Mixed Metaphors - On Being a Professional Amateur

If you’ve read Maya’s books or even her interview here on Constructing Stories, you know she excels at crafting powerful metaphors. Today, she helps us figure out how to do the same. And, if you haven’t already, check out her posts about sloppiness and language abuse.

Mixed Metaphors
By Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff

Sample sentence: This seemed a long way from the moment in which Gregor clearly saw through me as a fish out of water, acting out an unnatural scene.

How many metaphors did you count? I got three:

1. He saw through me (meaning, I was transparent to him).
2. He saw me as a fish out of water (meaning, he saw that I was out of place).
3. He saw me as an actor in an "unnatural" scene.

Mashing these three ideas together results in what's called a "mixed metaphor." Our hero is a window, a fish, and an actor all in one sentence.

When this happens, the reader is at a loss to know which metaphor to go with. While in this case he may not literally envision each of these, the use of three metaphors blurs the emotional "image" of the relationship between these two characters.

What's a good metaphor? One that gives you more than one tangible image to hang your observations on. For example, let's say you go with the initial image of the window. You might say: "This was a long way from the moment in which Gregor clearly saw through me, stripping away any pretense of curtain or color."

In selecting a metaphor, think about what the images that go with it mean—how they look, sound, taste. Chose one that sends a single message to the reader's mind, such that each image you add enhances or focuses it. In the sentence above, Gregor sees through our hero as if he were a window without curtain (concealment) or color (disguise).

Check out Maya’s previous posts in this series, “On Being a Professional Amateur," and don’t forget to sign up for the RSS feed so that you won’t miss the next one!

Language Abuse - On Being a Professional Amateur

In Maya’s second post, she writes about some of the ways writers abuse language. How have you seen other writers abuse language? Leave a comment and let us know! And, if you haven’t already, check out Maya’s first post of the series on “sloppiness.”

Language Abuse
By Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff

Sample sentence: To attempt any consideration of Gaudi's life, he must be placed in his time and located in his place. To accomplish this, an overstanding of how he came to be is indispensable.

These two sentences have several problems:

1. Bloat
2. Word misuse
3. Redundancy

Sentence #1 begins: "To attempt any consideration of..." When you see a phrase like this in your prose, deconstruct it. Try simpler synonyms for the words you've chosen. A bare bones rendering of this phrase is "To try to think about."

But that's not all. This is action once-removed. We are not going to think about Gaudi's life, we're only going to try to think about it.

The sentence continues: "he must be placed in his time and located in his place." This is a passive and bloated way of saying, "we must know when and where he lived."

Sentence #2 tells us what we must do to accomplish "this." "This" what? To accomplish trying to think about Gaudi's life, or to accomplish placing him? Oh, and don't bother to look up "overstanding" in the dictionary—it's not a word. The writer meant "understanding," but wanted something that sounded bigger and less ordinary.

Ultimately, he meant to say: "To understand Gaudi's life, we must understand the context in which he lived it." And: "To understand Gaudi, we must understand the forces that shaped him."

If you're thinking that the second sentence is virtually a repeat of the first, you're right. The writer used two sentences to convey what he might have done more clearly in one. In the end, he failed to convey the idea because he was overreaching. He was trying to sound eloquent by reaching for words and phrasings he wasn't at home with.

What to do? When you write, write simply. Get down the bones of your story. Use words that come naturally to you—words you don't have to look up. Go back later with your editor hat on and maybe look for nicer, more eloquent words and phrasings. But make sure you know your tools—words—before you use them. And don't repeat yourself—say it once; say it best.

This post reminds me of the old KISS philosophy: Keep It Simple, Stupid. It's true, though. There's no reason to say more than you need to. You're just wasting good words. What are your thoughts?

Sloppiness - On Being a Professional Amateur

Constructing Stories presents the first installment of Maya’s series, “On Being a Professional Amateur.” Please let me know what you think!

Sloppiness
By Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff

Sample sentence: Pausing for a moment to look over at the commander he noted the slight of approval who said, “besides, to obtain Washington approval could take months and we can’t have civilians interfering in our politics.”

