Write what you smell

[Galoot]

An attic has a certain smell, different from a damp basement. Nobody with their eyes closed would mistake a deli for a forest. When I say "musty" an image springs to your mind. "Musky" causes a different reaction. Or so I hear. I don't know for sure, and looking the words up in the dictionary doesn't help.

I have anosmia, which is just a fancy word for "you can't smell anything." I don't even understand the concept of odor.

Anosmia is a good thing because diaper pails and moldy compost don't scare me, though I hear they should. This is a bad thing because I have to wait until my eyes start burning before I realize the house is on fire. I can't smell the smoke.

This is a potential problem in writing. Years back one critique I received was that I didn't describe some scenes well enough to immerse the reader. The issue was smell. I can't describe things the way you would describe them. My ocean beaches look and sound realistic. The characters can feel the wind and taste the salt in the air just fine. But none of my characters can describe the smell. I hear that beaches smell wonderful, and so unique that the smell is an important part of their description. I couldn't describe it to you without copy/pasting from someone else's description of a beach.

Eliminating smell from some descriptions leaves readers flat.

How does a blind man describe what a sighted person experiences in the forest? He has no concept of what it looks like. Unless he wants to write only for other blind people or include only blind characters in his work, what does he do?

I'm in a similar bind. I don't want to have all my characters in each of my stories suffering the same strange ailment. That's unrealistic. But I have no concept of smell other than "good" or "bad." That's enough for some scenes, not even close for others.

What to do? Does anyone else have a similar problem? Is anyone here deaf or blind? :D

[azbikergirl]

Possibly, you could use smell to evoke a feeling or memory instead of trying to describe the smell itself. Might that work?

[Vipersniper]

:kiss: I can see the valid reasons for writing about smell in your novels because it is one of the senses. I never thought about a person who had no sense of smell because how else would you know if something is dangerous but this could be done in a novel with a lot of medical jargon. I do write humorous poems about smells of things that we often take for granted you know those smells that have been prerecorded by a certain sound.

[Lisa Y]

Use people around you and people here. Ask "what does a brush fire remind you of?" Maybe keep a record of what different things smell like to different people. Hey, maybe I should do this also...and I have no trouble smelling!

[alaskamatt17]

Thank you so much, Galoot! The sense of smell figures prominently into one of the cultures in my sci-fi novel, and I've been searching everywhere for a word that would be equivalent to blind or deaf, but for the sense of smell instead. There is one character with anosmia, but up until today I've just been saying, "She can't smell."

[sgtsdaughter]

might sound corny, but try writing your smell sequences with the computer monitor turned off. then, if possible, have the smell near you . . . now if you are writing about a brush fire that might not be so feasible. :idea: sometimes writing with the monitor off forces you to feel and put forth the words that your eye will prematurly erase as a possiblity. just a thought . . . sometimes the tricks work for me.

Annessa

[aka eraser]

It's a hindrance when it comes writing Galoot, but needn't be a roadblock I don't think. You'll just have to do what writers have done since time immemorial: use your imagination and fake it (based upon your own reading/research of course).

I'd start underlining passages in books that describe smells and copy them into a notebook, gradually building your own reference book. Check with a trusted beta reader or two if you're uncertain whether your own efforts "smell" true.

I don't recall the senses of smell or taste playing a large role in any book I've read but it's true that a passing mention can add verisimilitude to a scene: the piney woods; the earthy loam etc. Is it possible that because of your condition you have an exaggerated sense of the importance of describing smells in writing? (I confess to being one of "those" readers whose eyes glaze over when faced with a long descriptive paragraph. I skim quickly, eager to get on with the story.)

I have a hunch you're talented and smart enough to find solutions. And yes, we have at least one regular here who is deaf.

[CindyBidar]

but it's true that a passing mention can add verisimilitude to a scene: the piney woods; the earthy loam etc.

But a passing mention is just that. It's not something that needs to be described in great detail. If you say "grandma's kitchen always smelled of baked apples and Pine Sol," most people will recognize those scents. You really don't need to say that baked apples have a sweet-tart scent tinged with cinnamon, do you?

[maestrowork]

You don't have to describe a smell if it's "common." I mean, the smell of a beach or tree or french fries or oranges... Sure, there are people who probably have never smelled those before, but you describe every smell (or any of the five senses), your book will end up 1200 pages long.

Describe the smell if a) it's unusual or b) it's important to the story. When describing smells, use metaphors, tap into the readers' sensory memory. Build layers:

The kitchen smells like burnt food -- okay, but what kind of food. Burnt food is very generic. I can't really smell it.

The kitchen smells of burnt flesh -- better, but what kind? Burnt chicken smells differently than burnt steak or burnt fish.

The kitchen smells of burnt steak mixed with three-day-old rotten fish -- now we're going somewhere. We might not precisely know what the smell is like, but we can imagine burnt steak and rotten fish... Now do we need to say what kind of steak or fish? No, because that kind details is overkill.... unless, of course, the POV character is a dog and he's trying to solve a mystery by following a precise smell...

Sometimes you do want to detail your setting with smell, even if it is not unique. In that case, baked apple-pie and pine sol would be just fine.

