Stephen King in his book "On writing" suggests three rather rigid rules that he has compiled from the "The Elements of Style" book: avoid adverbs, limit the usage of passive voice, and make the dialog's attribution as simple as possible. And I had a hard time deciding whether to inherit these rules or not.
The supporting arguments were really logical, and I had no choice but to agree with the author. However, when I went back to writing my own story, I just couldn't omit those words. They didn't feel unnecessary to me. I would agree that adverbs might have been kind of redundant, and the sense of HOW everything is going on should be clear from the context. But if I removed all of them, the text would just become plain, flavourless, and not that interesting to read.
Not to say that I just love dialog's attributions! I do understand that you have to be very careful with those; but you can add sparkles and hints about your characters while describing how they said something, what were their facial expressions, and what were the accompanying moves, gestures, and reactions. You certainly don't want to let your Reader get lost and forget that s/he was reading a dialog, actually! But nevertheless, instead of using "he said"/"she said" you could just add some irony, sarcasm, or any other fun stuff, and that would make reading much more vivid.
I don't have many problems with the passive voice. Although I use it more often when it comes to a background history and "already known facts" about buildings and other stationary objects in my story. Sometimes passive voice is just a necessary part of a figure of speech. But all in all, I agree that you should prefer active voice and take the responsibility for the actions in your writing.
Having considered all these buts, I'd say that you don't have to comply with these rules unquestioningly. You should definitely keep them in mind while editing your text (I wouldn't worry too much about them while writing the first draft) and pay a special attention if you have problems with either of them. But they are not obligatory. Stephen King writes suspense, and for that genre his rules work the best. For suspense you need to focus on actions, dynamics, and creating and keeping Readers' tension. That means you don't want your Readers' attention to slip away. You don't want to distract them with unnecessary words and expressions. But whether to use these rules or not very much depends on your own style and the genre of your writing. For some genres it is more important to hide clues in characters' behaviours that could lead to the solution of a puzzle (and here you have to break at least one of the rules). It is you who should decide where you want to focus, what you want to emphasise, and what are the most important parts in your story. But always think of the flow of Readers' thought while writing, keep their attention where you want it to be and make sure the image they see matches your own.
I'm taking the class Write101 on Edx, and as our first assignment we've been given a task to write a blog post related to grammar or the process of writing (still confused about the topic actually - it's quite unclear).
So here it comes!
Writing is like Teaching
When I think of writing something, I always imagine the process of teaching. It is quite complicated and tricky to explain something, and it is even harder to make sure that what you have said has been understood properly.
As in teaching, in writing you have a knowledge you want to share with your audience. And you want them to see the exact image that you have in your mind. You want them to reach the conclusion you have reached before by yourself. It won’t be useful for a student to tell him just the answer. The same thing applies to your writing. Sometimes you don’t want to just reveal “the truth”, because it won’t be that valuable and appreciated, and will be forgotten soon. What you might want to do is to give the Reader several minor thoughts, images, and questions to make him think in the right direction. Which may (or may not - that also happens) lead him to the idea you have wanted to share.
You have to be imaginative to find new and interesting ways to show the Reader your knowledge. You have to think of common images, associations, and links that will help you to communicate with the Reader. You should make sure he is not getting bored with your explanations and descriptions. Once he is bored, he will just shut off his brain and stop following what you are saying. It is pretty much like teaching - I used to do that myself as a kid when studying English became too monotonous for me!
That is why you should not just give raw information while teaching, but you should make it more engaging, interesting, and exciting by adding your personal experience, live examples, and other down-to-earth things that connect your ideas to real students’ lives. And it is absolutely the same for writing. You have to find common ground with your Reader by appealing to him with your personality. You have to put yourself in every sentence in your text to make it animated and, thereby, intimate to the Reader.
In some ways writing is even more difficult than teaching, because you don’t know your readers and you cannot see them. You are separated by the distance and the time that makes it impossible for you to get proper feedback in the process. Whereas while teaching you can observe students’ behavior and identify understanding or struggling in their eyes. That is why it is usually a good idea to imagine your potential Reader while writing the text, to “see” them laughing or being skeptical in the certain places in your writing. That is what most authors do. Of course it applies to those who write their texts for an audience. But even if you write absolutely private things in your diary, you would most likely read them in a few years. So anyway you are having at least one Reader - your future self!
As you teach, you don’t want your students to get the knowledge, pass the exam, forget everything and move on. As you write, you don’t want your Reader to close the book, put it back on a dusty shelf and live his life as nothing has happened. You want to influence your audience’s lives in a good way. You want to help your students in their future; you want to change your readers’ lives for the better. And I believe that as a responsible writer you should always refer to your readers as to your students with all the respect and carefulness if you want your work to be useful and appreciated.
