In today’s New York Times, the article, “Could Your Voice Betray You?” by Douglas Heingartner covers the aspects of lie-detector testing and its value in measuring voice stress to analyze whether a person may be telling the truth, particularly used in criminal investigations.
With the constant innovations in technology, this application, sans wires attached to a physical body, is being studied for its use in other areas. Software is being produced that enables the recording and evaluation via telephone, and expands its application to “telemarketing and matchmaking” to improve marketing and sales pitch, I assume, by points of tension of hostility or willingness to listen on the part of the pitchee. Fraud detection is another valuable use that has already been implemented by the insurance industry.
This is nothing new, but what intrigued me into writing this posting is its relationship to the voice writers attempt to establish particularly in fiction. What do we tell from the tone and pace of a writing? How much does it reveal of the author, and how far can he go in manipulating it to create a first person narrator that is totally unlike himself? Does an author’s voice become so constant that it comes through each successive story, despite his efforts to separate himself from the narrative? This is a very interesting—and long-pondered—element of writing that I am still a novice in comprehending.
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I’ve been told that no matter what I write (and I write EVERYTHING [except poetry, for which I have no talent]), my stories and essays are nothing alike, and yet they all “sound like me.” I think it is very hard to completely eliminate the writer’s voice. However, I’m tempted to believe that voice is often confused with elements like style, wit, and form by the reader.
I also think it depends on how distinctive a voice and style a person has. Higher education, and most notably the fields I’ve gone into (science, etcetera) tend to homogenize things, and as a result I have a scholarly voice and style that is nothing at all like my casual writings.
As for my casual sorts of things, I’ve made a conscious effort to maintain and even encourage some of my more stylistic quirks. In so far as it’s something I pay attention to, I think I could alter it if I wanted to. I imagine you couldn’t say the same about those who are completely oblivious.