[reph]

The vocabulary of English – or, I suppose, any other language – doesn't do justice to smells, because smells are ineffable. Consequently, smells are hard to describe even for a writer whose nose works. I mean that we don't have anything for smells that comes near to the variety and precision of color words or words for the shapes of objects. People who try to describe an unfamiliar smell resort to saying what else it smells like, and they don't do very well. I might say "A skunk smells something like the odor they add to natural gas, but different, more acidy or something, uh, I don't know."

It doesn't seem to me that smells are usually very important in fiction. Movies do their job without smells. How badly do you think you need them?

[BlueTexas]

You could try associating smells with color or sensation. You know how tabasco sauce burns the back of your throat? It does the same thing to your nose...it smells like fire might taste.

[maestrowork]

It doesn't seem to me that smells are usually very important in fiction. Movies do their job without smells. How badly do you think you need them?

In movies smell is done through the visuals -- a garbage can full of rotten fruits, gun powder, sewage full of rats, etc. The visuals tap into our connected sensory memories -- when we think of rotten garbage we think of the smell associated with it. In writing, we may do the same thing, by vividly describing the visuals.

[johnnycannuk]

Galoot, Brother, I think NOT being able to smell is an interesting, not common issue that would really add colour to a story. What a great character. Think a person like Jennings in "Paycheck" by Philip K Dick only with no sense of smell instead of no memory...I don't know I think it might make some sort of neat sci-fi story if you put this person in a position where he must do something that having a sense of smell would help...

I say embrace your anosmia and use it to your advatage. You can write what you know.

For other writing, just ask your friends to describe to you what "musty" is, the phyiological reaction or the images it brings to mind. Kinda like in "Mask" where the mc shows the blind girl colours - hot potato is red, ice cube is blue..

Even better, you have all of us - friends and writers to help. Maybe start a "What does it smell like" thread and get a bunch of different descriptions from all of us.

Just an idea.

Mike

[Galoot]

Pretend these are numbered, yo.
Check with a trusted beta reader or two if you're uncertain whether your own efforts "smell" true.
...
Is it possible that because of your condition you have an exaggerated sense of the importance of describing smells in writing?
...
(I confess to being one of "those" readers whose eyes glaze over when faced with a long descriptive paragraph. I skim quickly, eager to get on with the story.)
...
I have a hunch you're talented and smart enough to find solutions.
1) That's how I discovered the problem in my writing in the first place. You bet I'll be asking, after the fact, if it's an issue.

2) It's absolutely possible I'm over-worrying. But I'm often surprised to learn about smells I never knew existed. When the main character is being chased by Michael Meyers and floods her car, it's immediately obvious to her what's happened because of the smell. I wouldn't even know that if I hadn't once had a passenger tell me I'd flooded my own engine.

3) Oh, me too. I'm all for letting the readers fill in as many details for themselves as possible. Padding sucks. It's those car flooding, natural gas leaking, dead body behind the wall situations I worry about.

4) Heh. Careful, or I'll ask you to beta read. We'll see about talent when an editor decides whether to accept or reject.

Describe the smell if a) it's unusual
You're telling a blind man to only mention it if their character's friend's skin is an unusual color of green. I only know a gas leak smells unusual enough to mention because I've read it does. It beats me what "unusual" means most of the time. Again, beta readers are going to be my best friend in this regard.

I say embrace your anosmia and use it to your advatage.
You bet I will. But not in every story. :D

[Mistook]

Gallot,

I'm just curious if you can taste? From what i understand, smell and taste are very closely linked senses.

Foul smells come from biologically produced chemicals that nobody would ever dare ingest.

A "musty" odor, for example is associated with damp, enclosed spaces where mold has formed. The mold is the source of the odor. A "musky" scent, on the other hand is almost always a body-odor. "musk" can be revolting, or sexually arousing, depending on what part of the body is "stinking" and who it's coming from.

Most bodily odors contain pheremones that are not consciously detected, but are picked up by an olfactory node known as the "vero nasal organ". Because the pheremones excite sexual organs, the "musky" odors associated with them also tend to be erotic, but these same "musky" odors become overpowering when the person in question has not bathed in a while, and so musk has a revolting side.

Bad breath is the exception. Breath would never be described as "musky". A clean mouth won't produce any noticable breath. After a person has eaten or drinken, their breath will, for a while, smell of whatever they've ingested. This is usually not revolting, but as bacteria in the mouth begin to break down the residue of ingested substances, the odor becomes quite foul.

Farts, as you must know, are never enjoyable. We are hard wired to avoid animal waste, of course, because contact with it can make us ill or kill us. The same sense of revulsion goes for rotting foods, and we are very keen to detect even the slightest traces of such chemicals.


The smell of food, for the most part, is described according to it's taste. A freshly baked pie will smell sweet, for example. When it comes out of the oven, the hot air inside the pie will escape and expand into the cooler atmosphere of the room and the house. Even after it has cooled, the smell will hang around for a while.

Plants also give off odors, usually pleasant. Grass and deciduous trees don't normally get noticed, tough after a rain storm, especially an electrical storm, the leaves and blades undergo chemical changes that can be detected as a vague sense of "freshness".

Flowers and weeds are primarily distinguished by their odors, which usually correspond to their appearance. A beautiful flower will ususally smell nice. A weed will look odd or ugly, and usually don't smell at all, or smell vaguely "musky" again.

