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“I must, like a whore, unpack my heart with words.”
- Hamlet, Hamlet, Act II, Scene 2
In a recent issue of The New Yorker there’s an article on John Banville and his alter-ego Benjamin Black. Banville is a rather well known, high-brow, “artsy” novelist who, for reasons all his own, but perhaps of an inner necessity, created a nom de plume — Benjamin Black. Banville writes complex and “literary” novels. Black writes popular detective stories. According to Banville, the way this came about was, “I sat down at nine o’clock on a Monday morning, and by lunchtime I had written more than fifteen hundred words. It was a scandal! I thought, John Banville, you slut.” Some are word-smiths, others are word-sluts. Banville is the former. He says that “as Banville” it is an accomplishment if he can write up to 200 words a day. But “as Balck” he can write up to 2.5 thousand words a day!
Believe me, I know how he feels. This little stroll through Slutville has already resulted in over 80 thousand words (and counting), whereas my other writings require intense concentration and construction. But, as Carmela Ciuraru says (quoted in the article), “The authorial persona is a construct, never wholly authentic.” When “the author” says “I,” who or what is that? Does it refer to a fictional character? Does it refer to the writer or scriptor? Who is that writer, scriptor, author? Does he…