How-To: Economy Writing

“Omit needless words,” William Strunk, Jr. advised in The Elements of Style. “A sentence should contain no unnecessary words…for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines.”

This advice is like a writer’s hazing. How do you know which words to cut? You rip out every word that might not be needed, and suddenly your draft is a mess.

I don’t know, officer. They said, “omit needless words,” and I just lost it.

In Keys to Great Writing, Stephen Wilbers explains how to obliterate the crap sinking your sentences. There are fourteen techniques (double digits? really Steve?), but he divides them into three easy categories. It’s like winning the writer’s lottery!

Never shall I write “pink in color” again!
(Image courtesy of posterize/ FreeDigitalPhotos.net)

1. You Already Said That
Wilbers’s first category urges eliminating redundant words. You know, things like terrible tragedy, heavy in weight, true and accurate. When isn’t a tragedy terrible, anyway?

Condense. If you’re using six words to say “because,” just say because. Do you really need that “very” there? Does extremely happy sound as good as ecstatic? No? Right.

2. Get to the Point
Is that first sentence/word/paragraph really needed? Does it change anything if you take it out? No? Get rid of it.

Be equally merciless with the ends of sentences. You want to get in a good last word, don’t you? Don’t you?

3. Shut Up

“I am of the opinion that cake is delicious.”

“Cake rocks my socks!”

These sentences say the same thing, only sentence one sucks. Use action verbs. Keep personal commentary to yourself. If someone “does not like” something, can’t they just like it instead?

Remember: If it annoys you when someone does it in person, don’t do it in writing. It’ll just annoy someone else.

[This post is taken from my "professional" blog, aewrites.wordpress.com]

The Importance of Prewriting

Let's face it: prewriting is important.

I was struck last week in my fiction writing course. My professor, Andrew Ervin, started the week by stressing the importance of writing before you write. We even looked at the Freytag triangle.

Story by formula=Something that looks like a story

It seems basic, but it's useful advice. Unless a story has a plot, conflict, and crisis, it isn't really a story. If you, the writer, don't know everything going on, you can't choose the best place to start or end. You can't choose the best time to reveal things. You know nothing about your character outside the context of your story.

Personally, I like stories that leave things unresolved at the end. I like walking away with a little mystery, and trying to figure out what happened for myself. It's not effective, though, unless all the clues have been placed. I can't debate what would have happened if the groundwork isn't laid. To leave a story unresolved, there needs to be only a few options presented, and of those options, a reasonable person needs to be able to make an argument for the outcome they see most likely.

It's important, too, for establishing conflict. I love reading, but I like very few stories. They often fall short on expectations because something doesn't ring true for me. Like Harry Potter and all the romance in the sixth and seventh volumes. Were there hints that Harry/Ginny and Ron/Hermione would end up together? Absolutely. But I felt I was told this would happen, and I never emotionally believed it.

It was clearly love at first sight

I don't pretend to know how things were supposed to go. J.K. Rowling is famous for her extensive notes and prewriting. But just because I don't emotionally buy something, doesn't mean there aren't plenty others who do, and if you want a reader to buy anything, you need to know the expanse of your story first, even if you never use it. Especially if it's science fiction, fantasy, or some other high-concept idea.

I've done prewriting, character profiles, drawn maps, etc. for years, but I'm guilty of doing this, too. When it comes to short stories, I often dash off my prewriting instead of really focusing on it like I would for a novel. But it's important here, too. It's important any time you try to convince someone that your fiction is some kind of reality.

What really surprised me was that my teacher stressed this so emphatically, like he'd run across reluctance to prewriting in the past. I remember meeting people when I was in community college who said they never planned anything before they wrote it. It destroyed the organic quality of the writing.

There were no pesticides involved in the making of these radishes

Honestly, prewriting can only strengthen a story. Trust me. You don't need to keep to the outline. It's a flexible frame. You will never do so much prewriting to avoid getting to an important part of a story and realize you didn't prepare for this.

So next time you want to write a story but don't know what to write about, start with a character sketch. Draw a map. Draw a picture. Do some prewriting. It will help.

Or just screw it. It'll give me less competition.