Saturday, October 11, 2008

Bouchecon III

It's not specifically an international-crime-fiction conference, but Bouchercon 2008's second day touched from its beginning directly on a number of subjects often mentioned on this blog. And I do mean from its beginning. I was up, scrubbed, dressed and at an Edgar Allan Poe panel at 8:30 in the morning.

As is always the case with a good conference, much worthwhile stuff happens informally, and I don't mean just drinking and carousing. I hope to devote a post to the informal side of the convention in the next day or two. For now, on with the business at hand (and these reports cover a small selection of the panels on offer. For a full schedule, click here.):

1) The Poe panel, chaired by Philly Poe Guy and Detectives Beyond Borders friend Ed Pettit, focused principally on Poe's centrality in American literature, but Pettit also cited Poe's internationalism, specifically in "The Mystery of Marie Rogêt." Quoth Ed: He's living in Philadelphia, he writes about a crime in New York, he sets it in Paris."

Panel member Shelley Costa Bloomfield said: "There's something about Poe's work that's not very American. He's not a naturalist. He's not a realist." The French, she said, were ready and waiting for what Poe had to offer: "Maybe it takes an older civilization to feel comfortable with the dark side and be able to enjoy it," a statement pregnant with meaning and ripe for future blog posts if I've ever heard one.

2) A panel on "the influence of music on/in writing." John Harvey offered a striking remark or two about his jazz-loving protagonist Charlie Resnick: "I try and get onto the page what he actually hears" – not always an easy task for music much of which is instrumental. "Sometimes he'll listen to Billie Holiday if he's feeling particularly melancholy" or to Lester Young, who suffered much.

Peter Robinson discussed a rather puckish invocation of technology in his Inspector Banks books. Odd things pop up occasionally when Banks' iPod is in random-play mode, Robinson said: "Sometimes a song will perhaps ironically reflect a situation."

3) Michael Genelin, an American who lives in Paris and writes novels set in Slovakia, suggested during a Soho Crime panel that an author writing about a country not his or her own can see things a native would miss because they are so commonplace. Cara Black, who lives in San Francisco and sets her Aimée Leduc novels in Paris, said that city works as a setting because "Many people have their own Paris."

© Peter Rozovsky 2008

Labels: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

4 Comments:

Blogger petra michelle; Whose role is it anyway? said...

Very interesting, Peter. Any writer in making a decision where to place the story has to be careful, especially if they themselves don't know the locale and its nuances. But with a great imagination, which most writers have, the story will find its home.
Am looking forward to your future posts regarding Poe, one of my favorites.
Wanted to thank you for your comment on Sharing Popcorn...
Yes, the accent came up while I was writing the current script, and decided to leave it to the reader's imagination. Hope you enjoy "Columbus Meets Captain Jack Sparrow."
Have a wonderful weekend, Peter!

October 11, 2008  
Blogger Peter Rozovsky said...

Thanks. You need to click on the "Ed Pettit" link in the post if you like Poe. Pettit is one of the centers of the Poe universe.

I picked up one book each for you by Declan Burke and John McFetridge, if you want to send me your postal address.

October 11, 2008  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I have a collection of Poe from a long time ago and have yet to start reading.

I have a collection of about ten million things and have yet to start reading.

Setting stories in other countries has always been problematic for me, since I feel insecure about my writing if i don't know something for a fact or have the ability to make it plausible logic. I can't afford to just fly out to wherever I'm writing about to study it, so relying on written information is the access. But of course, that doesn't completely reveal the character of a country to you either.

October 14, 2008  
Blogger Peter Rozovsky said...

Poe's detective stories are fascinating. The style is obviously of its time, but it's interesting to see how many conventions and sub-genres of crime fiction grew out of Poe.

October 14, 2008  

Post a Comment

<< Home