JM on Ages & Timelines
May 19, 2005 As posted on the Simon & Schuster Bulletin Board

I've always taken the position that when I stop writing about a character, his aging process stops, and it does not begin again until I start writing about him again, at which time I decide how much older he is.

When I noticed your posts last week about seeing Matt at the age of 53 in EBYT, I was stunned that you'd think he was going to be 14 years older just because I wrote PARADISE 14 years ago. I was going to post a joking reply here that said something like, "Hey, it took me four years to write WHITNEY, but you wouldn't expect me to make Clayton four years older when I finished because of that, now would you?"

But your posts seemed so sure Matt would have to be 14 years older--and you're all such experts on my books--that I was really bothered by your certainty about his age...

And then, two nights ago, I had an awful thought which I assured myself couldn't be true. I grabbed a copy of PARADISE and there it was--my "worst nightmare": I did put a date at the beginning of Chapter One. And several chapters as well.

I grabbed a copy of PERFECT, and saw that I'd done the same thing in PERFECT.

I can't believe I did something that stupid--not when I've gone out of my way in subsequent books to avoid any mention of current events or real politicial figures, or anything else that could later cause my book to be "dated." I don't even describe clothing that could seem "dated" to readers in years to come.

Eight or ten years ago, if I would have recalled that I'd put the dates on those chapters in PARADISE and PERFECT, I'd have notified Pocket to yank them off the pages and I would have written a line or two instead to explain how much time had passed since the ending of the last chaper. I should have done it that way in the first place. The only explanation I can come up with for why I would have put actual dates on those chapters was that I'd been writing historicals for years, and in an historical, it's important to know the actual date.

Right now, the only practical way to circumvent the problem I created by listing those dates in PARADISE and PERFECT would be to have the dates on those chapers changed to 15 years sooner. The problem with that is there's millions of copies of those two books in print already, so its really too late to update them and have it make a real difference.

Since that isn't an option, and since I don't want to portray Matt as a 50-year-old, I'm going to solve the problem by avoiding any hint of his age in EBTY. He's not going to have gray hair, and if I mention their daughter is at school, I'm not going to say what grade she's in now.

That way, you and other readers may envision him being whatever age you choose. Personally, I envisioned Meredith and he being four or five years older in EBTY than PARADISE, and I'm going to stick with that as I work on EBTY.

[ May 19, 2005, 01:20 AM: Message edited by: Judith McNaught ]

MareofEarth: If I understand your suggestion about inserting the appropriate date in the new book, that would mean implying that EBYT takes place circa 1994, but that's back-dating a new book, which is deliberately creating the very problem I'm annoyed with myself for inadvertently (and needlessly) creating in PARADISE. If that makes any sense...

You're right about current influences inevitably creeping in, but as long as they continue to seem "current," that's fine. It's when these current influences become "outdated" that a book suddenly looses a little of its authenticity with new readers, and that's what I'd like to avoid.

An example that comes to mind involves DOUBLE STANDARDS. When I wrote it in 1982, I was using a "Mag Card," which was an automatated typewriter and the absolute cutting edge of office equipment--such a cutting edge piece that major corporations only had a few of them, and they were always installed in a centralized "Customer Service" department. At that time, the luckiest of high-powered executive secretaries in a corporate environment was using the latest IBM electric typewriter, and nothing more.

At that time, and for 20 years prior to it, an IBM electric typewriter was the ultimate, state-of-the-art piece of executive secrectarial equipment in corporations. Prior to that, and for as far back as anyone could remember, manual typewriters were the only choice.

Shortly after I finished DS, I bought one of the first PC/word processors on the market. However, technology was about to advance beyond anyone's wildest dreams. Within five years, PC's were being installed on secretarial desks all over the country.

It was about that same time that I received a fan letter from a new reader who was probably 18 or 20, and working at her first job. After telling me how much she enjoyed DS, she gently pointed out that I'd made a mistake when I referred to the sound of "clacking keyboards" going quiet when Nick Sinclair strolled toward Lauren's desk. She explained to me that computer keyboards really don't clack and they don't make enough noise to become noticably quiet.

I thought it was cute that she'd never heard the rhythmic clatter made by a group of electric typewriters in use.

But my all time favorite example of your "things we take for granted now that just didn't exist all that long ago" occured in a Regency Romance written by an obviously young new writer. In an effort to illustrate how humorously tacky a social climbing 1820's dowager was, the young writer referred to the fact that the dowager had put bouquets of plastic flowers all over her townhouse in an effort to make her daughter seem sought-after by elible noblemen.

Now, to be honest, I'm not old enough to remember a time when there wasn't any plastic either, but I am old enough to know plastic was a "new" sensation with unexplored uses not long before I was born.

What made this young Regency author's plastic-flower "blooper" especially entertaining and remarkable is that it escaped detection by her own editor who read her finished manuscript, as well as the copy editor whose job it is to watch for and notice any sort of dscrepancy, no matter how minor.

Evidently all three of these people were so young that they actually thought elaborate plastic products were commonplace long before someone figured out how to design a rudimentary toilet. (And before my Dreadnaughts pounce on the opportunity to ask me if I know who is credited with designing that, the answer is yes, I do know. And yes, I think his name is funny.)

[ May 19, 2005, 05:31 AM: Message edited by: Judith McNaught ]

In view of how acutely aware you all were of PARADISE'S timeline (and how unaware I was of it), I'm surprised someone here who read STWOM didn't suggest that Joe O'Hara should be thinking about surrendering his driver's license.

[ May 20, 2005, 07:09 PM: Message edited by: Judith McNaught ]

~~ Judith McNaught on Simon & Schuster's SimonSays Discussion Board