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when characters take over
Here's an odd thing. Elizabeth was writing a letter, and Nathaniel just... decided it was his job, this time, to share the news. So he took over. I was thinking it would be Curiosity who took the pen and paper away from Elizabeth, but I find I was wrong.
It is definitely Nathaniel's voice, and more than that, I can feel Elizabeth's sense of pique about the whole thing. She doesn't like being coddled, you know. This is one of many ways in which she and I are nothing alike. I daydream about being coddled. Someone bringing me things I didn't even know I needed or wanted. Adjusting the shades and pillows, magically producing books I've been wanting to read. Offering to brush my hair. Shall I peel you a grape? That kind of thing. Of course I might really dislike it if I ever got what I daydream about. I probably would, because I'd be worried the whole time about what a terrible imposition I was being. It's not easy to shake off a Catholic upbringing, I tell you.
Elizabeth doesn't like the idea at all. Though she has good cause to take a rest, she bristles at the need and also at the fact that others won't let her forget the need.
June 20, 2005 04:05 PM
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Comments
I can't wait to read this scene...I can already picture something of it in my head.
Posted by: Alison at June 21, 2005 05:43 PM
God I love old newspapers. I first got into it when I was running a role playing game (hello, geek here) for some friends that featured an angle on Jack the Ripper (original, huh?) And this was back in the early '90s, before the Web was more than a glimmer in some peoples' eyes, so I went down to the UW library and found their microfiche archive of the London Sunday Times and read all the original articles about the Ripper murders. It was totally fascinating. Not just the fact that they were there-- the contemporary reports of this famous thing --but how they were written. Like forensics reports: the body was found in such and such a position, so many paces from the gate and so many paces from the wall. The light was this, the fog was that. I could draw a map off the descriptions.
There's an Ethiopian restaurant on Broadway with old newspapers pasted onto its tables. Everytime I go in there with Appalachia I end up reading all the little scraps while we're waiting for our meal and I'm always tempted to go down to the library and look them up to get the rest of the stories.
Posted by: Joshua at June 22, 2005 04:37 PM
Sara,
To whom was Elizabeth writing the letter and about what? Can you tell us?
Cynthia in Florida
Posted by: Cynthia at June 24, 2005 11:59 AM