Tone deaf

[ksmith]

This post in janni's LJ triggered something that has bothered me off and on for years. I wonder if I'm tone deaf to cliched writing, or would know a cliche if it reared up and picked my pocket.

Is cliched writing in the eye of the reader? If you read a lot, and in many genres, do you have a more difficult time finding prose that strikes you as evocative or that moves you in some way? Are there cliches that are genre-specific--the romance images of heaving bosom and throbbing manhood come to mind.

If you have a sentence handy that you find cliched, could you please post it in this thread, along with the reason you feel it's a cliche?

Update: The character describing themselves while looking in a mirror or any other type of reflection--I've seen enough complaints about that one, although I admit to having used it before I had heard it was a cliche. Now I make a conscious effort to avoid doing it.

Comments

[barbarienne.livejournal.com]

Why the obsessive need to describe the lead character at all? I think that's the biggest problem with the first-person-narrator-looks-in-a-mirror. The writer is stopping the story to tell us irrelevant information. If the information is relevant, it will show up in bits of incluing when it needs to.

I present as evidence Nine Princes in Amber. We are 2.5 chapters into the book before Zelazny tells us what Corwin looks like. Corwin has woken up with amnesia in a hospital, broken out of the hospital, and made his way to his sister's house--and this is no problem whatsover for the reader to follow without knowing what Corwin looks like. We get an idea what Corwin is like as a person, and the extent that we get a physical description is in his ability to fight. Corwin never has to say "I was a big, strong guy." He displays some physical prowess and we are left with an impression that he not small and wimpy.

The other crime writers commit is that too often the description is a dry, witness-describing-a-crime-suspect list. "He was 5'9" tall, a white guy with a tan, sun-bleached hair, green eyes, and stubble on his manly jaw." Oh, please. Shoot me now!

When Zelazny does tell us what Corwin looks like, it's much more than just a list of features. Corwin finds a set of Trumps, and seeing his own image is startling to him because of the context. The reader learns what he looks like, but also gets a million questions: What's with the cards? The otherworldly clothes? All these siblings? This is important! the whole scene screams, at Corwin and at the reader, and so the description is merely a tiny fragment of a much larger event.

So, in conclusion, it's not that a first-person narrator seeing themself in a mirror/window/puddle is a cliche (though it is). It's that the whole notion was flawed and pointless when the very first person did it. It was never a good idea. The writer should never stop dead in the middle of the story to tell the reader something irrelevant. If it's relevant, it will come out naturally.

[rolanni.livejournal.com]

Why the obsessive need to describe the lead character at all?

Because readers often want to know what a character looks like?

The other first-person novel I've written is a mystery. Along about the second chapter, Our Narrator, a reporter, shows up at the local town meeting to find the hall packed; standing room only, 'way at the back. And she comments that this is OK by her because she's six foot tall, overtopping the average local by a good three inches, and can see the selectmen's table at the front just fine.

Beta readers fell on their swords. If I was going to have something so unusual as a female character who was six foot tall (digression: Yr Hmbl Correspondent is a six foot tall female, so doesn't find the height all that unusual), then I needed to get that information before the reader immediately. Never did figure out how to do that, exactly. Did try to soften the blow to reader sensibilities by having another of the character's address Our Narrator as "High Pockets" early on.

All that lengthily said, you're right that the author shouldn't stop the story while pointless information is related at length.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

I also like knowing what characters look like. Descriptions really don't stop the story for me--I tuck the details in my pocket and shoulder on.

In some respects, I am a very uncritical reader.

[alfreda89.livejournal.com]

I like a hint or two, as well. I remember nebulously in the past reading a few books where you get no hint of what the narrator looked like--so of course I made up my own character. And then, suddenly 75% of the way through the book, something happens that tosses me out of the book. We get a descriptive hint, and it's something weird, and nothing about it has shown up so far.

I hate that. It's important, figure out a way to get it in.

[barbarienne.livejournal.com]

Because readers often want to know what a character looks like?

-->I dunno...I don't think that's true at all. I think they want to know if it is somehow important to the story, but otherwise it's just scene-dressing.

Oh, readers want some help--is the character male or female (or neuter or...) is generally at the head of the list. But that is usually inclued quickly.

It's when you get into the nitty gritty like what color hair does the character have. If it's important or somehow part of character (all the Weasleys have red hair), then yes, the author needs to say it. We know Harry Potter has green eyes and dark hair, but is he cute, handsome, or otherwise good-looking? Rowling never says. The main point she ever makes about his face is the scar (which is plot-significant), and that he looks like his father (which is characterization-significant, though also plot-significant in Prisoner of Azkaban).

From what you're saying about your 6-foot-tall woman, it may be that your beta readers are hypersensitive, or it may be that you didn't inclue it right. Not having read it, I can't say. (I will note that the idea of a 6-foot-tall woman would not startle me, but then I am 5' 10" and not the tallest of my female relatives. ;-) Your "High Pockets" reference sounds like exactly the sort of thing to give the hint. I do things like "Mary Lou glared up at her" to inclue a character is tall without ever having to say it in so many words.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

It's when you get into the nitty gritty like what color hair does the character have. If it's important or somehow part of character (all the Weasleys have red hair), then yes, the author needs to say it

On one side of the discussion, I recall the author of one write-that-bestseller book advising writers to keep the description of the protagonist to a minimum in order to allow the reader to project whatever appearance they preferred onto that character. It supposedly helped the reader bond that much more to the book.

That being said, I like some description. I'm a describer myself, very tuned in to features and appearance.

[alfreda89.livejournal.com]

So, in conclusion, it's not that a first-person narrator seeing themself in a mirror/window/puddle is a cliche (though it is). It's that the whole notion was flawed and pointless when the very first person did it. It was never a good idea. The writer should never stop dead in the middle of the story to tell the reader something irrelevant. If it's relevant, it will come out naturally.

I like that. It's what I strive for...