Kurt R.A. Giambastiani

This is the last specific topic I’m going to post in this series on common mistakes that plague new/untrained writers. But, I’ve decided that the final post is gong to be an experiment. I’m going to take an old trunk story and post it here, warts and all, highlighting the errors I’ve been complaining about here. Then I’m going to edit it, rewriting it to see how much better it might be. Then, you can be the judge of whether or not my advice given here is of any value.

But that’s later. For today, I’ll lay out my last gripes about unpolished writing: repetition, assonance, and alliteration. Like last time, these are hard to find in editing, and not something I can spot by scanning a work. But I find that if I keep my “ear” open as I read, I’ll hear them.

By “repetition,” I mean the re-use of a specific word in close proximity. Naturally, I have to re-use words, but most words don’t cause a problem because they’re so common. We’re accustomed to their being repeated over and over within a paragraph or even within a sentence. It’s the unusual words that, when repeated, cause a problem, and the more unusual the word, the more it sticks in the reader’s mind. Editors I’ve worked with call this an “echo,” and I’ve had “echoes” called out chapters away from each other.

Example: If I use the word “diaphanous” in Chapter 1, and then again in Chapter 2, you’ll remember it. You’ll probably remember it if I use it in Chapter 10. If I use the words “bifurcate” or “spavined” more than once in the entire book, you’ll remember it. But even common words, when used in close juxtaposition, can create a problem of “echoes.”

Assonance and alliteration are also forms of repetition, but only of specific portions of a word. Assonance is the repetition of similar vowel sounds or word rhythms (e.g., “How now brown cow?”), and alliteration is the repetition of initial consonants in a sequence of words. These, too, are unavoidable to an extent, but when used frequently, they draw attention to themselves, and that’s when the reader notices the writer instead of the writing. And that, in my humble opinion, is bad.

I found a couple examples of these in the early stories I’ve posted on this site.

From “Sum of the Angles“:

“Just the other day you wished you could go through high school again knowing what you know now.  Well, now you’ll get your wish.”

From “Intaglio“:

Colonel Gavin Price-George arrived on the day of the celebration, his sleek ship sliding silently over the village on its way to the landing field.

In the first example, the phrase “you wished you” isn’t so bad because it’s fairly common, but the knowing/know and now/now repetitions, while they might have been acceptable on their own, put together like that make for a quirky, awkward sentence. In the second example, I remember doing that on purpose (Bad writer. No biscuit!) because I thought the sibilant S’s would evoke the hissing ship…of course that contradicts the “silently” adverb, so it’s really awful on two fronts.

Thinking of these as echoes is helpful in finding them, though, and when editing for this problem, I have to read slow and “hear” each word in my head. If I hear them, I’ll hear the echo. Some writers read their work aloud as part of their editing process, and I can see how that would be a great help in many ways.

So, that’s it for “The View from Here” topics. I hope some of you found them helpful. If you’re still doubtful, wait for the final, double-installment of the series, and you can compare a before and after version for yourself.

k