to reiterate what Taolung said, the first paragraph is almost too much. to be honest, i read it, had an inward groaning moment, thought "great, another writer using obscure words and over dramatic descriptions," and moved on to the replies. once i had read the praise, i went back and reread the exerpt, and ended up liking it. one of my biggest pet peeves is when writers replace good, solid words with fluffy ones in an attempt to sound smarter, or better. i'm not saying that that's what you did, it could just be the way you write, but saying that (for instance) something was "unnecessary" is just as good as saying it was "superfluous", and saying it was "bad" or "good" is no worse than saying it was "maleficent" or "marvelous", or whatever other fancy words you can come up with.
again, i'm not trying to imply that you did it on purpose, it's just that you don't have to be fancy to be good. craft your message and the way you say it well, and there is no need to use flowery language, unless you plan on continuing it throughout the entire piece (some that is hard to do without becoming boring, even if you have a great thesaurus on hand).
eh, anyway, good stuff other than that. there was a lot of telling as versus showing, as someone else mentioned, but that can be ok, since we're kind of hearing his inner voice, and if those are the thoughts that he's having, then why not tell us?
feel free to disagree with me as much as possible, i'm just an amateur, and throwing in my two cents. :-D
An extract
Author
I agree that using flowery words is unnecessary, and is one of my pet hates as well. Apart from the first 3 sentences (which where phrased to give a sense of the characters detatchment), I'm not aware that I have used particularly "clever" words.
Of course, choice of language is not down to the writer, but the character's and indeed the narrator's voice (this applies to the third person).
Of course, choice of language is not down to the writer, but the character's and indeed the narrator's voice (this applies to the third person).
Seems to me that his use of "flowery" language is based more on rhythm than any particular interest in being pretensious. I do the same--if it sounds better in my head by saying it that way, I do it.
I think the rhythm and the words work well. I don't know if I could take a whole novel of it though... maybe the it's a little too powerful or intense.
It's still good!
- Dr Default
It's still good!
- Dr Default
This topic is closed to new replies.
Advertisement
Popular Topics
Advertisement