[stylist] advice on hearing blind characters.
Robert Newman
newmanrl at cox.net
Fri Oct 24 09:14:07 UTC 2008
Helene
The small portion of your book in respects to dialogue of "hearing blind"
characters reads okay. Yes, a few wrong words, but the interaction flows
okay; you don't sound deaf, meaning I have deafblind and/or def friends and
some of them speak in broken English." And as my little mind will sometimes
spew out, though I as an American say this last part with tongue in cheek, I
could have phrased my response this way --- Your characters do not come
across like they are non-English speakers." And so I am not doubting your
ability to write in English, after all it was your people who invented the
language.
So write on. Oh, and you asked if what I read made me want to read on. And
so I'll say that what you shared with us didn't give me a real hint as to
where they were going and to do what? For all I know, they were going off to
an NFB meeting or to the pub. Yes, I got the sense they were a team who take
care of some bad guys, like a dragon. (In the rehab profession, we have
in-house jargon about blindness and we say of a person with RP and their
acceptance of blindness, that RP stands for "Resistive Person . a
Robert Leslie Newman
Email- newmanrl at cox.net
THOUGHT PROVOKER Website-
Http://www.thoughtprovoker.info
-----Original Message-----
From: stylist-bounces+newmanrl=cox.net at nfbnet.org
[mailto:stylist-bounces+newmanrl=cox.net at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of helene
ryles
Sent: Tuesday, October 21, 2008 5:20 PM
To: NFBnet Writer's Division Mailing List
Subject: Re: [stylist] advice on hearing blind characters.
Here is a sample of my work:
"Blindness isn't as bad as you think it is Paril. Once you learn the
necessary blind skills you will find you can do anything you want.
Except for slaying Dragons, unless you have magic as powerful as Myra's
that is." Hari Murdag, the team healer, explained to his
colleague Paril Emai. Paril was struggling to keep up with the team,
tripping over everything in his path. Hari, who was also blind, had little
difficulty detected obstacles he found in the hot sandy terrain. He used a
long cane. Now and again one of his team mates would call out to him with
directions. In this sort of terrain he didn't even need guiding as he
simply followed his team mates by the sound of their voices.
"Well I know the sort of things you got up to. My wife tells me how you
and your brother used to commit incest right in front of her and the
children. Can't you and that infuriating bat get it into your heads that I
don't need your blind skills as I'm not blind" retorted Paril as he tripped
over every stone in his path.
Hari turned away in frustration. Paril was forever bring his sexuality
into the conversation, along with all sorts of lies that his crazy wife
Savasha came up with. Despite this, Hari couldn't help but pity the guy.
It was clear to everyone else on the team that Paril's sight had been
deteriorating for months. It was due to some sort of human ailment called
retinitis pigmentosa which was quite rare
for people with demon blood to inherit. He was also in deep denial.
Not only about his sight lose but about his wife too. She was a
compulsive liar who showed him neither love, respect, or even common
courtesy.
Earlier Venom had announced that Paril no longer had a place on
his team. There had been angry words exchanged and they had both
resorted to insulting each others various family members. The
friction in the air was still quite deadly. Hari wouldn't have been
surprised if Venom had put a curse on Paril, instead of which he'd simply
resorted to cruel and cutting remarks at Paril's expense.
Blindness by itself wouldn't have caused Paril Emai's expulsion from the
team. There had been whole generations of blind Murdag who all worked as
healers.
In fact Venom had been meaning to give him simple jobs to do until he
was better adapted to his blindness, but Paril Emai had refused to learn how
to use a long cane or any other blind skills for that matter. Venom kept
trying to send him for some training with Myra, only Paril had refused to
go. He wouldn't let Hari teach him anything either. It was almost as if he
believed that the total rejection of everything to do with blindness would
somehow prevent his sight from leaving him completely. Hari could only hope
he came to his senses soon. It was clear to everyone on the team that he
was now more of a liability then an asset.
It was his reckless determination to get into the line of conflict with
the dragon, that had almost cost the life of another slayer, Shirn Skunki.
Shirn had risked his own life to push him out of harms
way. Venom was particularly furious because Shirn had been one of
his best slayers. Shirn's legs were now badly burnt and they had to take
him to the hospital at Port Nisea for an amputation.
On 21/10/2008, helene ryles <dreamavdb at googlemail.com> wrote:
> Thanks very much for all your advice so far.
>
> Yes, I have read Harry Potter several times in Braille. Tapes are
> useless to me as I am profoundly deaf now. Disabled characters in
> fiction aren't the best to copy from which is why I feel it's best to
> copy in real life in that case. Which I'm researching at the moment.
>
> I don't have a problem with interacting of characters as such. I know
> what a deafblind person can do as I am deafblind myself. But a hearing
> blind person would also be able to rely much more on their hearing
> too. I used to be hard of hearing but now I don't have any useful
> hearing to speak of. So from a discriptive point of view I'm curious
> what hearing blind people would know through their sense of hearing
> and what use can be gained. What is realistic and what isn't for
> example. So I only can discribe sound from memory and reading books.
> Although I also struggle when I write from the prospective to describe
> a scene without using either sound or sight as in the case of a
> deafblind character.
