![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Now see, I'm starting to have those doubts. Am I ruining my story by importing characters from Shakespeare? Does writing a novel starring Lady and Mr. Macbeth bring too much baggage to a world that should, by all rights, have completely different baggage all its own? Do I do [myself? the story? someone else?] a disservice by writing a wildly transformative but still derivative work?
I was reading Macbeth again recently for the first time in a few years, and I nearly didn't recognize Lady M. She's become something very different in my head: should she stay the famous murderess or just become Gruoch, original character whose husband's head was cut off and stolen by witches? (One of the notions guiding my interpretation was that of Macbeth being one of Shakespeare's greatest love stories, one between a good man who does bad things and a bad woman who could do good things. I had to work some to find that this time around: certainly Macbeth and Lady M are the ultimate two-person team, and her rage at his weakness may come from a seat of deep love. Is that more work than a reader — the generic "reader" — is willing to swallow?)
The more I think about the landscape and the people of Hecatia, the less I want it to seem Scottish by default. After a certain point you're doing so many contortions to justify the parameters of the original story, it may not make sense to stick with the specific elements of the source text. Am I to that point, or is the Shakespeare element too intrinsic and too large of a selling point (to make people interested) to shuck off?
Of course, the only way to figure this out is to write. So, fingers crossed, that's what I'm going to do. For all the time I've been spending discovering details, though, there are still enormous moving parts that are eluding me at the moment. This helps and it doesn't; I don't disagree with its basics, and that's making me just a little bit crazy. But again: the only way to figure this out is to write.
That's the plan, fingers crossed.
My very crowded notebook (one of the neatest pages) and my very be-arrowed motivation chart (plus bed-head)
I was reading Macbeth again recently for the first time in a few years, and I nearly didn't recognize Lady M. She's become something very different in my head: should she stay the famous murderess or just become Gruoch, original character whose husband's head was cut off and stolen by witches? (One of the notions guiding my interpretation was that of Macbeth being one of Shakespeare's greatest love stories, one between a good man who does bad things and a bad woman who could do good things. I had to work some to find that this time around: certainly Macbeth and Lady M are the ultimate two-person team, and her rage at his weakness may come from a seat of deep love. Is that more work than a reader — the generic "reader" — is willing to swallow?)
The more I think about the landscape and the people of Hecatia, the less I want it to seem Scottish by default. After a certain point you're doing so many contortions to justify the parameters of the original story, it may not make sense to stick with the specific elements of the source text. Am I to that point, or is the Shakespeare element too intrinsic and too large of a selling point (to make people interested) to shuck off?
Of course, the only way to figure this out is to write. So, fingers crossed, that's what I'm going to do. For all the time I've been spending discovering details, though, there are still enormous moving parts that are eluding me at the moment. This helps and it doesn't; I don't disagree with its basics, and that's making me just a little bit crazy. But again: the only way to figure this out is to write.
That's the plan, fingers crossed.
My very crowded notebook (one of the neatest pages) and my very be-arrowed motivation chart (plus bed-head)
There are 4 comments on this entry.