Voice

The voice of a novel surfaces regularly among readers and writers as critical to the readability and impact of a book, yet remains elusive as an element that can be easily defined, or (for writers) learned.

At a recent meeting of The Women's National Book Association (of which I'm a member), we explored that topic with a guest speaker who teaches creative writing at a local university.

Susan Meyers, Assistant Professor at Seattle University, has done academic research on the subject, and is, herself, a poet and writer.

Susan began by asking each attendee at the meeting what the term "voice" means to them. The group's members include avid readers, librarians, and others interested in books for various reasons, as well as writers, and the responses ranged from the feel of the novel to the way the main character(s) talk/present the story.

As it turns out, those responses were similar to what Susan has identified in her research. That is:

• Voice is typically understood as one of two things: an overarching or 'big concept' feeling to a book, or something akin to the personality of the point-of-view character(s). In the first of these, content, rather than style, is what is believed to constitute voice. It comes from a very intimate relationship between the writer and the characters and their environments. In the second definition, voice comes not exactly from characters' points of view, but from how, generally, the character perceives the world. 
• Voice is both Text and Subtext. What is not shown or said is at least as important as what is.

We had a wonderful time at the meeting discussing these concepts and what they mean to us. 

As writers, we can really get our teeth into these ideas and learn from them. They are each loaded with depth in the sense that when you are writing, you are creating voice through layer after layer of what is said (or unsaid) and how it is presented.

For example, I've just started reading a historical novel that everyone else in the world has apparently already read: Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel.  It's about Thomas Cromwell and what happened to the churches of England by his hand in the 1500s. (backstory: Cromwell was an English lawyer from humble and violent beginnings, who became chief minister to Henry VIII, and was a leading advocate of the English Reformation, which included attempting to dismantle the Catholic Church. But long before that, when he was still young, Cromwell was Cardinal Thomas Wolsey's man of business as one of the first steps on his ladder to success.) 

What a writer Mantel is! The voice of this novel is powerful, yet indirect in many ways. I would categorize it as the first of the understandings Susan Meyers mentioned: an overarching, or "big concept" feeling. Subtext is used beautifully. Characterization is crystal clear and fully three-dimensional. The way Mantel achieves that is most definitely from "a very intimate relationship between the writer and the characters and their environments."

There's a scene early in the novel, for example, where Thomas Cromwell, as Cardinal Wolsey's man of business, is meeting with Wolsey about a delicate matter (Henry VIII wants Wosley to find a way to get his 19-year marriage to Katharine of Aragon annulled, since she has not provided him with a male heir). From this scene, I feel like Cardinal Wolsey is someone I know intimately. Mantel has researched him so thoroughly and understands him so profoundly that her character sketch of him is more like an x-ray, showing him from the inside out through his gestures, postures, sense of humor, and his turn of phrase.

Have you read (or written) something where the voice is recognizable as one of the two things Susan Meyers identified—either the big concept, or the way the characters perceive the world? How about subtext? How do you think about voice in what you write?