Recently I read a book of Stephen King's, "On writing" and there was one small assignment he gave to his readers which I completed and even translated in English. So here it goes!
“...Everyone is familiar with the basic details of the following story; with small variations, it seems to pop up in the Police Beat section of metropolitan daily papers every other week or so. A woman—call her Jane—marries a man who is bright, witty, and pulsing with sexual magnetism. We’ll call the guy Dick; it’s the world’s most Freudian name. Unfortunately, Dick has a dark side. He’s short-tempered, a control freak, perhaps even (you’ll find this out as he speaks and acts) a paranoid. Jane tries mightily to overlook Dick’s faults and make the marriage work (why she tries so hard is something you will also find out; she will come onstage and tell you). They have a child, and for awhile things seem better. Then, when the little girl is three or so, the abuse and the jealous tirades begin again. The abuse is verbal at first, then physical. Dick is convinced that Jane is sleeping with someone, perhaps someone from her job. Is it someone specific? I don’t know and don’t care. Eventually Dick may tell you who he suspects. If he does, we’ll both know, won’t we?
At last poor Jane can’t take it anymore. She divorces the schmuck and gets custody of their daughter, Little Nell. Dick begins to stalk her. Jane responds by getting a restraining order, a document about as useful as a parasol in a hurricane, as many abused women will tell you. Finally, after an incident which you will write in vivid and scary detail—a public beating, perhaps—Richard the Schmuck is arrested and jailed. All of this is back story. How you work it in—and how much of it you work in—is up to you. In any case, it’s not the situation. What follows is the situation.
One day shortly after Dick’s incarceration in the city jail, Jane picks up Little Nell at the daycare center and ferries her to a friend’s house for a birthday party. Jane then takes herself home, looking forward to two or three hours’ unaccustomed peace and quiet. Perhaps, she thinks, I’ll take a nap. It’s a house she’s going to, even though she’s a young working woman—the situation sort of demands it. How she came by this house and why she has the afternoon off are things the story will tell you and which will look neatly plotted if you come up with good reasons (perhaps the house belongs to her parents; perhaps she’s house-sitting; perhaps another thing entirely).
Something pings at her, just below the level of consciousness, as she lets herself in, something that makes her uneasy. She can’t isolate it and tells herself it’s just nerves, a little fallout from her five years of hell with Mr. Congeniality. What else could it be? Dick is under lock and key, after all.
Before taking her nap, Jane decides to have a cup of herbal tea and watch the news. (Can you use that pot of boiling water on the stove later on? Perhaps, perhaps.) The lead item on Action News at Three is a shocker: that morning, three men escaped from the city jail, killing a guard in the process. Two of the three bad guys were recaptured almost at once, but the third is still at large. None of the prisoners are identified by name (not in this newscast, at least), but Jane, sitting in her empty house (which you will now have plausibly explained), knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that one of them was Dick. She knows because she has finally identified that ping of unease she felt in the foyer. It was the smell, faint and fading, of Vitalis hair-tonic. Dick’s hair-tonic. Jane sits in her chair, her muscles lax with fright, unable to get up. And as she hears Dick’s footfalls begin to descend the stairs, she thinks: Only Dick would make sure he had hair-tonic, even in jail. She must get up, must run, but she can’t move…
It’s a pretty good story, yes? I think so, but not exactly unique. As I’ve already pointed out, ESTRANGED HUBBY BEATS UP (or MURDERS) EX-WIFE makes the paper every other week, sad but true. What I want you to do in this exercise is change the sexes of the antagonist and protagonist before beginning to work out the situation in your narrative—make the ex-wife the stalker, in other words (perhaps it’s a mental institution she’s escaped from instead of the city jail), the husband the victim. Narrate this without plotting—let the situation and that one unexpected inversion carry you along. I predict you will succeed swimmingly…”
Stephen King, “On writing”
Pretty Eyes
“But Daddy, this doll is just too pretty to give it to Sue!”
“It’s a present and you’re going to do it gladly,” stated James holding his red haired daughter’s hand while heading to her friend’s house. “Don’t worry, I will make sure you’ll get the most ideal doll ever. Daddy will make sure of that!”
He pressed the doorbell and winked to Milley. The little three year old girl giggled and straightened her new yellow dress coquettishly holding the doll with her other hand.
The door opened and there appeared Martha - Sue’s mother.
“Well, well! Look at our new guest for tonight in her gorgeous dress!”
She leaned to Milley and started complementing the little girl and praising her dress. Sue ran out of the house shortly after. Milley passed her the doll and girls started hugging and squeaking happily. Sue took her into the house promising to show her the doll house. James was honored only with a slight wave of his suddenly emboldened daughter’s hand.
