Emma, I think 'willing to let it pass is purest 'tell'. Austen doesn't show us by Emma's actions or subsequent words that she is willing to do so - she just informs us so succinctly. It's neat, it's direct. I LIKE 'tell'.

But I do agree that anything done every time an on auto is likely to produce a poor result. Just like religiously avoiding speech tags every time!

Don't know why I'm feeling so argumentative today. Apologies again for fight-picking. Must go and do some work, anyway. Sorry.

R x



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And I hate Hemingway.

Rosy, I said there was the suspicion that lots of tags etc indicate a writer is not in control. On the other hand, if there are lots of tags that are intentional, then I think we're just going to have to differ in view. I'm veering away from saying this is all to do with taste, because I don't think it is entirely. To stick with art for a minute, if I wanted to learn to paint, I wouldn't ask Damien Hirst, even though he's won lots of prizes and is a zillionaire, and even if his stuff was to my taste. And I'm very glad Azel said what I was thinking re Zadie Smith. As for Jane Austin, that was a long time ago and she was writing for people with different expectations of novels. But, really, ' . . . said Emma playfully' would make me think I'd picked up a Mills and Boon novel.

Also, I'm not sure why I bothered to explain before, but you're still going on about how it's not a good idea to break the flow with lots of action descriptions -- I agree! I'll say it one more time: I was not advocating littering the story with endless action descriptions; I was making the point that a prose writer can select an action -- just one; not lots and lots -- which can signify a mood or feeling that the dialogue can't.

I've really enjoyed this thread but suspect it's not going to get much further. So, just to sum up where I am: there are no rules; nothing is good or bad; any writer is free to use any system, technique, sets of words and grammar they wish to; no one is a member of the speech tag police (although I'm beginning to feel there's an organisation forming here that's going to make it compulsory for everyone to use them). I'm not interested in whether or not a writer has won prizes or sold millions of books, at least not when I'm looking for good writing. I'm interested in the craft and art of writing, and how it can be used to create magical, uplifting, mysterious and moving stories. My experience of writing is that it's like any other skill -- people get better at it when they love to do it, then work hard to understand how to do it better, then let the love take over again. Now, if someone has gone through that process and concluded that lots of dialogue tags and adjectives are a good thing, then fine. But one final thought: I think those on this thread who are advocating avoiding tags wherever possible do at least understand why they're used and the effects they cause. But I'm not so sure those who are all for them have shown that they understand the argument against them: mostly what we're getting is accusations of policing, examples of prize-winning authors who use them, and a fierce insistence that there's nothing wrong with them.

Terry


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And having seen the pro-Austen posts that have appeared while I was writing this, I really am going to duck out now!

Yes, 'willing to let it pass' is tell, but so what? Nothing wrong with tell, in the right place. The passage as you've edited it is show-y in the sense that most of it is dialogue...

Show vs. tell is a useful though not always clear distinction for discussing a certain aspect of writing. Neither is automatically right, or wrong. If it's too-automatically said to aspiring writers that's because they more often tell when showing would work infinitely better, than they do it the other way round. But I think it's of limited use in discussing writing of earlier periods - 'earlier' being any period before writers started discussing in those terms.

Having said that, if you want to learn how to use what's so unhelpfully called 'free indirect' style (i.e. multiple, moving PoV, with or without authorial interventions) Austen invented it, and is still the best.

Emma

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Don't mean you personally, Rosy, but you as in anyone...

What a compelling thread. Sol Stein recommends taking out every single adjective/adverb, then reading again and inserting just those that feel necessary. This makes sense to me. I think it's a matter of amount, more than anything. If a writer sprinkles tags/ads/adjs too liberally it does smack of laziness. S.Stein writes about 'liposuctioning flab' which for me sums it up perfectly. Spare, lean writing invites the reader's imagination in and gives the reader space to inhabit the story along with the characters. Or, to put it another way, you can mollycoddle your reader too much. I really do think it's 'horses for courses' though. And I agree that it's a matter of consciousness above all. If you choose to do something consciously, fine. If you do it because you aren't aware of any other way, not so good.
Susiex

Sol Stein recommends taking out every single adjective/adverb, then reading again and inserting just those that feel necessary. [my italics]

Even if this sounds a rather mechanical way of doing it, the underlying idea is right because it's not prescriptive: which ones any given writer feels is necessary will be determined by their style: it might be none (lean and mean), or quite a few (gorgeous, weird, baroque), but the point is that they're not auto, each one has really earned its place... It's actually only a formulation of the kind of attention to detail that one should be paying to everything. Like many writers, I often don't see what a passage needs and doesn't need till the first draft is sitting on the page in front of me.

