Learn Writing with Uncle Jim, Volume 1

[euclid]

Pardon?

 

[Jake Barnes]

A lot of people on these boards consider any sentence with "was" or "were" in it to be passive. This is not technically correct, but it is correct that there is often a better way to write the sentence.

 

[Dawnstorm]

Pardon?

What Jake Barnes said, and then some stuff that's not really important.

Never mind me. I complicate stuff, even if I'm trying to keep it simple.

Just remember if the text works and breaks a rule, it's the rule that needs be changed, not the text. People tend to forget that in crit mode.

 

[FOTSGreg]

Copular, in terms of copulation, can almost never be passive it occurs to me.

In any way that you speak of it, you are an active participant, one way or another.

I was screwing...

I was being screwed...

He screwed...

She was screwed... (oky, maybe this one depending on the circumstances)

etc.

(one of my more lucid moments)

 

[HConn]

A lot of people on AW read my (best) stuff and say: "It's too passive, rewrite those passive constructs and it should be fine." But I can never find the offending constructs!

Euclid, a quick question: On a sentence and paragraph level, does your story focus more on the doer of the action or the one done to?

 

[Chris Grey]

A lot of people on AW read my (best) stuff and say: "It's too passive, rewrite those passive constructs and it should be fine." But I can never find the offending constructs!

I think what AWers are trying to tell you is that your story needs more evil golems.

 

[blacbird]

I complicate stuff, even if I'm trying to keep it simple.

Or, rephrased passively: Stuff is complicated by me, even if keeping it simple is being tried by me.

caw

 

[Dawnstorm]

Or, rephrased passively: Stuff is complicated by me, even if keeping it simple is being tried by me.

The first clause is allowed to stay, but in the second "it" should be made subject:

"Stuff is complicated, even if it is attempted to be kept simple."

There. Better, no? (The by-phrase was removed as well. That sort of info isn't needed, anyway.)

 

[smsarber]

Oh, my poor brain!

 

[euclid]

Answer

Euclid, a quick question: On a sentence and paragraph level, does your story focus more on the doer of the action or the one done to?

No way I could even attempt to answer that question. My book (if that what we're taking about) is 106,000 words long...It's written in the first person, so I suppose "I" is the doer of the action throughout. If anything, the words "I, me, my" probably appear too may times!

Did a count. Out of 106,000 words (260 pages single-spaced), the word "I " appears 4,106 times. That's an average of nearly 16 times per page!

 

[euclid]

Not the same

The first clause is allowed to stay, but in the second "it" should be made subject:

"Stuff is complicated, even if it is attempted to be kept simple."

There. Better, no? (The by-phrase was removed as well. That sort of info isn't needed, anyway.)

That's not the same thing. What you have here is a general statement about things being complicated. The original version was all about Blacbird's difficulties explaining things.

 

[euclid]

Dale:

Why did you break that nice titanium encrusted chafing dish?
You ought to be ashamed of yourself! I hope you replaced it - you naughty boy.
What is a chafing dish anyway, and why does it need to be titanium encrusted?
Why do you always introduce new imponderables into my life?

 

[James D. Macdonald]

A chafing dish is one of those serving dishes with the little alcohol-lamp under it to keep the contents warm.


In today's cool news: Remember "Philologos; or, A Murder in Bistrita"?

It's been picked up for Year's Best Fantasy (edited by David Hartwell).

I'll let you know when the anthology comes out.

 

[James D. Macdonald]

I think what AWers are trying to tell you is that your story needs more evil golems.

You must always strike the right balance between dinosaurs and sodomy.

 

[RJK]

Let me put your mind at ease, or perhaps, add to the confusion. Passive does not equal bad. In many cases, the sentence needs to be phrased passively. In today's politically correct climate, it is better NOT to point the finger at an individual, so passively phrasing your sentence (instead of Sam broke the copier, you write the copier was broken.)
In police/mysteries/etc., the perpetrator is unknown, so many of the sentences are written passively (We use Sam was killed. Rather than: The copy machine repairman killed Sam.) We don't know it was the repairman yet.

 

[euclid]

Why would the copier repairman kill Sam? Sam never hurt a fly, didn't have an enemy in the world. Did the repairman even fix the copier?

 

[James D. Macdonald]

"That was the first thing we noticed," Dalmatia said. "The copy-machine was broken."

"Broken? How?"

"The cover-glass was cracked. And when we opened the front cover, we found a photocopy of someone's bum jammed in the fuser."

"That would have been before you found Fred's body."

"Yes. He was hidden behind the coffee cart. We didn't find him until mid-morning. Everyone thought at first it was odd that he hadn't come in. Then ... the look on his face. Horrible."

"I understand," Lieutentant VanDelven said, writing in his notebook. "Do you have any idea whose butt it is?"

"No. Not really. We thought at first that it might be Fred's -- he was always such a joker. And the phone directory on his desk was open to 'Xerox Repair.' But then ... Sandy noticed that the butt was ... female."

"I see," VanDelven said. He looked around the office. No less than fifteen females were within easy view. His next question would need to be asked very tactfully....

 

[euclid]

That's Fred and Sam. This copier repairman is a serial killer!

 

[smsarber]

I'd have to disgree: A serial killer is a person who murders usually three or more people[1] over a period of more than 30 days with a "cooling off" period between each murder, whose motivation for killing is largely based on psychological gratification.

(Excerpt from Wikipedia, not the most accurate source for facts, but I have always heard the same thing, so the copier repairman needs to knock of Steve, and maybe Suzie, also. You know, for that all important "serial" status!)

 

[euclid]

Watch this space, Steve!

 

[smsarber]

You're right; I do have a copier- better use judgement if I ever need to call a repairman!! I forgot to add that he better go after Suzie after a few months have passed, otherwise he'll only be able to plead temporary psychosis.

 

[James D. Macdonald]

"Sam" is short for "Samantha," and it is her (cute and bouncy) butt that was Xeroxed.

(Note the passive construction.)


Fred's secret was that he was a transvestite: his given name was Winnifred. That won't be the only surprise the autopsy reveals....

One of Lieutenant VanDelven's most baffling cases has only begun!

 

[semilargeintestine]

If Winnifred was a woman and identified as a man, subsequently getting an operation or at least passing as a man, he is transsexual. The term transvestite refers to individuals who wear the clothing of the opposite sex, but most often not for gender identity reasons. Statistically, most transvestites are straight men.

Hooray for killing the fun with details.

 

[smsarber]

I guess I'm in the clear then, I am not transsexual, I do not dress in women's clothing- except at my wife's request, of course, nor do I plan to start in the near future. So this serial killer won't have any interest in me. But now is were Uncle Jim points out some overlooked reason the serial killer is a woman, not a man, as inferred by me earlier, so SHE will be after me, after all.

 

[James D. Macdonald]

Statistically, perhaps.

Fred was by no means a transexual -- she dressed in traditional male clothing and identified herself as a male at work, but was still biologically and physically a female, and kept his daytime life secret from her husband, Jerome. (Jerome called her "Winnie," and as Winnie she enjoyed wearing taffeta frocks.) Having trained as a youth as a quick-change artist, Fred/Winnie was able to keep up her double life for years.)

Incidentally, Fred wasn't murdered. He died of natural causes, if you can call an unfortunate drug interaction between NyQuil and caffeine "natural." Lieutenant VanDelven's investigation is about to take a very strange turn indeed.

From its seemingly mundane beginning in a Filene's Basement Spring White Sale to the startling conclusion on the peak of Denali during a blinding snowstorm, the latest novel in the best-selling VanDelven Investigates (R) mystery series will keep fans of the genre guessing!