Learn Writing with Uncle Jim, Volume 1

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Allynegirl

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I thought that was telling ... how about this example:

He exaggerated a yawn and felt, more than saw, her rush him again.
 

smiley10000

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Hello Uncle Jim!

I am working on reading through the whole long thread... I am up to Februrary of this year... I may eventually catch up.

I wanted to thank you for this amazing thread. It's very helpful in keeping me on track and my goals in sight.

I thought you and your readers might find this site interesting. It's along the lines of the Evil Plot Generator but is more mainstream. I just stumbled across it today and wanted to share.

I will return with questions when I'm all caught up (don't want to add more redundancy than necessary)
:Hail:10000
 

Allynegirl

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Uncle Jim, wait ... come back ... I need youuuuuuuu! :cry: :e2drown:
 

SeanDSchaffer

James D. Macdonald said:


How did I know you were going to give me an answer like that?

Still, it is very informative; I believe I have some thinking to do.


I look forward to seeing you back at the forums later on, Uncle Jim. Have a good week.
 

janetbellinger

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I would take out the "felt rather than saw" and say something like this:

He forced out a yawn, feigning indifference but could not anticipate her rush into him, which knocked him to the ground. His teeth clanked together as he hit the asphault.

Allynegirl said:
I thought that was telling ... how about this example:

He exaggerated a yawn and felt, more than saw, her rush him again.
 

Cassiopeia

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janetbellinger said:
I would take out the "felt rather than saw" and say something like this:

He forced out a yawn, feigning indifference but could not anticipate her rush into him, which knocked him to the ground. His teeth clanked together as he hit the asphault.
Actually, I thought the original words were just fine. I think your suggestion is too wordy.
 

SeanDSchaffer

retterson said:
Can I say you're both wrong (retterson said, laughing out loud instead of only in my head!)?

....Snipped for Length....

Dare I add that this is my humble understanding of English grammar?

(Caveat -- please forgive me if someone else already weighed in on this one -- I'm working my way through the thread.)


First, retterson, welcome to the Water Cooler. I hope you enjoy the site.

Second, I think what Uncle Jim is trying to point out, is that writing is not an exact science. You can write 'wrong' and still be correct, because what matters is not so much your grammatical skill as your writer's ear (I believe that's what he calls it). In other words, if you write something in the correct manner, but it still sounds wrong to you when you read it, then it's wrong, no matter how much correctness there is to your writing.

Many writers I know -- myself included -- gained our knowledge of English Grammar through Grammar School, in the first few grade levels. But writing good novels is not something that you can just follow a formula to. It requires that you have a good ear for what sounds right, not just for what is grammatically correct.

This is not to say that learning grammar is a bad thing, or that it is unnecessary; what it is to say is that learning grammar is only part of the equation. If you know the rules well, then you can gain a better understanding, through that knowledge, of what works for you, and what does not.

A good way of thinking about this might be to compare painting a house with painting a picture. In painting a house there is a science that has to be followed, a rule of where exactly a particular color goes, etc. OTOH, painting a picture, though it does require a good knowledge of the handling of paints, does not have the rigidity where the rules are concerned. This is because you are painting your own creation onto the canvas.

What I'm trying to say is, because writing a novel is bringing your thoughts onto paper, the rules, though they ought never to be completely discarded, are not as necessary to the quality of the work as they would be if you were writing, say, a textbook.


Again, retterson, it's good to meet you, and I hope you enjoy the forums. I hope you have a good weekend.
 

Cassiopeia

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The imagery I derive from the simple sentence, "He exaggerated a yawn and felt, more than saw, her rush him again." is of a man pretending to be asleep but then purposely exaggerating a yawn to get her attention and then felt her rushing at him again. As in she pounces the minute he lets her know he is awake.
 

retterson

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Ken,

Thank you for the helpful link. I'll be sure to check it out.

Yet, I think that banishing a discussion on grammar is rather like saying that the discussion of engines is not welcomed on this car site because it is really just about paint jobs and dealerships.

Besides, Uncle Jim started that one!
 
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Bufty

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Retterson,

If you take time to work through this thread - I see you're up to post 200 out of some 5447 - you'll see what KS means. It's not a question of banishment - it's a question of trying to maintain a degree of focus in the Thread. Grammar for Grasshoppers concentrates on grammar issues even though they do crop up here from time to time.
 
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retterson

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Focus Puller

I was up to 200 when I posted that post.... but time advances and so does my scroll bar..... but it's hard because the thread's.... eh, well, it's really unfocussed.

"And," rett asked with mild, but with truly well-intentioned and good-natured, amusement, "how's that whole focus thing going, anyway?"

lol!! (Please, please, laugh with me here, Bufty) :)

Heck, it's like trying to keep a bunch of ADHD-afflicted cats in a lidless box. MEOW!
 
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NicoleJLeBoeuf

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To expand on what Bufty said: Since AbsoluteWrite is so chockfull of such a vast catalog of writing fora with topics on every possible esoteric aspect of writing you can think of...

an individual thread can afford to be very granular in its focus.

That said, it's great to see you here! (You should add a post to the "AWers going to VP!" thread, just to bump it!)
 

