Tea at Trianon: How to Avoid Clichéd Emotional Responses In Your Writing

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Sunday, June 30, 2019

How to Avoid Clichéd Emotional Responses In Your Writing

From Anne R. Allen:

Clichés in writing are frowned upon because they’re easy; they’re the sign of a writer who chooses to go with the first idea that comes to mind rather than digging deeper to find the exact phrase to suit the character and scene. They don’t contribute to a unique authorial voice or say anything about who the character is as an individual. Clichéd emotional responses are particularly yawn-worthy because they literally could apply to anyone.

Readers come to each story with different purposes—to be entertained, informed, or to escape the real world, just to name a few. But regardless of why they open up a book, they all have something in common: readers all want to be engaged, to lose themselves in the story world. And the best way to make that happen is to get them feeling as they’re reading.

Consider the stories you’ve read that were thoroughly engrossing, that you couldn’t put down. My bet is that your emotions were engaged along with the character’s. When she was in danger, your own heartbeat increased. When she experienced insecurity, you felt that twinge of uncertainty in your gut. Your spirits lightened just a bit at the moment of revelation, when she finally recognized the changes she had to make to achieve her goal.

When our character’s feelings are clear and logical, they trigger the reader’s emotions, making it harder for them to put the book down. Character emotion is, in my opinion, the most effective and longest lasting hook in our bag of tricks, so it’s imperative that we get it right in our stories. And clichés that we’ve seen a million times or overuse in our own writing just don’t get the job done. (Read more.)