Hatrack River Writers Workshop: 'First Five Pages' Exercise

This is topic 'First Five Pages' Exercise in forum Fragments and Feedback for Short Works at Hatrack River Writers Workshop.

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Posted by mikemunsil (Member # 2109) on :

After reading the first few chapters of 'The First Five Pages', I decided to try an end-of-chapter exercise on dealing with the overuse of adjectives and adverbs. I took the first page of one of my worst WIPs and went through the exercise.

Following is a section from the 'pre' version:

quote:

She was uncanny, the girl-child; light on her feet as an autumn breeze, tumbling through the night shadows as though she mocked the dark. In her wake, silvery moonlight gathered, turned, twisted and followed after. It rose in the air, following the girl from interior dark to moonlit corridors, into a cluttered vestibule and finally to an end.

...and the same section from the 'post' version.

quote:
She was uncanny, light on her feet as a harvest breeze, tumbling through silvery shadows as though she mocked the dark. In her wake, shimmering moonlight gathered, turned, and followed after. It rose, following the girl from inner murk to luminous corridors, through a close vestibule and to an end.

Is it better?

If anyone is interested, I'll send them the entire file I created with pre-, intermediate and post- exercise versions to look at and comment on.

Or not.

Posted by Beth (Member # 2192) on :

It's tighter - I can see where you cut out some unnecessary phrases. (like "into the air" after "rose".)

I think the choices you made swapping adjectives are good - the originals were ok, but the new ones flow a little better. "night shadows" to "silvery shadows" and "moonlit corridors" to "luminous corridors."

At the same time the tone of the paragraph hasn't changed - it's a little tighter, and it flows better, but preserves the feel of it. The difference is subtle.

Posted by Survivor (Member # 213) on :

Uh, yeah, but how are any of the changes related to eliminating adjectives and adverbs? I only spotted a single place where you simply eliminated an adjective or adverb rather than replacing it.

Posted by J. Stewart (Member # 2262) on :

The second version is definitely better in my opinion. It flows better and the writing is “tighter.” I think it is a good improvement.

I notice you still use a lot of adjectives and adverbs, but I think you need to. You are not just relating action here; you are setting a mood and describing the environment. Of course, if you are just supposed to be relating action, you missed the boat.

Posted by mikemunsil (Member # 2109) on :

Thanks guys. For this piece, what I learned was that eliminating all the adjectives and adverbs resulted in trash, so I elected to replace most of them. The excercise also highlighted one of my most basic problems, that of going for mood rather than making things happen. I told you that I chose a poor piece of writing.

Posted by Survivor (Member # 213) on :

Was this supposed to be opening text? Because if it was, then there is a reason you were forced to resort to so many ad-words. You're starting out of POV, with an unreferenced pronoun as the main actor, in a setting defined only by mist and darkness.

Posted by mikemunsil (Member # 2109) on :

Good points, Survivor. Thank you.

As I pointed out earlier, this was poor writing. I chose this poorly written piece to test the technique that the author had suggested, to see if there were any real value to it. Firstly, I identified all the adjectives and adverbs. At this point I found that I was using many compound nouns and that (at my present state of grammatical knowledge) it was difficult for me to identify adjectives and adverbs and separate them from the compound nouns and compound verbs. At that point I learned not to use so many compound forms.

I then tried to rewrite the page without any adjectives/adverbs and found it almost incoherent. Finally, I rewrote the page, selectively replacing adjectives/adverbs as I went and striving for more clarity.

So, all in all, was it worth going through the excercise? Yes, but it was not some magic wand. Like all techniques, it provided an incremental improvement, mostly in my awareness as I write.

Posted by Beth (Member # 2192) on :

I'd kind of like to see the version with no adjectives/adverbs - could you post that?

Posted by Survivor (Member # 213) on :

The key is to replace all the "adj"-words with descriptive nouns and verbs. Or rather (since simply replacing adj-words with nouns and verbs will result in gibberish) to replace your "she"s and "dark"s and so forth with nouns that stand on their own. Also replace some of the colorful metaphorical verbs with concrete literal actions.

They should have made that clear in the book, but if "should"s were "would"s then something something something...

Posted by djvdakota (Member # 2002) on :

OK. I'm offering a challenge.

Someone come up with a REALLY adjective and adverb heavy sentence and let the rest of us try to come up with something better that eliminates as many of them as possible.

Might be a good idea to start a new thread--but don't know of F&F is the right place to do it.

Posted by Survivor (Member # 213) on :

It might find a home in those "Learning Grammer/Style" threads...if either of them is still about grammer and/or style.

Posted by mikemunsil (Member # 2109) on :

See http://www.hatrack.com/forums/writers/cgi/forumdisplay.cgi?action=topics&forum=Writing+Class&number=5&DaysPrune=

Posted by franc li (Member # 3850) on :

I don't think vestibule is a real word

Just kidding. But it's such an arcane word that there had better be some serious bodice ripping in this book or I'll want my money back.

Posted by wbriggs (Member # 2267) on :

I like the first one better, because the words are interesting, and I need something to keep me reading -- but what I would like even better is for something to happen, or some hook, in the first sentence.

Posted by mikemunsil (Member # 2109) on :

quote:
I don't think vestibule is a real word Just kidding. But it's such an arcane word that there had better be some serious bodice ripping in this book or I'll want my money back.

You bring up a good point here, franc. To me, vestibule is just another word, not arcane at all. To you it is arcane. What is it to the majority of our potential readers? How do we review our language for words that tend to put people off? Should we even try?

Certainly I recognize that most people would understand "death assemblage" better than "thanatocoenosis", but that is because the latter is clearly a technical term.

I'm puzzled. How would you go about it?

(Of course, I'm easily puzzled. )

Posted by HuntGod (Member # 2259) on :

Vestibule is more appropriate to a fantasy theme than a modern or sci-fi one. I have no problem with it.

I too preferred the second version, though it did not have the splash of the first and for some reason "murk" doesn't seem to fit, maybe "inky" or "pitch". Not sure why but for some reason murk is disjointing to me.

Posted by Survivor (Member # 213) on :

Modern usage would tend towards "atrium" because such rooms are no longer considered strictly necessary in designing a house. The use of "vestibule" tends to imply something too small to be considered an atrium but still serving the essential function.

I will say that I'm puzzled at the way it's used in the passage you posted, but that's probably just because neither version of the passage was very solid on concrete details.

Posted by mikemunsil (Member # 2109) on :

Yep, well it wasn't very solid in many ways.

quote:
It rose in the air, following the girl from interior dark to moonlit corridors, into a cluttered vestibule and finally to an end.

I had imagined a complex of adjoining family dwellings, each with its own little vestibule to provide a place for visitors to enter but not intrude on the private space.