Descriptive passages

[Cimarron]

You know those parts of books that provide the setting, the passages that go into detail about where things are in a room, or where buildings and streets are in a city. Even though they're great for putting things into place in your mind, I find my mind not sticking with those descriptions as I keep reading. I mean, even though they told me on page 52 that "John walks this direction to go to work," in my mind I still picture his office building on the other side of the street. My mind meets resistance when I try to picture it otherwise, and kind of defaults back to my incorrect picture.

It's like when the author says "John walks into his house," I automatically picture what the house looks like. Then the author starts to describe the house in detail, but it's too late. He can't change the way I see the house, as I've already created how the details look in my mind.

What's going on there? Anyone find this familiar to their own reading experiences?

 

[Clownmaster]

Yeah, I find that very familiar. If its an important detail, I might focus to reimagine it so that things make more spatial sense. If John is stuck in traffic on his way to work, i'd picture him on a highway rather than unable to back out of his driveway and so I might want to put the conscious effort to right my err. Otherwise, if I don't find the detail important (and just sometimes I can't change my mental image) then yeah I stick with the flaw.

 

[Cimarron]

I guess another point is that if they wouldn't expect us to remember those things, the author wouldn't have mentioned them. The author must have mentioned them for a reason, right?

But if this happens to all of us when we read, then the authors are really wasting their time, it looks like.

 

[Clownmaster]

Eh, it depends, sometimes my mental image is fuzzy at first and I haven't thought of more of the house except the doorway and with the authors descriptive clues I'm able to piece together a more solid image and fill in the blanks with good ol' imagination.

 

[Gauche]

Yeah I keep my own mental image, then author describe something in detail and I'm confused

...
It was like in Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, when about a half of the book were descriptions of fishes they saw from the living room of the submarine through the window. I think they just needed to thicken the book or something

 

[Kasper]

That's what I love about books that you lose in movies. I tend to ignore anything inconsequential that contradicts the image I have in my head if I'm absorbed by a book.

 

[bluebell]

Yep, same here. I think that's why I usually prefer books that are really light on descriptive details. IMO, really good authors are ones who generate really vivid mental imagery with minimal description.