Second Wind Publishing discussion

Most writers are avid readers. They have a love for the written word that pulls them to paper and pen or more precisely in this day and age, to the keyboard. The computer has become an extension of ourselves and we are as comfortable with it as we are with our remote controls and driving a car.

Other people may have a similar love for movies or theater and take up acting to be a part of the world they love. Would the writer and reader be more visually perceptive than the actors and theater people? Which group would likely have a deeper level of imagination?

I don’t believe there is any right or wrong answer. My husband is certainly a movie person and I swear there are dozens of characters living in his head. My best friend and sister are both the same way while also being creative and talented authors. My husband doesn’t read at all. I read my novels to him. Reading the books aloud also helped me to edit as I read.

Now, let’s talk about you. Are you a movie person? A book person? Is there a hidden actor or author within you? Maybe all of the above?

If you’re a mixture of both, do you read the book and then go see the movie? If you see the movie, do you refuse to touch the book?

Are you at the point where you watch movies or read books on your computer or on a handheld device such as Kindle, or game systems such as PSP. Would you read a book or watch a movie on your phone?

The line between pen and paper and the keyboard as well as the silver screen and the digital world are all blurring together faster than I can keep up!


Claire Collins is the author of the romantic suspense novels Images of Betrayal and Fate and Destiny both available from Second Wind Publishing, LLC.

I used to watch movies all the time, but I rarely find time anymore. Books, I make time for, but in spurts, also as I have time. My husband just got a Kindle, and loves it, but I'm not all that impressed. To each his own, I guess!

I find I'm usually disappointed in the movie if I have read the book first. And I've almost always read the book first. The only GREAT adaptation from book to film was "To Kill A Mockingbird," in my humble opinion.

I'm thinking seriously about getting a Kindle2, I've only been waiting for the bugs to get worked out, but I think it may be hard to get used to.

And it's sorta strange - the fact that back in the olden days I couldn't "write" and "think" without the physical act of putting pencil to paper. I was in college and grad school in the late 80s and early to mid 90s and I wrote out all of my papers in longhand and then typed them with Wordperfect. Does anybody remember those days???

Nowadays, my brain is straightwired to my fingertips and I fly on the keyboard as fast as my thoughts and words can tumble and flow out.

I am none of these things. I watch a lot of film but most bores me - the scriptwriters are not original enough for me. If I ever read books it would be non-fiction - understanding and making sense of the world. I am certainly not an actor although I am a member of a theatre company.

I would say that my writing comes from within the pain within me. Stories are like dreaming, but that is not enough for a good novel. Stories are about the journey of the hero. They have to have learnt something or have changed their circumstances. A great novel deals with some wrong in the world and how the hero overcomes it. It is strange one becomes attached to the character and places them in new stories where they overcome new adversaries. I suppose this only applies to teen and adult fiction.

I ask myself why I do not read fiction. I may suggest that I am original enough not to borrow ideas from others. Alternatively we all dream for a substantial part of our lives and we are all practised storytellers. As I mentioned before past suffering is the springboard for most creativity. Like Billy Liar we live out our hoped for lives through our writing, viewing and reading. Despite heroes having awful live we would like to be the hero in our own lives and come out on top like most heroes.

You experiences may be different.

LOOKMAN
Author, Screenwriter, Producer.

Although I enjoy good movies, I find them less and less worth watching these days, with many of the story lines either contrived, copied or composed of withered ideas, but slathered with enough sex and violence to keep the adolescent mind at bay. Although I am rather strict on my requirements for literature, I want to find it uplifting and generally important.
The great ones, of course, are life changing, although I expect that these tend to irritate modern readers who seem to read for entertainment alone. Still there is nothing more pleasureable than spending time with a great author, turning pages and following the hand of a master craftsman, watching issues unfold and combine in miraculous ways, even when one has read them before. Thus great literature is always breathtaking, although it is often considerable work. Still what one reaps from such endeavors seems to yield a greater and deeper sense of humanity, something for which one can only hope and pray in this world which has exchanged its gods of excellence and understanding for overt sex and the accumulation of money.
What, of course, this question omits is the magic of a stage play, although forgetting about them is understandable these days. In my local area, I always check to see whether something might be of interest, but am usually disappointed to find either a repeat of Mary Poppins or Nunsense when what I truly crave is O'Neill, Shakespeare and Euripides. The last of these disappeared when Shakespeare was performed at the local festival as a Rap musical. I remain dumbfounded that the stage company cannot understand its lack of popularity.