Allynegirl

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Thank you all for addressing my "show-don't tell" issue. It is a bit more clear now.

Retterson has the right of the meaning behind the sentence - good job!

Here is a larger excerpt with changes I made.

Karen did not disappoint him. The dirk was pulled from the belt and, with an awkward thrust, she lunged at him. He sidestepped her approach and tripped her with his staff. She ended up flat on her face.

“Is that the best you can do?”

Her green eyes flashed in anger and she pushed her curly brown hair out of her face. She got back up and circled him. “Send me back – now.”

He exaggerated a deliberate yawn. Infuriated, she rushed him again. Aaron disarmed her and planted the bottom of his staff just under her sternum. She lay in the grass, curled in a fetal position, sucking air and trying not to puke. At last, she raised herself back to her feet.

“I would suggest that, with your ineptitude at combat, you use your weapon as a last resort.”

:)
 

LloydBrown

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::raising hand::

I have a couple of minor issues with this. I haven't been reading along, by the way--I just clicked "new posts".

Allynegirl said:
The dirk was pulled from the belt

Way too passive for a combat sequence. You know how to improve that.



I don't see how
Aaron disarmed her and planted the bottom of his staff just under her sternum.
leads to
She lay in the grass, curled in a fetal position,

If there's a step in there, like "knocked her to the ground again", I recommend that you mention it.
 

Sesselja

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My next suggestion is also going to be work: Take your favorite novel.

Now, retype the first chapter. Do this with your writer's eye, not your reader's eye. Think about the lengths of the sentences, the lengths of the paragraphs, the sounds of the words. Think about the order of the scenes. Notice the dialog. How are the dialog tags rendered? Where is the point of view?

Yes, I know this is several years old, but as a newbie to the forum, I'm working my way through the undiluted Uncle Jim thread, and yesterday I came across this advice.

So I picked up one of my favourite books, The Secret History by Donna Tartt, and started typing the prologue. Then I decided it would be better to do this with a Norwegian book (as I my ficition write in Norwegian), so I picked Flommen by Jonny Hallberg. Then something dawned on me: they were both written from first person POV. Coincident, I wondered, and walked over to my bookshelf and had a look at some other of my favourite books: Money by Martin Amis, I Capture the Castle by Dodier Smith, The Wind-up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami, The Shadow of the Wind by [SIZE=-1]Carlos Ruiz Zafón, The Secret Life of Bees by [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]Sue Monk Kidd[/SIZE][SIZE=-1]. [/SIZE]All are written in the first person POV (or at least the first chapters are).

Now, I don't know what to do with this information, if it will have any influence on how I write or just how I pick books to read, but had I not followed uncle Jim's advice, I would never have known this at all. For that alone: Thanks! :)
 

klostes

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Just wanted to pop in here and say "Hi!" and do a bit of fangirl squeeing. This past winter, on the advice of Sherwood Smith, I picked up your "By Honor Betray'd" and the next two books in the series from the library. My 13 year old, a reluctant reader with some serious vision issues, saw the books and asked if he could read them, too. OF course! It was the first time he'd been interested in anything beyond Edward EAger and Garth Nix, and the first time he'd really applied himself to reading a "full-length adult" novel. He devoured the entire series and then branched out into new authors. Last week he asked me to get him your series again from the library, and he's on his second read through. Your series is what really hooked him into reading for fun, and I'm very, very grateful for that!

I enjoyed the books very much myself, but as a mom, my true joy was my son telling me, "Mom, I'm reading. Can't the dishes wait?" Yeah, they can. This time. :)
 

NicoleJLeBoeuf

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'Course I can't speak for Uncle Jim hisself, but my guess is... As this particular thread has been going on for so very long, it's probably not going to change its modus operandi at this late date.

HOWEVER! there's a thread in this forum called "Uncle Jim Undiluted" which I think does exactly what you're looking for--pulls all of JDM's posts out for quick perusal without all the surrounding chatter.

Here it is!

Between that and the Index to the Writing with Uncle Jim Thread, a newcomer has lots of options for catching up (and an old-timer has lots of options for reference).

If you like 'em, give the compilers/indexers a rep point. They put in a lot of work on those threads out of the goodness of their hearts (or the Type-A-ness of their personalities, which I can totally understand).
 

janetbellinger

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retterson said:
Let me preface my long post here with: I'm not a arbiter or style maven; I just find that when people tell me how they read a thing (or the many different ways they could have read it), it helps joggle my mind and focus my writing. Hope the following helps.

Here's what I think is problematic about your above quote.

I don't understand what you mean by exaggerating a yawn. Did he feign a yawn (as in to indicate boredom) or was his yawn to cover up something? Or, as Casi mentioned below, because he wants to signal that he's awake? Do you need to explain (i.e., show) to us what it going on that would cause his yawn to be exaggerated? (I can't tell because I don't know what comes before or after this.)

In my very humble and admittedly inexperienced opinion, I think this is one instance when an adverb is in order, in other words instead of exaggerating a yawn, he could yawn hugely or widely or something.
 

janetbellinger

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I am sorry. I am tired from running in the rain so please forgive me but "the dirk was pulled from the belt," sounds too much to me like a similar word for dirk and it kind of makes me smile, likewise other readers would too.
 
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