(Originally published on LiveJournal)
One of the things about being both a writer and an artist is that eventually, the artist gets an itch to draw something that the writer has written. Of all the possible scenes, characters, and events in The Ring of Adonel that appeal to me, however, I did not expect the first one to be the following one. Mainly because the character is quite fantastical.
But I’ve now done a preliminary sketch for an eventual pen & ink drawing. I’m not going to start on that for quite a while (at least, I don’t think I will be). But it amuses me to put the sketch before you, my friendly readers. 🙂
The text from which this comes follows. The setting is a big midsummer celebration, and my hero, Gidion, is performing a solo dance that is quite blatantly drawn from the Highland Fling (heck, I’m half Scottish, so I come by it honestly).
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_____In the dwindling light, an earth-green glow was beginning to form before him, shaping itself into the form of a powerful man, one who danced with him. Gidion glanced at Caoin and saw a strange look on the face of the Rinden musician, as if he were compelled to play and could not stop. Gidion sensed that he too was caught in the compelling spell, which drew more and more from musician and dancer. He looked back at the other dancer and his eyes widened.
_____The other danced with his fists planted on his hips, for he had no need to suggest antlers. Sweeping back over his dark head was a pair of gleaming antlers.
_____Except for the sound of the bagpipe and drum, an utter silence had fallen upon the shian. Then, as if from far off, Gidion heard Narin’s voice.
_____“Fiad!”
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End of chapter. Actually there should be an accent over the ‘a’, but I’m too lazy to go hunting it right now. The name is /fee – AHD/.
Hmmm. Antlers on a humanish head. How’s this going to work?
So I did the following preliminary sketch —
This was based on working from some pictures of stags, and the proportion and position of the antler sweep to the rest of the head. I also discovered that human or Fynlaren ears weren’t going to look right with the antlers. Hence the stag’s ears.
From there I went on to do a “thumbnail” (except that it’s about 2/3rds the sketchbook page) of Fiad dancing. Thus —
Eventually, when I do get around to doing the pen & ink piece, I want it to come out something in the style of an old picture I’d done from The Silmarillion – Elwing greeting Earendil.
Comments
sartorias Aug. 17th, 2007 01:15 pm (UTC)
Ooooh, evocative!
kalimac Aug. 17th, 2007 01:54 pm (UTC)
One of the things about being both a writer and an artist is that eventually, the artist gets an itch to draw something that the writer has written.
You do have a knack for reminding one of Tolkien, don’t you?
Is it OK to suggest a change of wording in your passage? One part might be rephrased something like this: “The other danced with his fists planted on his hips. He had no need to suggest antlers – for there the pair of gleaming antlers were, sweeping back over his dark head.” I think that suggests more the surprise of seeing them. (Also, compelled/compelling in the previous graf.)
scribblerworks Aug. 17th, 2007 04:23 pm (UTC)
You do have a knack for reminding one of Tolkien, don’t you?
Heh. I guess I can take that as a compliment. But certainly, when I found out that Tolkien also drew pictures of his world, I felt very akin to him. But I’ll never be the linguist he was, so I don’t pretend to that.
And thanks for the rewrite suggestions. I should have said the passage was from the unrevised first draft, and needs some tweaking. I noticed the compelled/compelling chime when I typed it to LJ, but didn’t change it. But I do need the word once.
kalimac Aug. 17th, 2007 04:56 pm (UTC)
Yeah, “chime” – that’s the technical term I needed. I was fixing on the chime in both passages. Using the word once each, though, is of course appropriate.
Don’t worry about clumsiness in your first draft, though. Tolkien didn’t. (I’m going to keep on making encouraging comparisons like that so long as they’re appropriate.)
jpantalleresco Aug. 24th, 2007 08:11 pm (UTC)
Awesome pieces Sarah. I really like the last one in particular.