What’s wrong here? Lots. In the first clause there’s a comma missing after “commander,” a word missing after “slight” (“nod”, I’m assuming), and a misuse of the word “who.” The phrase as written says that the Slight (Nod) of Approval is “who” uttered the rest of the sentence.

In the dialogue that follows, “besides” is not capitalized and should be, “Washington” should be possessive (Washington’s) but isn’t, and the sentence is run-on.

A run-on sentence is one in which there are two independent clauses that aren't separated by a semi-colon. In simple terms it means that there are two separate things happening here—the acting character (He who is not named) looks at the commander, the commander nods (we think) and one of the two men delivers the line (though we don't know which one).

How did this happen? The writer has not bothered to craft his sentences. He has thrown them down and just left them where they lie. It is, to use a cooking metaphor, a bad job of plating. This sloppiness fails to communicate clearly 1) who’s pausing, 2) who's nodding, and 3) who’s talking.

If a reader is patient enough and determined enough, she might realize that the soldier paused to look over at the commander, who nodded and uttered the dialogue. But it’s our job as writers to write clearly enough that that level of patience and determination isn’t necessary.

The moral of the tale? Your reader should not have to use a pickaxe to dig gems of communication out of your prose. Reading should be less like mining and more like picking shells off a beach. Reading your prose over carefully aloud can help find problem areas.

Do you agree? Let Maya and I know what type of “sloppiness” bothers you. What do you struggle with personally? Share your thoughts!

Introduction - On Being a Professional Amateur

When Constructing Stories started, I envisioned it being a place where writers could discuss how best to tell stories. Part of that vision was fulfilled when Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff became the first writer to be interviewed on this blog. Now, a little over a month later, she’s also the first to write an entire series of posts for Constructing Stories. It’s another way to bring different viewpoints to the table, and I’m thrilled to have Maya as a guest writer.

Having written six novels (with more on the way), Maya is uniquely gifted and full of valuable insights. Her series, “On Being a Professional Amateur,” starts today and will continue for the next 5-7 weeks. Tell all the writers you know to stop by and share their opinion, and be sure to sign up for the RSS feed so that you don’t miss a post! Enjoy!

On Being a Professional Amateur
by Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff

Defining “Amateur”

To be an amateur in the original sense of the word simply means to do something for love, though our culture has added the rider, "not for pay." An amateur writer, then, is generally taken to mean one who’s not paid for her efforts.

“Amateur” has also come to mean someone who lacks polish, skill and craft. Synonyms for “amateurish” include: unprofessional, sloppy, inept, slipshod, clumsy, crude. That doesn’t sound good.

To me, truly being an amateur writer—a lover of writing—means you love your craft enough to have a professional attitude toward it, a desire to do it with the highest level of skill you can. So, how do you make your craft reflect true amateurism and not the other kind? By weeding out the signs of amateurism and cultivating craft.

In this series of short articles, I'd like to offer some ideas on how to spot the "weeds" of amateurism in your writing.

What do you think of Maya's definition? Leave a comment and let us know! Maya's next post (coming next week) will tackle the issue of "sloppiness" and how not to let it creep into your writing. Don't miss it! Sign up for the RSS feed before you leave!

Summer Preview

I hope you enjoyed the series on structure. It was a concise overview, but hopefully it added some value for you. Please let me know what you think.

There’s a lot going on here at Constructing Stories! Here’s a preview of what the summer is going to look like:

• Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff’s series of posts on “Becoming a Professional Amateur” writing (beginning the first week of May and continuing for seven weeks).
• Writer Interview: Lori Z. Scott.
• Writer Interview: Karina Fabian.
• Series of posts about “adding value” with your writing.
• Writer Interview (still pending): Dr. Joseph Bentz.
• Writer Interview (still pending): Dr. David Esselstrom.

That’s just what's planned so far. What are you dealing with? What would you like to discuss with other writers? Let me know and I’ll address that topic so that we can facilitate some learning around it. And, if you’re a writer who has something important to say, send an e-mail to palidod@yahoo.com so we can talk about how you can post a series on Constructing Stories.

Thanks for reading! If you like what you see and you’re intrigued by what’s coming up, please take a minute to sign up for the RSS feed. There’s a lot happening over the summer, and I don’t think you’ll want to miss it!