Emma

Speaking of Stein, I ordered my copy of 'Stein on Writing' on Terry’s suggestion. If my writing goes to hell, it will be Terry’s fault.

Azel

Why is spare and lean so often equated with good when it comes to writing? I'm not at all keen on that style: I like prose that has what I call 'mouth feel' and in which a writer is not afraid to play with the richness of language.

I'm not going to defend Zadie Smith from accusations of being a bad writer, despite very much enjoying her novels. I'll just say that I wouldn't feel confident in judging a writer as either bad or good on the strength of four tiny extracts taken out of the context of the whole novel.

This thread does prove how subjective the whole writing thing is, though.

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For Emma: given your academic and writing interests and your mention of free indirect style, you might be interested in this person's work (if you haven't already come across it).

http://www.shef.ac.uk/english/staff/profiles/joebray.html

But, really, ' . . . said Emma playfully' would make me think I'd picked up a Mills and Boon novel.

Terry, have you read any Harlequin M&B novels recently? Because HMB is the home of the most slavish following of the voguish CW 'rules'. You will find stage directions breaking every line of dialogue, and not a tag-with-adverb in sight.

Rosy

Just to lighten the moment a little… I was reading one of M R James’s ghost stories last night and came across this little gem of author intrusion:

… tea was taken to the accompaniment of a discussion which golfing persons can imagine for themselves, about which the conscientious writer has no right to inflict upon any non-golfing persons.

Made me chuckle!

Dee

Sorry to be combative! Actually, I've really been enjoying ths argument - and I guess in a way playing devil's advocate. Sorry

Rosy

LoL, Dee - I love that! Reminds me a bit of Wodehouse, too.

Why is spare and lean so often equated with good when it comes to writing? I'm not at all keen on that style: I like prose that has what I call 'mouth feel' and in which a writer is not afraid to play with the richness of language.

One reason I think is that in beginner writers it's far, far more common to over-write than under-write, because such writers are, very properly, drunk on words, but haven't yet learnt to control them. As David Morley says, "Over-writing is a cardinal symptom, not a sin, of creative writing classes.' So what starts as a frequently appropriate suggestion to be ruthless with any excess, becomes a cast-iron rule peddled by teachers without the confidence to be flexible about judging others' work.

Having said that, I think spare and lean can be good. It can also be incredibly boring, as a hundred million wannabe Hemingways in a hundred million CW classes would show you. That's why in my post I added the alternative - gorgeous, weird, baroque - which can also be good. The only criterion for either is that every word is necessary, and there are none missing that might improve it. That mine mean very few words, or an awful lot - it depends on the writer's purpose. And that call's always going to be a matter of writerly and readerly taste, to some extent.

If I was being cynical (and felt like starting a ruck) I'd say that the exclusive obsession with spare and lean comes from a certain macho (or even misogynistic) defensiveness: just in case anyone thinks there's anything worryingly feminine about this 'ere writing lark, we'll make sure we don't write anything that could appear remotely decorative or emotional or - heaven save us - camp. You can blame Hemingway for that, too... But I'm not being cynical (and I don't feel like starting a ruck,) so I'm not saying it.

Emma

That's an interesting point you didn't make, Emma.

Lol, Dee! That's lovely, and a timely reminder of the sheer fun you can have with writing - which can get forgotten when people get too bogged down in fretting about rules.

I almost mentioned the gender divide, too, Emma. Austen versus Hemingway....! I know which side I stand on!!



R x

I don't see it as a divide, to be honest - I love both. Some Hemingway is terrific. It's his imitators, as ever, who a) do it less well and b) elevate one interesting but not fail-safe way of doing good work into The One True Religion. Bit like Freud, really.

Emma

Daisy, I mentioned 'spare and lean' in the context of S.Stein's words about 'liposuctioning flab'. Emma put it better than me:

The only criterion for either is that every word is necessary, and there are none missing that might improve it. That mine mean very few words, or an awful lot - it depends on the writer's purpose.

I love writing that is full and rounded as well as writing that is lean and spare. Like I said, horses for courses.
Oh, and flab includes cliches (sometimes)too!
Susiex