Velka
Sage
I've read, and skimmed over this thread, and the thing that stuck out was the blurring of lines between character's voice and writer's voice/style.
I'm still discovering my writer's voice, but there are a few characteristics of it that I have identified: prose teetering on the edge of purple, poetics, and lots of dialogue. It's just how I write and tell a story. I also believe, feel free to disagree, that a writer's voice is closer to an innate trait. It's how I speak and how my imagination works and how I naturally put words together to create meaning.
I believe a writer's voice can change organically, much in the same way as my cousin, from Canada, now has a natural sounding British accent after living in London for almost 20 years. I don't believe it is something that can be forced, or even should be, as it would sound off-key and inauthentic (like faking a British accent). I've refined my voice over the years; scraping off unnecessary adjectives here and there for clarity's sake, balancing my love of assonance and alliteration because, while they make me rosy, they usually don't add much to the story. Could I ever assume Faulkner's stream of consciousness voice and make it work? Heaven's no, I don't think like that or tell stories that way.
Character voice is much more malleable. To me, it's putting the reader into the character's mind as they speak and act, a mind presented in a precise, deliberate, and unique way. Different characters have different minds/lives and therefore different voices. This is where you can play with nuance and performance.
If you look at Hemingway as an obvious example, he has a very distinct writer's voice: clear, unadorned, a lesson in brevity and journalistic detachment. His characters, however, all have their own voices within the canopy of his writer's voice. Some are longing and nostalgic, some are subversive and flippant, some are tender and wounded, but all of them are presented with their own identities within his particular style.
I'm still discovering my writer's voice, but there are a few characteristics of it that I have identified: prose teetering on the edge of purple, poetics, and lots of dialogue. It's just how I write and tell a story. I also believe, feel free to disagree, that a writer's voice is closer to an innate trait. It's how I speak and how my imagination works and how I naturally put words together to create meaning.
I believe a writer's voice can change organically, much in the same way as my cousin, from Canada, now has a natural sounding British accent after living in London for almost 20 years. I don't believe it is something that can be forced, or even should be, as it would sound off-key and inauthentic (like faking a British accent). I've refined my voice over the years; scraping off unnecessary adjectives here and there for clarity's sake, balancing my love of assonance and alliteration because, while they make me rosy, they usually don't add much to the story. Could I ever assume Faulkner's stream of consciousness voice and make it work? Heaven's no, I don't think like that or tell stories that way.
Character voice is much more malleable. To me, it's putting the reader into the character's mind as they speak and act, a mind presented in a precise, deliberate, and unique way. Different characters have different minds/lives and therefore different voices. This is where you can play with nuance and performance.
If you look at Hemingway as an obvious example, he has a very distinct writer's voice: clear, unadorned, a lesson in brevity and journalistic detachment. His characters, however, all have their own voices within the canopy of his writer's voice. Some are longing and nostalgic, some are subversive and flippant, some are tender and wounded, but all of them are presented with their own identities within his particular style.