Writing Style: Learning to Think in Verbs

For three years, I taught a writing course to teachers doing masters degrees in the Literary Education program for Mount Saint Vincent University. The teachers did not want to be writers and most had never thought about writing style. Teaching them helped me to understand (and remember) how beginning writers think about style.

Good writing starts by learning to focus on two things. The first, and probably the most important, is expressing yourself clearly. Nothing else matters if the reader is confused. Learning to say exactly what you mean is a skill. The second is learning to think in verbs.

What does this mean? Most untrained writers will use modifiers to give their writing colour. This is a mistake. You don’t have to take my word for it. Elements of Style puts it this way: "Write with nouns and verbs, not adjectives and adverbs. The adjective hasn't been built that can pull a weak or inaccurate noun out of a tight place." In his excellent book, On Writing, Stephen King wrote a two-page rant that begins, “The adverb is not your friend.” He even says, “The road to hell is paved with adverbs and I’m prepared to shout it from the roof tops.”

What does this mean in practical terms? Here’s an actual edit from one of my books, An Earthly Knight. The character is just waking up from a migraine under stressful circumstances. In the first draft I wrote, “She opened one eye.” Like most writers, the first verb that comes to my mind is almost never the best one when I’m in the throes of just getting stuff down on paper.

A beginning writer might edit this by adding a modifier, “She opened one eye reluctantly.” This is exactly what Stephen King wants you to avoid. Why? It tells the reader what to think. Oh, she’s reluctant. It’s a passive experience. Readers come to fiction expecting characters to be presented as puzzles we can explore. This makes fiction more like real life and much more satisfying for the reader.

“Open” is a nondescript verb that tells the reader nothing beyond the basic action. In the published book, the sentence reads, “She forced one eye open.” The strong, active verb gives the short sentence energy. It offers the reader a clue about the character’s state of mind.

Lavish attention on your verbs. The verbs in your first drafts are almost never the ones you need.