in the case it is a hallucination, is replacing. He fears that if it is gone then he may suddently remember why he was sent to the asylum. He may have killed, or watched someone being killed and applauding, or plotted the death of someone, or done all three.

The story is supposed to be seen (in its deeper meaning) as the price one patient pays for his amnesia. The price being a minor hallucination, which is just about annoying enough to make him feel sad, but not that much that he feels it is worse than what it may be helping to hide.

 

[Borachio]

But what a perfectly delightful bestiole the mosquito is! Who wouldn't want one for a friend? They make a lovely sound when they get near your ear. A bit like a very small electric drill. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz zzzzzzzzzzzz Who could begrudge a drop or two of blood for such a fine fellow?

Your central premise is flawed. You need a beast with negative connotations, don't you?

 

[Kyriakos]

Not really. In fact what was needed was something on the verge of being seen as negative, so as to keep a balance (as a hallucination). The sound of the mosquito gets irritating, but not enough so as to cause its destruction, or its end of being imagined, if it is a hallucination.

Generally i needed something symbolizing at the same time a minor irritation, and a persistant pest.

Not sure just how much the publicist saw in that though, but i am happy it is published anyway.

 

[Borachio]

Sorry, I was just being a bit facetious. I can't always help myself.

 

[warpus]

I mostly read fiction and I read somewhat fast.. I'm not a speed reader by any means, but I do use some of those techniques.. That means that words will fly by and I will often not focus on one each individually, but rather fly by the sentence and take in the meaning as I go along, if that makes sense.

I stop as soon as I get the feeling that I've missed something or when something just doesn't make sense. I re-read as many times as necessary for things to click so that I can move on. When I do this I do focus on each word individually.

When I have to do this too often, it's generally a sign that the writing style is just not my thing or I'm not used to it.. or the author sucks. Or it's Herbert

 

[MrCynical]

I'd like to ask something about reading stamina. If you read something (mostly thinking of fiction here) and do not instantly understand it, do you persist to read it again?

I'm generally willing to take a second or third run at a passage of text if I can't figure out what it's supposed to mean. Large amounts of this kind of backtracking will detract from the story though, and usually indicates that it isn't actually very well written.