Today I like: tons of kids running around my house
Not so much: feeding them!
My girls are taking Chinese and Spanish at school. I can get by with the simplest French when in France (Je m’apelle Stephanie. Je suis une touriste Americaine.), and pick out a word or two in the more heavily accented areas of the Caribbean (In Haiti I understood manger and bonjour. That’s about it). So, I’m stoked they are getting this exposure now, from both a linguistic and a cultural viewpoint. Bring on the hola and the ni hao!
One thing that’s amazed me, particularly with the Chinese, is the girls’ pitch-perfect accent. Asian languages have tones the average Germanic or Romance language speaker can’t easily replicate. Ever try to pronounce the names of the menu items at a Thai or Vietnamese restaurant? There’s a reason they generally have numbers beside each entrée.
“Can I have the…Mwwnnaa…trraaa….the number seven, please.”
My kids, however, at six and eight, come home singing Chinese songs with perfect enunciation. They’re not shy or self conscious about it. They spit out the numbers one through twenty as easily as my four-year-old sings his ABC’s. It’s amazing to me how easily their little tongues wrap around tones that I couldn’t replicate if I tried. I’d produce sounds somewhere between a lowing cow and a dental patient emerging from anesthesia with a mouth full of Novocaine and a few less teeth.
We all know children with bi-lingual parents. They can switch between languages in one conversation, never missing a beat or dropping a cookie. Everyone knows that the younger one is, the easier it is to pick up a language. And here’s where this idea becomes relevant for writers.
I started reading adult novels, the ones my mom brought home from the library, around age eight. While some of that subject matter was a little intense (as I’ve stated before, Stephen King’s IT gave me nightmares for months at age ten), I truly believe that early exposure to novels shaped whatever ability I possess in creating long form fiction.
In reading (adult) novels from such a young age, I was absorbing, without realizing it, the basics of good storytelling: plot, character, dialogue. How scenes flow from one to another. Foreshadowing. I was learning the language of novel-writing at an age when I could easily take it in. Make it part of my native tongue.
If I loved a book, I’d read it over and over (sometimes thirty times over the years, as in the case of All Things Bright and Beautiful, The Stand, Pride and Prejudice, and later, Angela’s Ashes and Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood). This re-reading…the repetition…sealed the voices of these stories in my head, and in turn blended them into my own narrative voice.
I developed a habit, around age six, of telling myself stories to help me fall asleep at night. Made-up scenarios, running through my head, every night. I’ve never stopped. Nowadays, as I drift off I write the next day’s scene in my mind. Character and dialogue. Intro, build up, climax, closing. Usually in the third person. As if I’m sitting in front of the computer typing away. Weird, yes…but also very effective for a writer. I’ve been practicing non-stop for twenty-nine years.
I always wonder about “writers” who say they don’t read. Reading is practice for writing. The idea of learning a new language now, when my brain is set in a very specific communication pattern, is daunting…not matter how envious I am of my bi-lingual friends. So how do those who don’t read, and have never really read, suddenly expect to be able to understand the language of novels?
If I tried to learn Chinese now, my accent would be bad. I would be self-conscious. My words stilted, unnatural. Even if I wanted to say something a certain way and knew the correct words, it probably wouldn’t come out right…and it certainly wouldn’t be eloquent.
So, if you’re toying with the idea of writing a novel, and you’ve never been a reader, stop and think. Are you at a point where you can realistically devote the time to learning a new language? Is your mind still flexible enough?
If not, there are many accomplished novel-speakers out there. Grab a book and experience the beauty of fluency.
I’m just impressed that you can tell yoursrlf the stories and still fall asleep! I have to force my brain to shut down or it keeps me awake!
That DOES happen sometimes…usually on the middle of the night wake ups with the kids…then I can’t get back to sleep and end up either writing or tweeting at 4am!
Fortunately, I’m usually so wiped out at the end of the day I can fall asleep relatively quickly at least once.
I was the same way as a child — I read constantly, everything I could get my hands on. The only frustrating thing to me about reading now is that I can’t find enough time to do it — and I find myself longing again for the kid days of being able to sit down and read from dawn to midnight every single day, all day in the summer time! And like you, I write in my mind before I ever sit down at the computer.
It is sooo hard to find that time these days…the time I used to spend reading is now writing…but somehow manage to squeeze it in. Carpool line is great for that! xo
I always have to be reading something. To me, reading is like inhaling, writing is like exhaling. I couldn’t do one without the other.
I’ve always longed to speak French. You might have just inspired me to try to learn again. I love imagining your little ones chattering in Chinese while they run around the house.
Great post!
Have to say…at times those Chinese songs get a wee bit annoying.
xoxo
I love to map out plot points on my walks. I often will get distracted by the nature surrounding me, but if I am really pushing against a literary wall, I almost always find my way through by the time I am coming back in our lane. I like the idea of working things out in my sleep, though. I might try that tonight!
If you can sleep! I could not sleep at all by the time I reached your stage…well, more time to plot!
And I also plot on walks/runs. A great time to do so…not so tired at that point. xo
What a great analogy! It really is like learning a foreign language. I devoted five years and five novels to the study before I really got a grip on the craft.
Five novels…do you ever go back and read the original ones? I look back at early drafts of The Cracked Slipper and crack up…slightly embarrassed I ever let anyone read it.
Wow. I never thought about it before, but you are exactly right with your analogy! So cool. I was always a big reader, too, and I can totally see how reading hundreds (thousands!) of stories over the years would be like listening to thousands of hours of another language – and at a young age, too! Oh, and so cool that your kids are not only taking TWO different languages, but picking them up so well!
Hey Caryn! I feel so lucky my kids go to the school they go to…it’s an amazing place!
Love what Erika said–”Reading is inhaling, writing is like exhaling.” Perfect! I read on the treadmill at the gym as well as in car lines, dr. office, and late at night with my handy dandy flashlight app on my iPhone.
I haven’t reread a lot of books as of late. There are too many new ones I want to read! However, as a kid, I know I had my favorites that I went back to.
When I am walking/running outside, I love to work out plot issues, also. My thoughts on not reading? Writers that don’t read probably don’t get published.
Ni Hao Ki Lan is the only Chinese I know. My six-year-old held onto that show for about six months last year. I would laugh because he would be in the living room repeating what the characters said in the same dialect. Cracked me up every time!
Runs are great for plotting! I also plot in the shower..shhhh
And Ni Hao Ki Lan is the Chinese Dora.