I could go on, but I guess the point is that smells are primarily biological. Rocks don't smell. There are also smells that come from industrial chemicals. Gasoline, for example, has a distinct smell, but we know it's not coming from any kind of creature.

[PattiTheWicked]

How does a blind man describe what a sighted person experiences in the forest? He has no concept of what it looks like. Unless he wants to write only for other blind people or include only blind characters in his work, what does he do?



Wow. I had never even thought about this as an issue before, for a writer. I had a great uncle who had no sense of smell -- didn't know there was a word for it -- and he always used to explain to us that he could understand what something was "supposed" to smell like if he could associate it with a reading from one of the other senses.

For example, to him, a pile of burnt tires smelled "dark, thick and murky." Fresh cookies smelled "warm and chewy." While warm and chewy isn't a smell per se, when he described things that way, it made perfect sense, and I always knew exactly what he was talking about.

Of course, he always said that my great aunt smelled "red and rosey" because he brought her a red rose every Friday for the entire 57 years they were married. :LilLove:

[Galoot]

Gallot,

I'm just curious if you can taste? From what i understand, smell and taste are very closely linked senses.Misttok,

I get asked that all the time. Yes I can. Beats me if I can taste as vividly as you can, though.

- Galoot (Sorry about the spelling. I couldn't resist.)

[Mistook]

Misttok,

I get asked that all the time. Yes I can. Beats me if I can taste as vividly as you can, though.

- Galoot (Sorry about the spelling. I couldn't resist.)


:roll:

Sorry, Galoot. :) I must've been using the french variation or something.

[reph]

For example, to him, a pile of burnt tires smelled "dark, thick and murky." Fresh cookies smelled "warm and chewy."
Those adjectives that Patti's greatuncle used aren't smell words at all. They go with other senses or bodily activities associated with the objects. It'd never occur to me to describe cookies as smelling chewy. I wouldn't walk into someone's house and say "Mmm, it smells chewy in here. Are you baking?" So, Galoot, don't have your character say that, either.

Mistook wrote about smells of animal, vegetable, and bacterial origin. There are mineral smells, too. At least, there's one: wet sidewalks. Nothing else smells like a wet sidewalk. I don't know whether the smell comes from the concrete or from the dust on it.

Ripe fruit has more scent than green fruit. When fruit goes bad, the pleasant smell it had when fresh takes on an overlay of corruption, as if the good fruity smell had intensified but something you don't want were added, something evil.

Although smells are hard to describe, human recognition memory for them is superb. The best smell I've ever had was newborn kittens, two litters many years apart. They didn't smell like flowers or food or anything else in my olfactory experience.

[BlueTexas]

I just thought of something. To me, the smell of food is usually a precursor to taste. So the smell of say, cookies baking, might be a pale version of the taste of the cookies. Maybe useful, maybe not.

[Birol]

In movies smell is done through the visuals -- a garbage can full of rotten fruits, gun powder, sewage full of rats, etc. The visuals tap into our connected sensory memories -- when we think of rotten garbage we think of the smell associated with it. In writing, we may do the same thing, by vividly describing the visuals.

Movies, and books, also use character reactions to smells in order to describe them.

[Birol]

I'm just curious if you can taste? From what i understand, smell and taste are very closely linked senses.

Yes. It's the old science experiment where if you hold your nose and bit into an onion and an apple, you can't tell them apart. I think the same is true of an apple and a potato.

Sorry, I'm off on tangent. Ignore me.

[Galoot]

Anyone who's curious about creating characters who lack the sense of smell might be interested to learn that the old cliche about a blind person's heightened senses seems to apply. Certain visual cues make me want to upchuck.

My wife can clean out a dorm room fridge or pick up after a dog with gastrointestinal problems without batting an eye. All she has to do is hold her nose. I can't do those things without gagging, but if I look away I don't have a problem. With a wetsuit and a blindfold I could clean the pit beneath your outhouse, but if I got a peek I'd react just like you would.

Of course there are some things smellers can't even look at without feeling ill, but I seem to be rather more sensitive to certain images than anyone else I know. Then again, maybe I'm just kooky.

For what it's worth, when people say "That Galoot. He thinks his s*** doesn't stink," they're just being honest.

[reph]

Eating chocolate makes one's s*** really not stink. True.

So now you can say you do it for medical reasons.

[Jamesaritchie]

Those adjectives that Patti's greatuncle used aren't smell words at all. They go with other senses or bodily activities associated with the objects. It'd never occur to me to describe cookies as smelling chewy. I wouldn't walk into someone's house and say "Mmm, it smells chewy in here. Are you baking?" So, Galoot, don't have your character say that, either.

.

I don't know, I sort of like these descriptions. Anyone can describe something by using words that apply, but it takes talent to find surprising descriptions using words you wouldn't normally apply. I love the phrase "It smells chewy in here." I think it makes perfect sense.

I've also had people say, "It smells happy in here." They were right. And, of course, there's "It smells like Christmas, doesn't it?"

[PattiTheWicked]

Those adjectives that Patti's greatuncle used aren't smell words at all. They go with other senses or bodily activities associated with the objects. It'd never occur to me to describe cookies as smelling chewy. I wouldn't walk into someone's house and say "Mmm, it smells chewy in here. Are you baking?" So, Galoot, don't have your character say that, either.



