Just Say It

By Deatri King-Bey

Being concise is a major force pushing powerful prose. This workshop introduces the concepts behind conciseness. So, enough of the pleasantries, roll up your sleeves, and let's get busy. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to extricate rambling redundancy, and introduce concise clarity to your writing.

It is a fact that a whole lot of people use way too many words to tell the people who read their material the things that they want to say. What they have said might perhaps be said in a different way, but it is the same exact thing. Or maybe they might actually express a different thought but keep on using the same words over again. Or maybe they could possibly be choosing to put a lot of weak verbs and non-specific nouns in their writing.

Now imagine a whole novel written like the above. Yuck. This is a prime example of too much effort and too little content. Remember sometimes, less is more.

The Big Picture

Directness - to go in a particular direction. Before taking a long road trip, most people plot the course they’d like to travel. The same holds true with writing a novel. Plot maps are used to plan the course of your novel. Whether you use a plot map or not, you should know the final destination. This helps keep your prose from wandering into unknown and unwanted places. The final destination is not written in stone. If something happens along the road, adjust accordingly.

Directness for a manuscript is an inverted pyramid. The closer to the tip you become, the more direct your train of thought and choices need to be. Understanding how one level of the pyramid affects its neighbors is the first step to becoming a more concise writer. Below is further explanation of the inverted pyramid.

NOVEL:

The journey from the beginning to the end of a good novel has many twist and turns. Create a plot map on index cards to sequentially order major events (plot points) in your novel.

CHAPTER:

Chapters are the vehicles used to travel from one point of the journey to the next. Sometimes bumps in the road occur, but they are dealt with in the chapter or in subsequent chapters. There should be at least one index card per chapter in your plot map. If a chapter does not move the story forward enough to warrant a card, then the chapter needs beefing up, combining with another chapter, or deleted.

PARAGRAPH:

Paragraphs are the fuel the chapters use. They express distinct ideas and show what is happening.

SENTENCE:

Sentences are a mixture of ingredients to make fuel. The more direct sentences are, the better quality fuel.

Word:

Words are the individual ingredients; some are more powerful than others. Properly placed active verbs and specific nouns are the base of concise prose.

Word Reduction

Concise - clearly stated using as few words as possible. Your transportation on the journey to conciseness is active verbs, specific nouns; and redundancy reduction.

Indirect path: It is a fact that a whole lot of people use way too many words to tell the people who read their material the things that they want to say.

Write for meaning not maximum word count.

Direct path: Avoid wordiness at all cost.

Verbs – words used to show the actions taking place. Verbs breathe life into your sentences. When writing, maximize active verbs, minimize use of gerunds, and only use inactive or weak verbs when no other options avail.

Active verbs perform motion or action. They do, and are vivid in the mind’s eye.

(Exploded, cried, tortured, sang, ran…)

Gerunds are the –ing form of a verb that is used as a noun. (My knowing the rules helped.)

Inactive verbs are something.

(is, was, will be…)

Weak verbs are general in feel and depth.

(make, go, put, took…)

Specific Nouns – name definite people, places, and things. Replace non-specific nouns with specific nouns.

Non-specific: She is a writer.

Specific replacements: journalist, novelist, poet, playwright…

The deeper layer you choose, the more power packed behind the noun.

Layer 1: writer

Layer 2: journalist

Layer 3: sports columnist

NOTE: The thesaurus can be your greatest friend or enemy. In your quest to find strong nouns and verbs, ensure you use words that accurately depict your meaning and your audience will understand.

Tender the demitasse. >>>> Pass the cup.

Sometimes I want to pass, not tender.

Sometimes a cup is a cup, not a demitasse.

Redundancy Reduction

Once you have expressed a concept, don’t continue pounding your reader over the head with different versions of the explanation. If you think the reader didn’t catch what you said the first time, rephrase so they will catch it.

Avoid redundant and wordy phrases such as “advance forward” and “the fact of the matter is” like the plague.

Use Active Voice

I have a few hundred words to play with so let’s have a short discussion about voice.

Active voice places the main focus on the subject that is performing an action. The boy kicked the ball. Active voice is direct, easier to visualize, and reduces wordiness.

Passive voice focuses on the subject that is receiving the action. The ball was kicked by the boy. Passive voice is less direct and de-emphasizes the actor.

When the object receiving the action is more important use passive voice. For example, if you were explaining what smashed through the window, the object (ball) becomes more important.

That’s All Folks

This brings us to the end of another session. The next article is “Don’t Say It” and is actually an appendix to this workshop. It contains a list of redundant phrases and wordy phrases to avoid.

I can’t squeeze all of the good information on this topic in a single tutorial, but Stephen Wilbers wrote an excellent book called Keys to Great Writing that covers many aspects of writing. It can be ordered at http://www.writersdigestbookclub.com

As always, if you have questions or just want to say hi, send me an email.

workshops@deewrites.com

http://www.deewrites.com

Distributing and copying are prohibited without the express permission of the author.