Both. I cannot chose

I love both as well. There are books that are spellbinding. The written word has extraordinary power to convey imagery and take you on a journey. Books are the scripts of mental visualization where we become the associate director and audience as we interpret and conclude.

Great movies also draw you into them so that there is no separation. There is no acting, it is vividly real and very much alive.

I'm definitely a book person, although I do enjoy a good movie now and again.

I find I have to sift through the chaff going through the theatres for something I really want to see. I then pick a cheapie night. Mostly, I read and create a possible movie in my head. Going to a show is way too expensive I can get a good book for the price of admission and make pop corn.

Kendall wrote: "Both. I cannot chose"

Rhonda wrote: "Although I enjoy good movies, I find them less and less worth watching these days, with many of the story lines either contrived, copied or composed of withered ideas, but slathered with enough sex..."

I agree with you both! What I really enjoy are old movies like "The Ghost and Mrs Muir" or "Blacula". I don't care if the special effects are corny or out of date. What always grips me is the storyline. But there are very few recent one's worth watching. "The Piano" and "Jason's Lyric" are two of the greatest modern love stories I've ever seen in film. And "Fried Green Tomatoes!" I'll watch it over and over, and love it everytime.

But I also adore good fiction: writing and reading it (smile)!

Author of Immortal & Immortal II

Some of the best writers seem to have had a flair for both acting and writing. James Howe and Madeleine L'Engle are two examples of highly successful authors for whom acting in the theater was also a major part of their lives. James M. Barrie comes to mind, too, and to a certain extent Mark Twain.

Claire wrote: "
Most writers are avid readers. They have a love for the written word that pulls them to paper and pen or more precisely in this day and age, to the keyboard. The computer has become an extension ..."

I'm an author with a theatre background. May be it's all of the Method work, but I'm always examining my characters to figure out what their motivation might be. :-)

Claire wrote: "
Most writers are avid readers. They have a love for the written word that pulls them to paper and pen or more precisely in this day and age, to the keyboard. The computer has become an extension ..."

I am a movie person and a book person. I go to the movies less because of time constraints and I feel that the quality of movies (in my genres) has gone down and I feel dissatisfied more often after seeing a movie.

I'm not much of an actor, but I love the creative and dramatic aspects of movies. I thought about trying to be a filmmaker at several points in my life, but I am not a screenwriter. I like telling a fuller story, so writing stories is more up my alley.

I don't enjoy watching movies on my computer. The screen is too small for me to get much out of it.

I'd have to say I'm a little of both although books are out in front. I can live inside a book for weeks while a movie is just a 2 hour experience.

I don't go to movies all that often but when I do its either for pure entertainment (i.e. I just need to get my head clear of "stuff") or when one comes out that really speaks to me. The good ones inspire me and fire up my muse.

To summarize, both have their place for me for different reasons. A one track mind isn't necessarily a good thing. Michael

Book person. I HATED the Shopaholic movie but LOVED the book! Same with Prince of Tides. I could go on and on, but I would be here all night.

I think a lot of the storytelling aspect is gone from movies now. It's more about blowing things up and gratuitous sex than it is about a story. If I do watch a movie now, it's typically a family event with everyone sitting around the tv with bowls of popcorn.It's a mindless activity more geared towards enjoying the time and experience with my family. We also go to the drive-in. For my own personal entertainment, I always prefer a paper printed bound book.

