Posted: Feb 27, 08 10:26am
I'm starting this, the first in what I hope will be a series, not because I think I'm a fit writing teacher for you all but because as I learn things I want to share them with you. Some of you will already have learnt this far better than I have. For those people, please be patient with me and with this process. Feel free to contribute!
Here's Lesson 1:
The overriding principle of good writing is: Show, don't tell.
"Julia was always selfish."
The above tells me, it doesn't show me. Since it tells, it's bloodless, boring and unmoving. Blah.
"My first memory of Julia is of her pushing me off my bicycle and riding away on it, laughing."
Now we're showing that Julia is selfish, yet we haven't told the reader *about* Julia, we've only shown what happened.
Which of the above two examples do you think is stronger, more interesting?
Those were my examples, here are some professional ones:
1) "Sonny's pickup was a '41 Chevrolet, not at its best on cold mornings. In front of the picture show it coughed out and had to be choked for a while, but then it started again and jerked its way to the red light, blowing out spumes of white exhaust that the wind whipped away." "The Last Picture Show," Larry McMurtry, p. 5
If we rewrite this to tell, not show, we'd get:
"Sonny's old pickup was always breaking down on cold mornings."
2) "Watching the head of the family closely during dinner, he had not failed to detect in his eyes, while he was speaking of his wife's voyage to the West Indies, a lurking gleam such as one might discern in the eyes of a small boy who has been left alone in the house and knows where the key to the jam cupboard is." "Uncle Dynamite," P. G. Wodehouse, p. 17
Rewriting this to tell, not show, gives us:
"He saw his uncle was eager to have fun while his wife was away on vacation."
3) "On this fresh scroll, which the black man has found in the city. This morning Io showed how I write in my old one and told me how valuable it had been to me. I read only the first sheet and the last, but I mean to read the rest before the sun sets. Now, however, I intend to write down all the things that will be most needful for me to know.
Latro is what these people call me, though I doubt that it is my name. The man in the lion's skin called me Lucius, or so I wrote in the first scroll. There also I wrote that I forget very quickly, and I believe it to be true. When I try to recall what took place yesterday, I find only confused impressions of walking, working, and talking, so that I am like a vessel lost in the fog, from which the lookout sees, perhaps, looming shadows that may be rocks, or others vessels, or nothing--hears voices that may be men ashore, or of the tritons or ghosts." Soldier of Arete," Gene Wolfe, p. 3
Committing the ghastly crime of rewriting Gene Wolfe (like spray-painting Michaelangelo's "David"), telling without showing is:
"I forget stuff a lot, so I write things down in a scroll the way some friends showed me how to."
(If you haven't read Gene Wolfe, then pleasepleaseplease get to your library, to amazon or local bookstore and pick up his work. His writing is rich, dense with description, meaning, theme, characterization. You'll also need a comprehensive dictionary next to you when you read. He's one of the greatest writers, regardless of genre, in our age. Because he writes fantasy, he's often pigeon-holed and ignored by lesser critics and pundits. I warn you now--his work is not meant to be skimmed or breezed through. But he will take you to where true magic lives and show you wonders you'd never dreamt of.)
EXERCISE:
Write a sentence that tells but does not show. Then rewrite it so it shows without telling. (Go to multiple sentences if necessary, but please keep the rewrite to a reasonable length.) Post both of them and I'll comment on them if I think I can add anything worthy, and anyone else who wants to comment, *and who has contributed to this thread's exercise*, please do! (Ha! Gotcha! You can comment only if you contribute! So get writing!)
