This is so great. I LOVE talking Tillermans with you. SO MUCH.
The only way I can achieve anything like any kind of interweaving is to go back and forth through the different parts and insert and delete references and smooth them out. I can't just start at part one and work my through a series and have echoes and foreshadowing and different perspectives. She must have had a *lot* of this worked out, in her head if not on paper, before publication.
Oh, I know, right? Either she must have written the entire thing before publishing (unlikely), or everything was so clear to her that it was mapped out in her head as a unified whole. I don't even know how that works on the level she did it in these books! I am with you, that is the only way I can do it as well. I think the longest I've ever managed is 10k or so :P
So there are two boats
Ah, thanks for clearing up the boat thing for me! I knew it was confusing me, but not quite why :)
Runner has a theme of builders and breakers, and Johnny is a builder in this classification scheme. Bullet and his mother are breakers. (Sammy the younger as builder, hmm.)
OH. This… makes so much sense. And it's sort of ironic, too: Johnny is a builder who breaks all his family ties. I will have to think about this some more. Is Sammy a builder? He likes to help Dicey, but I'm not sure that he is natively a builder… I am going to have to think about this one. I am betting this is something that might show up elsewhere, too.
Wow, I don't think anyone had to teach Dicey to reach out.
Dicey is interesting. I feel like she has no trouble reaching out sometimes, and other times (Mina, Jeff) she's a ball of prickles. Maybe family is easier for her? It's odd to me, though, that she reaches out to Cisco in Seventeen. I am seriously looking forward to that one, for the first time.
Even that has Bullet remembering Liza singing, constantly. Neither he nor his mother can produce music, but they both seem emotionally connected to it. And there is the scene where Bullet enjoys square dancing. So it's there a little bit.
Oh, I really like that, that makes me think… Bullet, and his mother, were connected to Liza, but then she left, and there's no music any more… hmm! I don't have the book right with me (I'm out of town) but in Dicey's essay, doesn't she talk about how Liza doesn't have any songs any more at the end?
I do think you're right about there not being a boat in Come a Stranger. I'll have to think about that.
I have a whole theory about why there's no boat in Stranger! My theory involves the boats being a locus for cutting ties with others. Dicey holds on to her family and doesn't finish her boat in Song. Bullet gives a boat to his mother in the process of letting go of his family. Jeff's journeys in his boat reflect his increasing alienation from his parents. Dicey;s boat-building takes over her relationship with everyone in Seventeen. Heck, Francis Verricker sails away from his family! And who is the only major character who is emotionally healthy and doesn't go through a period of cutting ties with family? Mina, that's who!
His old man was a nothing, nothing but right answers and holding on to his precious farm.
Ohhhh, that quote about Grandfather Tillerman holding on in Runner, that's very interesting. He's holding on, but to something inanimate, the land, which is something worth holding on to but not at the expense of people, which is what he's done.
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Date: 2017-07-05 04:09 am (UTC)The only way I can achieve anything like any kind of interweaving is to go back and forth through the different parts and insert and delete references and smooth them out. I can't just start at part one and work my through a series and have echoes and foreshadowing and different perspectives. She must have had a *lot* of this worked out, in her head if not on paper, before publication.
Oh, I know, right? Either she must have written the entire thing before publishing (unlikely), or everything was so clear to her that it was mapped out in her head as a unified whole. I don't even know how that works on the level she did it in these books! I am with you, that is the only way I can do it as well. I think the longest I've ever managed is 10k or so :P
So there are two boats
Ah, thanks for clearing up the boat thing for me! I knew it was confusing me, but not quite why :)
Runner has a theme of builders and breakers, and Johnny is a builder in this classification scheme. Bullet and his mother are breakers. (Sammy the younger as builder, hmm.)
OH. This… makes so much sense. And it's sort of ironic, too: Johnny is a builder who breaks all his family ties. I will have to think about this some more. Is Sammy a builder? He likes to help Dicey, but I'm not sure that he is natively a builder… I am going to have to think about this one. I am betting this is something that might show up elsewhere, too.
Wow, I don't think anyone had to teach Dicey to reach out.
Dicey is interesting. I feel like she has no trouble reaching out sometimes, and other times (Mina, Jeff) she's a ball of prickles. Maybe family is easier for her? It's odd to me, though, that she reaches out to Cisco in Seventeen. I am seriously looking forward to that one, for the first time.
Even that has Bullet remembering Liza singing, constantly. Neither he nor his mother can produce music, but they both seem emotionally connected to it. And there is the scene where Bullet enjoys square dancing. So it's there a little bit.
Oh, I really like that, that makes me think… Bullet, and his mother, were connected to Liza, but then she left, and there's no music any more… hmm! I don't have the book right with me (I'm out of town) but in Dicey's essay, doesn't she talk about how Liza doesn't have any songs any more at the end?
I do think you're right about there not being a boat in Come a Stranger. I'll have to think about that.
I have a whole theory about why there's no boat in Stranger! My theory involves the boats being a locus for cutting ties with others. Dicey holds on to her family and doesn't finish her boat in Song. Bullet gives a boat to his mother in the process of letting go of his family. Jeff's journeys in his boat reflect his increasing alienation from his parents. Dicey;s boat-building takes over her relationship with everyone in Seventeen. Heck, Francis Verricker sails away from his family! And who is the only major character who is emotionally healthy and doesn't go through a period of cutting ties with family? Mina, that's who!
His old man was a nothing, nothing but right answers and holding on to his precious farm.
Ohhhh, that quote about Grandfather Tillerman holding on in Runner, that's very interesting. He's holding on, but to something inanimate, the land, which is something worth holding on to but not at the expense of people, which is what he's done.