Right, that was my point, was that he used descriptions from the other senses to describe the odors that he couldn't actually smell.

While I wouldn't say someone's house smells chewy, if you say "those cookies smell warm and chewy," it seems perfectly logical to me.

[maestrowork]

Yes. It's the old science experiment where if you hold your nose and bit into an onion and an apple, you can't tell them apart. I think the same is true of an apple and a potato.

Sorry, I'm off on tangent. Ignore me.


Taste and smell are highly connected. That's why when we are sick (cold, flu) we can't smell or taste anything, except the four basics: sweet, sour, salty and bitter. You won't be able to tell how the apple pie taste because you can't smell it.

p.s. I also echo Reph's comment: the burnt tire smells "dark, thick and murky" or the cookies smell "chewy" is not what I'd call good description of smell. How does something smell chewy? Or smell murky? That's what many call "mixing of senses." Dark and murky are visual cues. Thick and chewy is textile.

But "chewy" here works for some people because it's connected to taste. The cookies taste chewy, so if you describe the smell as "chewy" -- people connect that with the smell because, like I said, taste and smell are connected. But if you say, the "cookies smell flaky" it doesn't quite work that way.

[Nateskate]

You are forced to memorize phrases that you've seen, which is okay, since most of us do something similar. I have no clue what it is like to kill a man, or desire to learn about it. Yet, in my story I can describe how I think I might feel. "I shuddered, looking at the lifeless body...wanting to shake him awake, but there was no reviving. Fanciful thoughts of wanting to build a time machine, and go back and undo my error, came to mind. The realization, "This is it" was too much to bear; and it struck me like a cold fist, some things can't be undone. I wandered aimlessly, my mind filled with a thousand wonderings, 'Did he have any children...would he have been a good grandfather...and I mourned for his death, wishing it had been my own.

When we compare smells, we are trying to compare them to other smells, we often can't find a comparative smell, and we use a metaphor instead. Is there really such a thing as "Stale Smoke?" Well, smoke is smoke, "Stale smoke" invokes the idea of a shut in room where air isn't circulating. It's not "Stale", its just more concentrated and more irritating because it isn't mixed with fresh air.

Rain has a smell of its own. After a rain, there is a freshness. Well, you can try, but it isn't easy to describe the smell of rain to someone who has never smelled it. Instead, I might just say, "It was like the scent after a fresh fallen rain..." Well, that isn't exactly describing anything. It forces your reader to remember what rain smelled like to them. And likewise, when you say, "It smelled like smoke" that should suffice, but you might dress it up a little, "It smelled like the pungent smell of smoke....or the acrid smell of smoke. You feel smoke-irritating your eyes. Well smoke is irritating to the lungs, and the nose. Perhaps you've felt it instead of smelling it. But it is the irritation that comes to mind, not the actual smell.

Remember, you are only required to give them a mental image, not a real image. Smell is somewhat subjective. "It smelled like the scent of death..." Well, death has no smell that I know of, other than a decomposing body, which is different. Rather, in saying this, I want people to picture a time where something seems so palpably real, that you imagine you can experience it with every sense.

[Vipersniper]

:Wha: About the brush fire many times certain odors are intermingled into it but a brush fire has a distinct difference than an electrical fire. Because that smells a lot like plastic burning or has a distinct metallic odor. Trust me after going through a house fire where many odors emit one's nostrils can pick out chemical smells as opposed to the burnt flesh of a pet. The odor hangs in the air for days even weeks and no matter what anyone tells you it can't be erased. For example I had a trunk that had some of my quilts in it which were not burned but the fabrics absorbed the odor. The odor had a embalming fluid odor to it. I know the correct term just wanted to spell it right. Arsenic, tars, cynanide are also things in a house fire. Burnt tomato soup smells different from a burnt piece of bacon. Am I making sense here and now for another smell what does fear smell like? For me it has a heavy iodine smell or sometimes like fecal matter.

[Jamesaritchie]

How does something smell chewy? Or smell murky? That's what many call "mixing of senses." Dark and murky are visual cues. Thick and chewy is textile.



Have you ever walked into a house when someone was baking chocolate chip cookies? I can't think of a better way to describe that smell than with the word "chewy." Chewing them is exactly what comes to my mind. Not tasting, not smelling, but chewing.

Mixing the senses can be a very good thing for description.

And, of course, there are people who smell colors and who see musical notes, but this aside, if used judiciously, associations are always good things for description.

I like playing with the language, using it in different ways, and to me, at least, something can smell chewy. Smell and taste, as has been mentioned, are almost the same sense, and either can certainly invoke the other in me. I see no reason why this shouldn't also be true with description.

[reph]

Right, that was my point, was that he used descriptions from the other senses to describe the odors that he couldn't actually smell.

While I wouldn't say someone's house smells chewy, if you say "those cookies smell warm and chewy," it seems perfectly logical to me.
I didn't mean, in my earlier post, that it was somehow wrong or cheating to use words from other senses when writing about a smell. I was exploring the idea that the direct vocabulary for smells is so limited that writers have to take the long way around and borrow from the other senses to get words from, say, the global cookie experience in order to suggest a smell. I do think "chewy" in a novel might not work. It's part of one's impression of fresh cookies (one anticipates chewing them), and I can understand why your uncle said it, but I wouldn't count on readers to decode "a chewy smell."