“Thank you so much for the invitation! I think it will be useful for her to be with Sue for a while. As well as in women’s company…”
“Sure! This is not a problem for us at all! We’re happy to see Milley in our house any time. Especially considering everything you might be experiencing. How’s Lisa?”
Martha hesitated obviously before asking this question.
“As always. Doctors say there are no improvements to talk about. But we don’t visit her. I can’t see her in that state. And I don’t want Milley to deal with a psychiatric clinic.”
James paused for a moment before adding,
“Probably, it’s heartless to say this but... I’m glad she’s not getting better. There’s less of a chance she will get out of there and meet my daughter.”
Martha noticed how he stressed the “my” word and thought that James was trying to exterminate the memory of his ex-wife. From what she had heard, she couldn’t blame him for that.
“Oh no, I do understand that. Kids’ safety is above all! Either psychological or physical. And after that case, not only Lisa is a threat for you, but also for all of society.”
“I’m not even sure if the asylum is a better alternative to a prison. Sometimes I think I’d sleep more peacefully if she was in the prison. I know they’re trying to help her in that clinic, but… I don’t believe there will be any results.”
“Yeah… I, actually, still cannot get how a person could have changed so drastically in such a short period of time.”
“She was always like that,” James sighed. “Although not to such an extent, but still. ‘It’ was always inside of her.”
“Why did you get married to her then? If you knew what kind of person she was.”
“Oh, that’s simple. I just couldn’t resist her ideal blue eyes.”
“You’re a romantic, aren’t you, James!” Martha laughed and he sadly smiled in response.
“I should probably get going…”
“Yes, of course! You might have lots of stuff you’ve been wanting to do for a long time,” she nodded with understanding.
They said goodbye to each other and James returned back to his car. Before starting the engine, he turned back to look at the house where he'd left his daughter. He felt restless leaving her alone, but he persuaded himself that it was absolutely natural for a parent.
The day was coming to an end. The sun had already gone beyond the horizon and street lights turned on to illuminate the road. James wasn’t in a hurry. This time by himself was just what he needed. And he didn’t want any bustle.
He went to the suburbs of the city and parked near his house. The house looked lonely and abandoned, but James fixed it quickly by turning on the lights in the rooms, additional illumination of the lawn and the everlasting cure of the loneliness - the TV.
When he entered the house he seemed to smell a familiar scent that caused a strange anxiety deep in his body. He went to the kitchen and made some herbal tea to calm down. Being apart from his daughter, obviously, wasn’t going to be that easy.
He poured the tea in his favourite big mug, took it with him to the living room and made himself comfortable in the armchair. Some news was transmitting on the TV, but he didn’t listen to it. It was just a background noise to his own thoughts. At some point, his consciousness picked up a phrase by accident,
“… three patients escaped out of the psychiatric clinic, ‘Blue Star’. Two of them were found dead. The location of the third patient remains unknown… ”
Before he could think of anything, James smelled that scent again. It was much stronger this time.
“Lisa…,” he thought, having gotten frozen in his spot.
Then he heard sound of knocking heels approaching slowly, and James looked at the stairs shivering. A woman’s legs on black high heels were coming down. He could recognise those ankles anywhere, which confirmed his most terrible fears. It was her. She wore the blue cocktail dress that highlighted her shape and her red flowing hair curled in different directions. James recognised those shoes and dress. A lump stuck in his throat.
“Hi, James! How do you like it?” she said with a sweet seducing voice showing her outfit.
“Lisa? What are you doing here?” he asked with a weak voice setting his cup aside and stood up.
“Oh, darling! I missed you so much! I couldn’t make it any longer without you!” said she breathing heavily and smoothly approaching like a panther.
“But how?…”
“Oh! Are you asking about how have I escaped, or how did I find you?” notes of irritation appeared in her speech. Her mood tends to change unexpectedly.
“Both…” James got confused as he backed to the kitchen looking around for some solution.
“Where are they, James?” Lisa became worked up after following her ex-husband’s look.
“They who?”
“Your mistresses, who else? I always knew that you’re cheating on me! Just say it!” she grabbed the knife from the table and a spark of madness flashed in her eyes.
“Lisa, there is no mistresses,” James tried to calm her down huddling with his back to the cellar door that was blending with the kitchen wall.
“Hah! I’m not buying it! You think I’m a fool?! I can remember perfectly seeing you with the three different chicks when we were still together.”
