![]() ![]() There was the incongruity of hearing such a thing uttered in that particular voice, and I realised that she was as capable of drawing forth all the ugly power an oath might contain as she could the beauty and tenderness of other words. ![]() It was all the more shocking because Molly almost never swears. She swore when I said this, a sudden, crude outburst. ‘How did he know that today was my birthday? Did you tell him?’ Molly has just received birthday wishes from a mutual friend: Here the narrator, a playwright, is chatting by phone to her friend Molly Fox, a stage actor with what we have learned is a remarkable voice, ‘clear and sweet’ and at times ‘infused with a slight ache, a breaking quality that makes it uniquely beautiful’. (Or better yet, read it.) Madden has a gift for imaginative description but knows when to apply the subtler force of discretion. Take Deirdre Madden’s novel Molly Fox’s Birthday. But there are times when a writer can say more by not saying them. Swearwords pepper modern novels, not least in genres like detective fiction where they lend colour and authenticity to hard-boiled dialogue. It can apply to cursing, too, but doesn’t tend to in contemporary prose. Show, don’t tell goes the writer’s refrain. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |