The LitBlogHop(The Blue Bookcase)

The Blue Bookcase have once again thrown out a question with the aim of stimulating  conversation and debate amongst their fellow bookfiends. This idea of seeking out the opinion of their peers helps build and maintain a community of people that share a passion for literature in all it’s varied guises, for that I offer my hearty thanks. Now to the serious stuff. The Question ……

“What other outside influences affect your reading experience? Do you think these influences enhance or detract from the experience?”

This initially stumped me, the phrase “what other” had me reappraising previous questions in search for an answer, before coming to the conclusion that this could be answered as a continuation of a past question, that Megan was widening the debate on the influences that can affect your reading, or the decision on what you read. So in that light I read the question as….

What Influences affect your Reading experience (Social, cultural etc.), do these influences enhance or detract from the experience?

Now I think I've discussed before that my path through Literature was a series of stepping stones, that without a formal guide, my influences were the authors I read, this I described as the path of the autodidact, the self taught, or to be precise my teachers were the books I read and following that reasoning the authors, as one writer would introduce me to another in a trail that continues to this day. As to whether this has been an enhancement to my reading experience, well the answer has to be a resounding yes, or to put it more emphatically YES, without that influence I wouldn't be reading the range of writers I read today, in fact I wouldn't be writing this post for my Blog, which leads me to other outside influences, well again that’s an easy answer, the majority of the people that are now reading this, are my external influences, my love of world literature was a mere seedling, till I discovered Lit-Blogs, which gave me the knowledge & impetus to start my own, placing me in the position of asking this question to a writer, in fact the author behind my last post - Tomorrow Pamplona, written by Jan Van Mersbergen, How’s that for enhancing my experience, so the question I asked Jan, who was here as part of the………

Tomorrow Pamplona Blog Tour 2011, 1st Gig.

What Influences affect your Reading experience (Social,cultural etc) Do these influences enhance or detract from the experience & specifically how do they feed into your own writing?

Difficult question. I just can see that for writing reading is the most important thing. You need to find out how other writers build up a novel, what they tell and more important, what they don't tell. What they hide. I guess reading is influenced by your background, because people who grew up with books and reading often like to read when the are a bit older. I think a book is the same book for everyone, but everyone can make their own story out of a book. I don't really think about that when I write. Writers who think about their readers produce books with very much explanations. I like it when a book is made while reading. I let readers find out about the story and the characters. Give the reader a clue but not to much. The connections between clues are made in the head of the reader. I think everyone can do that, as long as the language is down to earth. I'm from a family of workers and farmers, from the south of Holland. We don't talk like intellectuals. I can be seen as an intellectual cause I write novels, and writing is a hard job, but from my background I cannot write in any other language than the one of my family. I don't know, maybe that's why I like American novels from the countryside...
best,
Jan