Claire wrote: "I think a lot of the storytelling aspect is gone from movies now. It's more about blowing things up and gratuitous sex than it is about a story. If I do watch a movie now, it's typically a family e..."
This sounds like me...

There aren't a lot of movies that are very satisfactory renderings of books, that's for sure. Even the glorious recent LOTR films changed, (in ways which didn't make sense to me)the original story, perhaps aiming for a stronger "dramatic" effect. Movies have to be simpler than books, because time is the deciding factor. Good characterization takes time and words--so you will see many movie with fascinating minor characters cut or reduced to simple stereotype. Do I prefer movies or books? Each has a place, but a movie is often simple entertainment, while a book may be far more than just something to amuse and pass time. A case in point for me is Perez-Reverte's "Club Dumas," which Polanski turned into a film called "The 9th Gate." I appreciated "The 9th Gate" and it did it's job which was to thrill and terrify and tell a heck of a good occult story, but the book, which it simplified greatly, is a work of great sophistication. There are shades of gray, and it ends with a host of philosophical and moral questions, rather than the satanic chuckle which ends the movie.

(And sort of re Claire's original question--although Turner has preserved an amazing film library, TT's colorization of b&w treasures was a disaster. We've even gone so far as to adjust our set to remove the color.)

I am a book person... and a movie person :) Books spur my imagination and take me to places I've never been to and I can create those places in my own head (I tend to read fantasy mostly). Movies are a challenge to me. I'll watch a movie of a book that I've read and for the most part, I'm not disappointed. Not really. I appreciate that they are two different mediums and what works well in one doesn't always work well in the other.

When I read a book, I will often "cast" it in my head and the characters start sounding like the 'fantasy cast' I've lined up. If that book is made into a movie, I'll watch it to see what that director did, how he/she cast it and were their choices better than mine or just different.

Mostly though I watch movies by directors I've come to know and admire, much the same way I read books by authors I've come to know and admire. One such director (and now author) is Guillermo del Toro. His Spanish language films, such as "Cronos", "The Devil's Backbone" and "Pan's Labyrinth" are artistic and entertainment masterpieces (IMO), and his 'Hellboy' movies are just plain entertainment. He has a wonderful grasp of the written word and translates it to the screen in ways that are so unique that his movies are pure joy to watch -- even though they are horror filled.

Books are able to go into so much more detail than movies and I often find if I read the book first, the movie will make more sense. A recent example is The Time Traveler's Wife. There were parts of it my husband just didn't "get" because he hadn't read the book. He still enjoyed the movie, but he understood some parts more after I added some details from what I read.

I have never seen a movie that was as good as the book. The Lord of the Rings movies were so violently graphic I could hardly watch. Jurassic Park turned into a long chase scene movie. Plot twists are often left out of movies as well. However, the very worst film adaptation I have ever seen was what Walt Disney did to Alice and Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass. And after the film came out people seemed to feel they had no need to ever read those two wonderful books because they "knew" what was inside. Perhaps some people are curious enough after seeing a film to want to read the book it came from, but I believe the opposite is true since we're in a nonreading culture.

I hated PS, I Love You. I thought it was sophomoric nonsense, and doubt it would have been published had the author not been Bertie Ahern's daughter. However, the film was *beautiful.* They took the concept and made it significantly better.

I have always loved good movies and good books, but not usually good books that have been made into movies--even when the movie is great. I have different visions of who the characters are and what they look like. For me, the movie has to stand alone, like it's a cousin of the book.

I am a great fan of old movies- mainly because they are similar to books- with all the special effects and computer simulations - they had to depend on ...stories! many written by esteemed authors and acted by professionals who were hired for their skills and theatre background rather then looks alone-
can anyone compare a current actor to a Cary Grant, James Mason, Paul Muni or Edward G Robinson or current actress to a Bette Davis, Thelma Ritter, Katherine Hepburn or Susan Hayward?