By the way, for Brits: American "cookie" = your "biscuit."

Do British computers contain biscuits?

Returning for a moment to the discussion topic: When you write about a smell, you aren't seeking to make the reader recall/hallucinate that smell, are you? I more often find smell descriptions used to help conjure up an atmosphere in the figurative sense. When a middle-class character enters a tenement building, the hall always smells of cabbage. That cabbage smell is there because the writer wants me to know that poor people live there (they can't afford asparagus, only cabbage), packed too close together, and the ventilation is bad, not because the smell of cabbage is important to the story in a sensory way.

[reph]

The cookies taste chewy, so if you describe the smell as "chewy" -- people connect that with the smell because, like I said, taste and smell are connected. But if you say, the "cookies smell flaky" it doesn't quite work that way.
Neither of them works for me. Cookies don't taste chewy to me, or crunchy or crisp or soft. They feel chewy, and they taste like whatever flavor they are.

Cookies might taste and smell either fresh or stale, though.

[maestrowork]

Fresh and stale are words for smell. But chewy or crispy is not. I think when someone says "the cookies smell warm and chewy" he really means "the cookies smell like they could be still be warm and chewy."

The human sense of smell is the most underdeveloped, compared to other senses. No wonder we don't have many words to describe smell, and we usually have to resort to using similes or other senses.

[AncientEagle]

I am pleased to "meet" someone else who doesn't smell. In my case, though, I once had the ability but lost it many years ago. The nerve simply atrophied, according to the doctors' best guess. I can relate to the problems and the advantages - I worry that I cannot detect a fire in the kitchen until I either see it, hear it, feel the heat, or have my nose and eyes sting. I can stand over a vat of ammonia and not know it.

On the other hand, when my children were babies, I could change diapers with complete immunity (if the sight didn't bother me.)

Having once been able to smell, I sometimes mourn the loss, as I can no longer smell fresh earth, a spring shower on dusty soil, flowers, or perfume. I can remember them very precisely, but I couldn't describe any of them if my life depended upon it. So this discussion has been helpful to me in making me think anew about the best ways to include odors in my writing. I try to include as many senses as possible, and as are appropriate.

As for taste - yes, I understand there is a strong connection between the two senses, but it hasn't worked that way for me. Otherwise my waist would be several inches smaller.

[JanaLanier]

You could try associating smells with color or sensation. You know how tabasco sauce burns the back of your throat? It does the same thing to your nose...it smells like fire might taste.

You actually don't use smell receptors to smell a noxious scent. You have a few nocioceptive nerve fibers in your nose as well as your tongue; that's why a bitter scent "stings your nose."


BTW, Mistook, it's "vomeronasal organ," and it's highly disputed whether humans still have a functioning VMO. Most scientists believe the VMO regressed during the course of human evolution. But then there are unexplained studies that suggest otherwise -- the best known one documents that females, when they live together, tend to have the same timing of their menstrual cycles.


Did you know there's a condition that's the opposite of anosmia? Hyperosmia is when the sense of smell is increased. Oliver Sacks wrote about a patient of his that had temporary hyperosmia (from LSD use!). He could identify people by their smell, like a dog.

[BlueTexas]

Remember, you are only required to give them a mental image, not a real image. Smell is somewhat subjective. "It smelled like the scent of death..." Well, death has no smell that I know of, other than a decomposing body, which is different. Rather, in saying this, I want people to picture a time where something seems so palpably real, that you imagine you can experience it with every sense.

A dying body has a smell when it's been sick a long time, and a distinct smell at death, when the body heaves it's refuse out, before decomposition starts. Trust me. Not pleasant. Irrelevant here, but still.

[HConn]

I say just ignore smell until you absolutely have to include it. Then ask someone.

"He smelled smoke." "She smelled baking bread." "He opened the door and smelled the corpses. Three minutes later, he found the first body." "She smelled like a wet goat."

If you can't smell, don't worry about including it in typical scene descriptions. Just be sure to include it when it *has* to be there.

[Mistook]

BTW, Mistook, it's "vomeronasal organ," and it's highly disputed whether humans still have a functioning VMO. Most scientists believe the VMO regressed during the course of human evolution. But then there are unexplained studies that suggest otherwise -- the best known one documents that females, when they live together, tend to have the same timing of their menstrual cycles.

Thanks for the correction, it's been years since I read that article. From what I understand, most scientists agree that the organ is present, it's just a question of whether it works. As it relates to pheremones in body odor, I tend to believe the VNO is operational, based on 30 years of meeting people who really do get turned on by otherwise unpleasant odors.


Did you know there's a condition that's the opposite of anosmia? Hyperosmia is when the sense of smell is increased. Oliver Sacks wrote about a patient of his that had temporary hyperosmia (from LSD use!). He could identify people by their smell, like a dog.


That's fascinating! A few weeks back I was toying with the idea for a story where an LSD type drug has the effect of giving the user the capability of sonar.

That was based on an article I read which said the human brain is capable of sonar, and that blind people can learn to use a clicker to bounce sound waves off their surroundings and get a mental picture of what's in the room.

In my story idea, the drug literally plugs the auditory sensors into the optic centers of the brain, and the subject can literally "see" sounds.

