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Mar. 10th, 2010 10:45 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bedlamsbardOne of my classes this semester is Early Major Authors: Edmund Spenser, and we're reading The Faerie Queene. Not all of it, sadly, we're skipping huge swathes in the interest of time, which depresses me, because I'm actually really liking it so far, especially now that it's getting easier for me to read Spenserian English.
One of the things that's struck me about The Faerie Queene is that it's very, very visual for me. I'm not a visual reader whatsoever; I very seldom know what a character looks like, or a location; I might have a quick impression of the action, but it's not at all in that "watching a movie in my head" sort of way some people have. I'm generally a very fast reader, so I think that might have something to do with it; I skip words and sentences and I suppose I might actually be more of a skimmer than a reader, though it doesn't feel that way to me. (I do skimming much faster, and with less detail.) But with The Faerie Queene, I really have to linger over each sentence and stanza, and I think that might be why I have the time to build up a mental picture of what's going on. When I'm not hurrying to read a canto before class, I mean; obviously that doesn't help. It's mostly fight scenes rather than moments of stillness, but it's still very unusual for me, and I rather like it. It's not a very clear image by any definition of the word; it is, again, very much an impression, but it's an impression I'm not used to getting, if that makes sense -- a feeling, a flash; I couldn't draw Britomart's face even if I could draw, but I can see/feel/hear/know her and Artegall charging at each other in IV.vi, and the following fight.
Even outside of The Faerie Queene, though, I feel like I'm getting to be a much more visual reader than I used to be -- I wonder if it comes out of writing more, or reading more slowly, or watching a lot more television and movies? I know that after looking at a lot of concept art, I tend to get a lot more descriptive as a writer. It actually kind of irritates me sometimes, the way that reading too closely does, especially if I'm rereading a book rather than reading it for the first time. (Actually, I haven't read anything new in a long time, but I might do it more for things that I'm rereading than not, because I know the action; I can build up the setting.) I'm not entirely sure how I feel about it sometimes, because I'm not used to it. But it is interesting.
One of the things that's struck me about The Faerie Queene is that it's very, very visual for me. I'm not a visual reader whatsoever; I very seldom know what a character looks like, or a location; I might have a quick impression of the action, but it's not at all in that "watching a movie in my head" sort of way some people have. I'm generally a very fast reader, so I think that might have something to do with it; I skip words and sentences and I suppose I might actually be more of a skimmer than a reader, though it doesn't feel that way to me. (I do skimming much faster, and with less detail.) But with The Faerie Queene, I really have to linger over each sentence and stanza, and I think that might be why I have the time to build up a mental picture of what's going on. When I'm not hurrying to read a canto before class, I mean; obviously that doesn't help. It's mostly fight scenes rather than moments of stillness, but it's still very unusual for me, and I rather like it. It's not a very clear image by any definition of the word; it is, again, very much an impression, but it's an impression I'm not used to getting, if that makes sense -- a feeling, a flash; I couldn't draw Britomart's face even if I could draw, but I can see/feel/hear/know her and Artegall charging at each other in IV.vi, and the following fight.
Even outside of The Faerie Queene, though, I feel like I'm getting to be a much more visual reader than I used to be -- I wonder if it comes out of writing more, or reading more slowly, or watching a lot more television and movies? I know that after looking at a lot of concept art, I tend to get a lot more descriptive as a writer. It actually kind of irritates me sometimes, the way that reading too closely does, especially if I'm rereading a book rather than reading it for the first time. (Actually, I haven't read anything new in a long time, but I might do it more for things that I'm rereading than not, because I know the action; I can build up the setting.) I'm not entirely sure how I feel about it sometimes, because I'm not used to it. But it is interesting.