To adverb or not to adverb
October 3rd 2008 01:35
I thought it only fitting to start any blog about writing with a nod to Shakespeare, the great English master.
My point is this: when you're writing (prose, not a script) is it best to use adverbs? Great writers like Hemmingway suggest that the verb should say everything it has to, so there should be no need to embellish it.
I;m finding it quite difficult, somethimes when I write, I try to be quite purple in my prose, verbose, if you will. Other times maybe I try too hard to copy Ol' Ernest and feel like I'm trying to force the simplicity.
Put it this way: simplicity is what I want but I don't want to sound amateur. Every time I write some dialogue and then just say "he said" or "she said" it feels like I'm a 4th grader without any imagination. yet that's the way they do it, those timeless authors. There's an art to it and I want to discover what it is.
Who knows what I'm talking about? How do you go about it?
My point is this: when you're writing (prose, not a script) is it best to use adverbs? Great writers like Hemmingway suggest that the verb should say everything it has to, so there should be no need to embellish it.
I;m finding it quite difficult, somethimes when I write, I try to be quite purple in my prose, verbose, if you will. Other times maybe I try too hard to copy Ol' Ernest and feel like I'm trying to force the simplicity.
Put it this way: simplicity is what I want but I don't want to sound amateur. Every time I write some dialogue and then just say "he said" or "she said" it feels like I'm a 4th grader without any imagination. yet that's the way they do it, those timeless authors. There's an art to it and I want to discover what it is.
Who knows what I'm talking about? How do you go about it?
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