“But I barely knew them, I swear! I didn’t even sleep with them! I’ve told you for a thousand times that they were: a waitress - I overturned a soup at her by accident; a woman in a supermarket - we confused our packages; and a sales girl - she helped me with choosing… ”
“If you hadn’t slept with them, then why do you need this house?! How come I hadn’t known that it even exists until tonight? And what are these women’s clothes I’ve found upstairs?!” Lisa started desperately ripping off her earrings, bracelets and other accessories.
“Damn! How did she find out about this house? She shouldn’t even be here! ”
“Lisa! I can explain everything…”
James had finally found a latch on the hidden door and having unfastened it quickly stepped back in the darkness barely dodging the late swing of Lisa’s knife.
He went quickly down the stairs orienteering perfectly in the mirk - it was his home after all. Lisa stood in front of the opened door with hesitation, looking into impenetrable darkness. She pulled the knife with effort out of the wooden planks and hid it behind her back.
“Darling! Please, forgive me for attacking you. You know I’m just too jealous. But it’s all because of my boundless love.”
Lisa stopped for a while but there was no answer.
“Let’s just sit, calm down and discuss everything. I promise I’ll behave decently!”
Having realised that her ex-husband wasn’t going to work out a compromise Lisa started taking off her heels silently. Throwing them to the corner, she fastidiously stepped with her bare foot on the stairs and went down clenching the knife behind her back. She was going down silently listening carefully to every slight rustle, but she could sense no move from James. Her foot stepped on the floor and Lisa started to fumble desperately in the darkness seeking for a switch. She groped a shelf with jars with canned goods. Moving into the cellar, Lisa noticed that she had never suspected James of having a predilection for homemade pickles. She could feel with her feet that the floor became a bit slimy and nasty. She regretted taking her shoes off.
At some point she groped a table lamp and turned it on quickly. The dim light lit up out of the darkness details of the surrounding space and Lisa gasped soundlessly. In the big jars at the back she could see floating parts of human’s bodies and the table was covered with small jars with eyeballs floating in the turbid swill. Choking with horror Lisa hastily stepped back and slipped slightly. Then she paid attention to a strange dark substance covering the floor. Having raised her foot closer to the light Lisa saw the blood on her sole and reacted late with her knife when James appeared behind her back and grabbed her firmly covering her face with a piece of cloth…
Finally, after all these years James’s work had been finished. It needed just a bit of cleaning and he could show it to his daughter right away.
“Thank you, darling. I always find your eyes to be wonderful!”
He smiled gently and kissed a cold alien forehead smelling strongly of formaldehyde. His creature with a long dark curly hair silently looked at him with its ideal blue eyes filled with a frozen horror…
PS If you have spotted any mistakes, please, let me know - I love to learn! (=
While riding on the bus this morning I noticed someone writing with a pen(!) in his book(!). What?! How dare you?!
The thing is in Ukraine (and other post-Soviet-Union countries) children are taught from the very beginning that books are sacred and to write or draw something in a book is a biggest sin! Some kids would get severely "beaten with a belt" for damaging a book. Book is a primarily source of knowledge. If you want to make a mark or something you can do it lightly with a pencil so it can be erased anytime! That's why I still get shocked every time I see such an outrageous behaviour (= So, please, don't do that to books - it's like ripping the leaves off the bushes! )=
But anyway, I feel so blessed seeing how many people here in Seattle read books while riding a bus. I'm not saying "reading books" equals "being smart", but it does surely indicate that there're more intelligent and wise people out there!
...And just as I was leaving my bus I saw another man reading manga! And it was in Japanese (the man wasn’t Japanese, I checked). The manga was about some dolphin’s adventures (whatever) and was most likely intended for kids, so the language was quite simple (hiragana, katakana and a bunch of kanji). But nevertheless: it was so super awesome! ^_^ (wanna get one of those mangas for toddlers but don't really know which one is good for beginners)
Just got this book from Seattle Public Library. Most of expressions are quite simple and very familiar to me. But nevertheless I've noticed that I almost don't use them normally! Have to fix it (=
Today's expressions:
keep going - continue
drop by - visit for a short time
put smb on hold - ask smb to wait (during the phone call)
in charge of - responsible for
running short of time - getting close to a deadline
get a move on - go faster
it's for smb - the caller wants to speak to smb
in an hour - one hour after now
ahead of/on/behind schedule - faster than planned/as planned/slower than planned
tied up - busy doing something that you can't stop
when is a good time - when is a convenient time for you
held up - delayed
move smth out of the way - move smth so that it doesn't block you
upside down/right side up - with the top part at the bottom/with the top part at the top
no wonder - now I understand why
The main point now is to try and use them in my daily life. Maybe I'll create an anki deck (like this one) for that purpose and will revise phrases on the bus during the day (=
turnnoffyourmind
areudirty
gracieabrams
pixelskylines
jimmyeatworldofficial
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