Subject: colours
From: Scottie Bowman (rbowman@indigo.ie)
Date: Fri Feb 11 2000 - 15:37:59 EST
Well, Cecilia, the greyness referred to the denseness
of the type & the general grubbiness resulting from
the staining by all those sweaty fingers & mascara-tinted
tears which the average Salinger volume bears after
the average week's usage by the average Salinger reader.
Remember, incidentally, that colours - which in
certain technical contexts may have a diagnostic value -
should, by & large, be avoided in descriptive writing.
Nothing is more deadening than the amateur's common
mistake of trying to convey the exact shades falling
within his vision: coral pinks, azure blues, copper oranges,
bottle greens & so on.
Many members of the Hemingway list recently had
their thinking transformed by my comments on
this very subject. (See the Archives: Heming-L.)
Flashing that old, uncanny perceptiveness, I pointed out
that the Master Himself (& I don’t mean the one in Cornish)
in his great, breath-taking descriptions of the natural
world - which linger so vivid in the minds of his readers -
in actual practice confined himself to a few grudging blacks
& greys; & a very, very occasional, unadorned blue or green.
Rather surprising.
I can't think how Salinger handles this particular problem.
Scottie B.
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