Val McDermid
Oh I do like this. To ponder upon magic and the feeling of magic and to connect it to storytelling - fun!
I hadn't stopped to think about it, but really it is quite a magical thing that stories, told or read, have the capacity to create other worlds and almost shift-shape you into them. They can somehow transport you there even though at no point do you leave your seat or this plane at all. Almost the definition of magic in a way.
It has started me thinking about the science of reading and the analysis of what happens as one reads; or as one listens to stories being told. As I ponder that, I realise what an unbelievably fascinating field that would be, trying to understand how letters, sounds, words on a page or words in your ears, form some sort of meaning or imagery in our brains. How do our brains then create those pictures from words? Or those sensations? or trigger those memories? those connections?
Oh my, I need to know more I think.
Magic, imaginations, connections...
and I wonder ... do you also "hear" the words in your mind as you read?
ReplyDeleteit was only recently that I learned that a "failure of imagination" is a real thing ... that there are people who cannot form mental images ... it's called aphantasia and, as usual, a Google search brings up lots of information
hi Liz, I definitely hear voices - and often end up with an accent somehow. It's funny because I think suffer a little bit from aphantasia; I oftentimes can't 'see' something in my head. Interesting!
Deletewhat is this magic blue world?
ReplyDeleteOh Mo I wish I could tell you! I trawled back through all my photos and Barry's from GOMA at Christmas time last year and couldn't find a reference. The lights changed from blue to violet to pink and back and it was utterly mesmerising. I normally do capture the artist, sorry for the lack this time.
Delete