The diverse character of voice and the big question

How do you come to have a ‘voice’ in your writing? This is without doubt a very difficult question to answer, probably, impossible. However, if I was to decide where to start, I would probably resort to Bakhtin’s construct of heteroglossia for a start.

To me, defining voice is a very difficult thing to do, even after these readings. So, in order to make things easier, as I write these words, I try to think of the most ‘remarkable’ voice I could think of, the most unique, the one that I could not forget. This makes things much easier for me. Having briefly revisited Bakhtin’s proposal, I can only think of Dostoyevsky. But I don’t want to bore you off by pondering over nineteenth century Russian literature. I just want to exemplify how a master voice is built up of different voices. Dostoyevki’s voice is a whole that finds its parts in Raskolnikov’s monologues, Prince Myshkin’s speeches or the memoirs of the Underground Man. When reading these masterpieces, one is easily confused because it seems that the character’s voice is meshing with the narrator’s and the other way round. It is difficult to determine who is ‘populating’ whose voice. This way, Dostoyevski’s voice could not exist without any of these voices, it would simply not be. Ok, so much for Russian literature.

My point is that I don’t know what voice is, but I suspect that it is not as individualistic as Bowden (1995) presents it. It may be related to the ‘inner self’, but this inner self is, I believe, at the same time, influenced by outer others, outer voices. However, and coming back to my example on Dostoyevski, I believe that the construction of a voice, as of a novel, may be an individualistic decision, may be a deliberate act of mixing voices. It relies on the level of awareness you have about the voices that govern your thoughts, the ideologies behind you deepest beliefs. This awareness may help you control your voice, use it to your advantage and in certain domains. Otherwise, you may have a voice, but you may not govern it. This will generally result in alienation.

After these preliminary impressions, I am attracted by the idea of a ‘situational’ use of voice. In accordance with the testimonies provided by Hirvela and Becher I think developing a voice in a foreign language could/must be a deliberate act. A ‘dress you can wear when you need to’. How do you do that? That is the big question.