My adverb experience: to use or not to use? That is the question.
Adverbs, unfortunately, get a lot of grief.
We are kind of mean to them. We put them in the story in our rough drafts so that we have an idea of how we want the scene to feel, and then when we revise we slash them out with a giant dagger called the Delete Button.
You'll hear a lot of "Never use adverbs! Ever!"
At first I was like, well, what about here and there? Why not a few sprinkled in?
This is what I've learned.
It is okay to use them, if they are the only thing that works and it is not appropriate to fill that space with a better description. Use them sparingly.
But I have also discovered why they have been hated on:
They throw you out of the story.
Let me emphasize that.
Adverbs throw you out of the story.
I was reading an MS recently and there were adverbs everywhere. The writing was good, with the exception of all the adverbs. And you know what happened?
I got distracted. The adverbs' little -ly's at the end were staring me in the face. All I noticed was the adverbs.
But that's not the bad part. The bad part is that instead of being immersed in the story with a great image, I was thrown out of the story because I was concentrating on the word instead of what the word was telling me. (See? Show, don't tell!)
For example,
"Blah blah blah," I said vehemently.
Now, when you read that, were you thinking about how vehemently the character said the phrase?
No!
Did you even have a clue as to what the character might have said?
No!
Why?
You were staring at the word vehemently and thinking about the word.
Therefore, you were thrown out of the progression of the story.
Alternate:
"Blah blah blah," I said, my nails digging into his skin.
From this version, we can see that there is intensity, and begin to form a picture in our mind, even without knowing what the character is saying.
So there you go. If you want your readers to stay indulged in your writing, don't sneak in adverbs everywhere. They are like little signs in your writing that say, "Hey, don't forget, you aren't actually experiencing this, you're just reading it!"
And we don't want that, now, do we?
We are kind of mean to them. We put them in the story in our rough drafts so that we have an idea of how we want the scene to feel, and then when we revise we slash them out with a giant dagger called the Delete Button.
You'll hear a lot of "Never use adverbs! Ever!"
At first I was like, well, what about here and there? Why not a few sprinkled in?
This is what I've learned.
It is okay to use them, if they are the only thing that works and it is not appropriate to fill that space with a better description. Use them sparingly.
But I have also discovered why they have been hated on:
They throw you out of the story.
Let me emphasize that.
Adverbs throw you out of the story.
I was reading an MS recently and there were adverbs everywhere. The writing was good, with the exception of all the adverbs. And you know what happened?
I got distracted. The adverbs' little -ly's at the end were staring me in the face. All I noticed was the adverbs.
But that's not the bad part. The bad part is that instead of being immersed in the story with a great image, I was thrown out of the story because I was concentrating on the word instead of what the word was telling me. (See? Show, don't tell!)
For example,
"Blah blah blah," I said vehemently.
Now, when you read that, were you thinking about how vehemently the character said the phrase?
No!
Did you even have a clue as to what the character might have said?
No!
Why?
You were staring at the word vehemently and thinking about the word.
Therefore, you were thrown out of the progression of the story.
Alternate:
"Blah blah blah," I said, my nails digging into his skin.
From this version, we can see that there is intensity, and begin to form a picture in our mind, even without knowing what the character is saying.
So there you go. If you want your readers to stay indulged in your writing, don't sneak in adverbs everywhere. They are like little signs in your writing that say, "Hey, don't forget, you aren't actually experiencing this, you're just reading it!"
And we don't want that, now, do we?
This is a good point. Adverbs can and should be used sparingly (there, I just used one!). :)
ReplyDeleteI think the main reason adverbs tend to drag down writing is because they're used in a place where a stronger noun, verb, or line of dialogue could be used instead. Like, instead of "he ran quickly", maybe you could say "he sprinted" or "he tore" or "he raced". But maybe they are developing more of a stigma than they deserve.
Just my thoughts. :) Nice post!
Thanks. Yes, definitely agree with what you've said. The critique group that I am in are adverb haters lol. I wasn't sure how I felt about it until I experienced how annoying they can be firsthand. But I think it is just a matter of using only when necessary.
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