[black winged fighter]

I have slight hyperosmia, and although it varies from time to time, it reaches peaks were I can tell whether people that pass me have dogs or not. The problem is that when I try to describe smells to people, they start to look for a straightjacket. Because I smell things so vividly, I sometimes can't describe them the way others would recognise them (unless I use cliches, of course).

Incidently, Mistook, I also heard about the sonar clickers and blind people. Cool idea.

By the way, if anyone here is familiar with Terry Pratchett's work, the way he has Angua describe smells is novel and works.

[Galoot]

If you can't smell, don't worry about including it in typical scene descriptions. Just be sure to include it when it *has* to be there.
Yes, but...

Example: I write a novel which hinges on the protag mistaking diesel for gasoline. My first reader says, "But what about the smell? He'd have known something was wrong right from the start."

Oh. Oops.

It wasn't until I was in my mid-20s that I learned the two fuels have different smells. It never occured to me to think about it, any more than it would occur to a blind man to wonder whether you were a redhead or a blonde. If my McGuffin can be derailed by any normally intelligent person with a working sniffer, but I'm not aware of it, there will be a problem.

I don't think it would often be an issue, if ever, but the possibility exists. Granted, I could make the protag anosmic if I screw it up, but using that gimmick more than once in a career won't work. :)

As was said earlier, I'll have to lean on my beta readers for that sort of help, as well as help with those descriptions that might fall flat without a smell factor, and hope I can fix things in a rewrite.

[HConn]

So, um...

Diesel and gasoline have different smells, huh?

Huh. I never noticed that.

[Galoot]

They don't? <sigh> See?

[JanaLanier]

Pat and I are hijacking the thread... sorry Galoot...

Thanks for the correction, it's been years since I read that article. From what I understand, most scientists agree that the organ is present, it's just a question of whether it works. As it relates to pheremones in body odor, I tend to believe the VNO is operational, based on 30 years of meeting people who really do get turned on by otherwise unpleasant odors.

You're right -- a few autopsy studies have demonstrated the 'pit' in the nasal mucosa leading to the VNO. I agree with you that on some level it probably does work. Ask any woman you know -- does she feel sexier or more attractive around the time she's ovulating? (They've studied this very question, and the answer is yes! But, if she's on the pill, the answer doesn't count.)


That's fascinating! A few weeks back I was toying with the idea for a story where an LSD type drug has the effect of giving the user the capability of sonar.

That was based on an article I read which said the human brain is capable of sonar, and that blind people can learn to use a clicker to bounce sound waves off their surroundings and get a mental picture of what's in the room.

In my story idea, the drug literally plugs the auditory sensors into the optic centers of the brain, and the subject can literally "see" sounds.

What a great story idea! I'm chewing on all the ramifications... they'd probably have a heightened sense of sound, making going to a bar or Chucky Cheese's or the Superbowl intolerable. Would the person have normal vision? Would he see the actual sound waves? (cool special effects. maybe it should be a screenplay! :) )

[BlueTexas]

Pat and I are hijacking the thread... sorry Galoot...






What a great story idea! I'm chewing on all the ramifications... they'd probably have a heightened sense of sound, making going to a bar or Chucky Cheese's or the Superbowl intolerable. Would the person have normal vision? Would he see the actual sound waves? (cool special effects. maybe it should be a screenplay! :) )

I'm helping you hijack here, but I have to add to this. People will rotten vision tend to hear better. I work in the optical field, and I'm also one of them. I'm a high myope, and all through school I refused to wear my glasses. (Chalkboard? What chalkboard? Literally.) That's when my hearing stepped up. My vision is worse now, but I've heard such small things as a battery leaking fluid across a room. Course, it was a darn quiet room...but it might add to the realism of you character.

[Writing Again]

Gasoline and Diesel? My nose works just fine, or so it seems. I know when a smoker walks past me, and yes, if they do not wash their dogs regularly I can smell it on their clothes. But I don't wrench cars and I cannot tell the difference between the smell of gas and diesel. Nor can I smell cats, yet I have a friend who can.

I have a daughter who can sniff clothes and tell you which member of the family wore it last.

My car was overheating one day. A friend told me it smelled like pancakes to her.

I personally get irritable when exposed to bad smells -- Even when I'm not consciously aware of them.

I always do at least one rewrite with the idea of including at least one description of each of the senses, on every single page: sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch.

Thank you, Galoot, for starting this thread.

[Lenora Rose]

There's a novel out there called Perfume in which most of the description is of the smells rather than the sights and sounds we usually use. It might be worth reading a bit, to see if it's A) comprehenisble to someone who can't smell, and B) if it is, then look to see what associations are made.

It's okay to be forced to use descriptions you borrow from other people, but I would suggest not only looking for typical, or good, descriptors. Look for BAD ones.

I've seen writers describe their characters' visual details with nothing but the the policeman's standard: hair colour, eye colour, skin colour, height, without looking for other and better descriptors.

Or, in sounds, they'll describe a speaking voice only as husky/shrill, and/or by Soprano-alto-tenor-bass. (rant) These latter are only applicable to singing range, not to speech - I've personally never met a woman whose speaking voice I would call soprano unless she's been so trained at singing she uses singing techniques in talking/shouting. In whch case the latter is a better detail than to call her a soprano anyhow.(/rant)

If a writer is doing these, chances are their descriptions of smells are as cliched. Look for these and note them down as things to avoid or use sparingly.