>
> Now I'll go and find a scene for me to paste here.
> Helene.
>
>
>
> On 20/10/2008, Judith Bron <jbron at optonline.net> wrote:
>> Do you read braille? If not, learn how to do it. If yes, start
>> reading fantasy books to see how their characters talk to each other and
others.
>> Read as many books as your fingertips can handle. This is the best
>> way to see how characters relate to each oth3er in fiction. If you
>> can hear enough to listen to books on tape, that is another good way
>> to hear how characters of this nature relate to each other. The
>> ohnly fantasy series I've heard on tape is Harry Potter. His
>> characters are not disabled but as far as I could hear, the
>> differences between the way they related to other "witches" and
>> Moguls or humans was minimal. These witches had human emotions.
>> Keep in mind that relaying emotion in fiction, be it fantasy or not,
>> is important so that your reader has a better handle on the
>> character. Good luck, Judith
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "helene ryles" <dreamavdb at googlemail.com>
>> To: "NFBnet Writer's Division Mailing List" <stylist at nfbnet.org>
>> Sent: Sunday, October 19, 2008 3:18 AM
>> Subject: [stylist] advice on hearing blind characters.
>>
>>
>>> Hello. My name is helene ryles. I am new to this group. I am writing
>>> a fantasy book which has several blind, deaf and deafblind
>>> characters in it.
>>>
>>> I'd like to have hearing blind people in this book and would
>>> apreciate advice on some scenes that are seen from a hearing blind
perspective.
>>> As I am deafblind myself.
>>>
>>> The main ones are:
>>>
>>> Hari Murdag: He is an intelligent mobile blind person. Although his
>>> family are very domineering. They expect him to get married and have
>>> children although he is also homosexual. They also expect him to
>>> become a healer on the local dragon slaying team like his blind
>>> father Ali. Although he doesn't want that. He's in the middle of
>>> taking a degree at medical school when his evil half brother Venom
>>> comes to press gang him into joining his team. He eventually has to
>>> drop out of medical school and turns to mobility training and
>>> establishes his own blind school which is funded by his rich
>>> grandmother Myra and the money he earns from being the healer on the
>>> dragon slaying team. Venom does not aprove of this enterprise since
>>> it eats up rather then raises money which he hopes to one day inherit.
>>>
>>> Myra Murdag: Hari's Grandmother. Very independant blind woman. She
>>> also happens to be a witch and a healer. She is also extremely rich.
>>> Partly from inheritance but also from a sucessful buisness she runs
>>> selling potions and human breast milk. She also works as a midwife.
>>> She is disapointed in Hari because she doesn't approve of his
>>> lifestyle and his reluctance to get married and produce children. So
>>> she spends a lot of time trying to introduce him to various
>>> prospective brides who she tries presurizing him into marrying. She
>>> is very conservative in her views. She does however fund his school
>>> since many of his pupils are from poor backgrounds. She also fund
>>> intervieners for some of her deafblind relatives and also some
>>> children from poor families who she considers promising. she won't
>>> help Hari's brother Malaz after he leaves the house with his mad
>>> wife Savasha. Even though he has also 2 young children to care for.
>>> (For years Savasha was being kept locked in a room but then when
>>> Myra gets enough critizm about this she just throws Savasha and
>>> Malaz out). She also fails to accept the evil nature of Hari's older
brother Venom.
>>> He eventually becomes President Venom Murdag after overthrowing the
>>> previous dictator. After that she sets up her own boarding school
>>> for girls which has a blindness skills unit attached. Prior to that
>>> the former dictator did not permit the education of girls although
>>> she has had a lot of practice with educating all her daughters,
>>> granddaughters and great grandaughter. The boys get sent to boarding
school.
>>>
>>> These are the main blind characters although I have several minor
>>> ones as well such as Hari's blind father Ali who was the team healer
>>> before losing his legs when a dragon attacks camp. Which is when
>>> Hari is supposed to take his place. Another minor character is Paril
>>> who suffers from RP but doesn't want to admit it. Myra goes so far
>>> as to insist everyone on the witches comitee meeting that she's head
>>> of (which Paril, Hari and Ali belong to) is to learn braille and
>>> long cane tecniques wether they can see or not in order to try and
>>> force Paril to change his ways. There are also a number of blind
>>> children including a set of blind septuplets which she gets when
>>> Venom tries to single handedly create his own army of prospective
>>> dragon slayers by making his wives wear these powerful fertility
>>> charms. Myra is literally left 'holding the baby'. She ends up
>>> having to baracade herself, wives, helpers and babies in the nursery
>>> until Venom 'comes to his senses'.
>>>
>>> I hope people will be interested in my work. I'll admit my
>>> characters tend to be extrodinary rather then just ordinary
>>> 'normal'. This goes for both blind and sighted characters. since I tend
to find 'normal'
>>> characters rather dull. I do however want to create blind characters
>>> out of the usual 'helpless' steriotypes that they are portrayed in.
>>> Myra is anything BUT the usual Helpless blind character. She's very
>>> forceful and domineering but she does have her good side too.
>>>
>>> Helene.
>>> _______________________________________________
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>>
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