[johnnycannuk]

I guess your upbringing and environment affect your senses. Growing up in rural areas in both Northern and Southern Ontario, I can tell the difference between gasoline and diesel pretty easily. Actually, given that we often didn't label our various gas cans around the farm or at the hunting camp, that's exactly how we did tell the difference - so you didn't put diesel in your snowmobile.

My wife, the city girl and Newfie, can smell salt water about 50 km from the ocean but I can't smell the difference between the Atlantic and Lake Huron sitting on the beach. I can tell whether that nasty smell that forces you to roll up your car windows while driving throught the country in August comes from cows or pigs, and whether they grazed or were grain fed...but I digress.

I think you should get a wide variety of responses about smell from many people, even if you can smell. Smell is innexorably linked to memory, so some people may not notice differences or smells that are blatantly obvious to others. That could even be part of the make up of one of the characters - they notice smells that others do not, making the description utterly personal and revealing about their past and personality.

I think, given that, that smell descriptions can be powerful, but not nescesarily universal.

Mike

[Muriel]

Hi. New member here. Here's a smell trick. Put cinammon in a saucer, pinch your nose closed, then dip a wet finger in the cinammon and taste it. You shouldn't be able to taste it. Then let go of your nose, viola! Galoot, my question is, can you taste cinammon?

Everybody else; try it!

Muriel

[sgtsdaughter]

So I feel like was being an instentive boob when I made my last post . . . writing about smell doesn't always have to be about the smell itself. Decribe the emotions that are playing into the story, or write about what something looks like. Not that I think that I am "the best" . . .but play with the idea. smell doesn't have to be about the smell itself--maybe intertwining the sensation with another (i.e. sight or stomach lurches) might do the trick. For instance here's a brief, and I do mean brief, section from a novel I'm working on . . . The food in question, probally does have a horrendous odor, but let the reader come up with thier own conclusions. Maybe, Maybe not . . .


Often the kitchen would look like a tornado came through, and that the Governor should come in and declare it a disaster area. He thought about doing an impromptu remodel of the kitchen, but he feared that she would know the real reason—that he hated her French cuisine. Truth be told, he loved her cooking. But that French **** wasn’t her forte. She made a lot of dinners that looked like leftover baby goo mixed with diaper droppings, and it took all the love in his soul to choke them down. At those moments he was thinking back on their wedding vows and wishing that he had inserted a line saying that I will not have to eat **** food with a look of delight. And if **** food is produced I may run to the nearest McDonalds and gorge myself on their brand of grease and dog food. Dog food would’ve tasted divine on many of those French cookery nights. It was too late to rewrite the vows now, so he choked down the lumpy gravy and Goodyear tires with a smile. He never could bring himself to ask for seconds. That would have gone too far, but he did think about getting a dog. No, that would have been animal abuse to feed him those creations. PETA would have come in and sent him to jail, but then again jail food would be better than this crap. He’d get three square meals a day, well balanced . . . Besides, a puppy might turn mean on that food—or he would be smart enough not to eat it and the evidence would be left on the floor. But when she served up soup with what looked like green turds floating in milk cream he decided he had had enough.
excerpt from Pitfalls Between Nightfall and Daybreak, A. Babic 2005

[reph]

You're right -- a few autopsy studies have demonstrated the 'pit' in the nasal mucosa leading to the VNO. I agree with you that on some level it probably does work. Ask any woman you know -- does she feel sexier or more attractive around the time she's ovulating?
Don't those feelings come from her hormonal balance rather than from anything she smells?

I think, though, the VNO accounts for the recent finding that women are attracted to men whose genes would most likely combine with theirs to make healthy children.

[Galoot]

Galoot, my question is, can you taste cinammon?
Howdy, Muriel. Welcome to AW.

Yes, I can taste cinnamon. Whether I taste it as vividly as you do is an open question, mind you.

[reph]

Yes, I can taste cinnamon. Whether I taste it as vividly as you do is an open question, mind you.
Well, whether A can taste cinnamon as vividly as B does is always an open question, whether or not A has anosmia. It's also impossible to know whether the essential cinnamon-ness of cinnamon flavor, leaving out intensity, is the same for A and B.

When I was about nine, it occurred to me that individuals might see different things when they looked at the same color. They wouldn't know, because they would have learned the color word as the name for that, and people can't compare their inner thats. The same must go for tastes and smells.

In fact, there's a chemical that some people can taste and others can't. The difference is inherited.

[Georgiana]

I'm sorry about your inability to smell.

I started working on a novel today that I had put aside for four months. I read your thread right before I reread what I wrote and I was interested to see how much my sense of smell permeates my work. I am the other end of the spectrum from you. I have an acute sense of smell. I have freaked people out by saying things like "Those damn dogs have been in the cat food again" when I am still unlocking the door to my house and could smell the peculiar salty smell of Iams.

In my book one of my characters will not go out with a guy until she knows what he smells like. There is a funny scene where her best friend tries to smell the guy for her just in case he isn't up to par and to keep her from being embarassed.

I've also got scenes where she is comforted by certain smells, hot chocolate and other things that remind her of the good parts of her childhood.

I really had not noticed how much smelling is in this book until you opened my eyes.

But none of that is helpful to you.

Maybe you will just have to ask people if a plot point will work (like gasoline vs diesel) or if there is something they think you should include on a case by case basis. I realize that is a pain but you have to deal with the body you have and that one quirk happens to be part of the package. Does that sound goofy? If so I'm sorry.

[Galoot]

Does that sound goofy? If so I'm sorry.
Not goofy at all. But so you know in the future, goofy works for me. :D

Good luck on your novel!

[Velleity]

When I was about nine, it occurred to me that individuals might see different things when they looked at the same color. They wouldn't know, because they would have learned the color word as the name for that, and people can't compare their inner thats. The same must go for tastes and smells.
This absolutely happens, and not only in color-blindness. There are some people who, for example, perceive 'green' in a different spectrum than others. It's biochemical -- one of the photosensitive chemicals in the cones of the eye has a slightly different shape and thus gets triggered differently. These people were in high demand during World War II because they could see right through camouflage.

In fact, there's a chemical that some people can taste and others can't. The difference is inherited.
There are a few of these. One of them makes broccoli and cauliflower bitter to some and not others. Another, as I recall, makes artichokes taste sweet.

[HConn]

Or makes cilantro taste like soap.

Some people have very good reasons for saying "I don't like that food."

[James D. Macdonald]

Every time I see this topic, it makes me think of The Stinky Cheese Man (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/067084487X/ref=nosim/madhousemanor).

[Galoot]

Every time I see this topic, it makes me think of The Stinky Cheese Man (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/067084487X/ref=nosim/madhousemanor).
And you've just reminded me of The Face (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0553802488/102-6892555-9238559).

[JanaLanier]

Don't those feelings come from her hormonal balance rather than from anything she smells?

Yes, you make more pheromones when you're ovulating. If you look at it from an evolutionary point of view, why would you "feel" more sexy when you're ovulating -- because you're "in heat" -- and those feelings encourage mating behavior. But you're right, a better example would be, do men find you more sexy when you're ovulating?

I think, though, the VNO accounts for the recent finding that women are attracted to men whose genes would most likely combine with theirs to make healthy children.

I read this article too -- the pheromones that best stimulate your pheromone receptor are the ones most genetically unrelated to you.

It seems off topic from smell, but it really isn't -- both are primitive senses that have atrophied to some degree over the course of human evolution. Both smell and pheromone sense are wired through the primitive centers of the brain -- not to the cerebral cortex, the place of conscious thought, but to the amygdala and hypothalamus, the place of "instinct."

[Mistook]

Pat and I are hijacking the thread... sorry Galoot...

What a great story idea! I'm chewing on all the ramifications... they'd probably have a heightened sense of sound, making going to a bar or Chucky Cheese's or the Superbowl intolerable. Would the person have normal vision? Would he see the actual sound waves? (cool special effects. maybe it should be a screenplay! :) )


I imagine the character would see sound simply as another source of light, with the color having to do with the frequency of the sound. I imangined a scene where he's in the middle of the forest - no moon - everything should be pitch black, but the sound of the crickets illuminates the entire place in a flickering green light.

He'd see sparks coming from the grass and wherever, but at the same time, the collective, ambiant sound would reflect off every surface much like moonlight.

In an other example, if he were playing music in a dark room, flickering light would come out of the speakers and reflect off the walls.

A rock concert would be blinding.

A dog barking outside at night would not only annoy him with the sound, but with the unwanted flashes of light coming in through the blinds.

[JanaLanier]

I imagine the character would see sound simply as another source of light, with the color having to do with the frequency of the sound. I imangined a scene where he's in the middle of the forest - no moon - everything should be pitch black, but the sound of the crickets illuminates the entire place in a flickering green light.

He'd see sparks coming from the grass and wherever, but at the same time, the collective, ambiant sound would reflect off every surface much like moonlight.

In an other example, if he were playing music in a dark room, flickering light would come out of the speakers and reflect off the walls.

A rock concert would be blinding.

A dog barking outside at night would not only annoy him with the sound, but with the unwanted flashes of light coming in through the blinds.

Pat... this sounds fascinating, and very VISUAL... like I said, maybe you should write a screenplay! :)

[johnnycannuk]

Pat... this sounds fascinating, and very VISUAL... like I said, maybe you should write a screenplay! :)

Guys, you seem to be describing synesthesia (http://web.mit.edu/synesthesia/www/synesthesia.html). A very fascinating condition. Hope my little link helps.

Mike

[vrauls]

I have at least some anosmia. I didn't know the term before, but I have a terrible sense of smell (I once nearly caused a house fire because I couldn't smell smoldering cloth). I also have a form of olfactory synaesthesia (from researchers I understand this is a rather rare variant) where I can smell colors, things I see on TV, and memories (you know how smell is supposed to trigger memory? for me it works in reverse).


So basically, I can't smell stuff that's there, but I can smell things that aren't.

In any case, I completely understand your problem Galoot. How would you even know if something smelled at all? How would you know if two things smelled indistinguishable or completely different? Writers with an average sense of smell would instinctively know how much information to include. Those on the edges of the bell curve might go too far, or not far enough. I know better than to write "the hall was painted in a rich brown that smelled like hot cocoa" but it's not always that obvious.