Alex Kostin

I wondered if a novel (SF in my case), needs to be very detailed, full of complicated words, poetical tricks etc. I'm trying to write in a simple language, that can be understood by anyone who reads. If it does need details, is there a strategy?

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Aliens exist. Look in the mirror!(I saw two of 'em today).They looked just like me.

kip

Write the kind of story you'd like to read. Unless your tastes are one-in-six-point-five-billion, you're bound to find people who understand it.

tehuti88

If it's not the style you naturally write in, and you feel the need to force in lots of complicated language and such, then it will show. It will stick out so much that readers will wonder what you were trying to prove, using such words.

Just write the story in the language that comes naturally to you--don't feel a need to "dumb it down" or "smarten it up." Either way, what you forced onto the writing will show, and not in a good way. If you write in a style that comes naturally to you, then it will read more naturally. And hopefully the audience that understands will find it.

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"No canoes...no maple sugar...this place is horribly uncivilized."--Manabozho

Writer of long online fantasy/mythology serials. Always looking for interested readers.

lisajane

Just write in your own style. Whether it's simple writing or complicated writing, there's going to be an audience for it.

If you try to use complicated words you don't know, you'll come off looking like an arrogant idiot.

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'Beauty stands and waits with gravity to start her death-defying leap. And he, a little charleychaplin man, who may or may not catch her fair eternal form spreadeagled in the empty air of existence.' - Laurence Felinghetti, 'The Acrobat'

lin

Eschew obfuscation

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Wintermute

As a reader, it's quite clear to me when a writer is trying too hard to appear "Writerly" or if he is truly writing from the heart. The worst thing you could do to your piece is go through it with a Thesaurus. Besides, some great authors use pretty standard vocabulary, like Hemmingway or Steinbeck. Then you have the Lovecrafts and the Gibsons on the other end (Yes, I placed William Gibson among the great literary minds because I believe he deserves to be there).

Just write in your own style for now, and continue to read. You'll find your vocabulary improving without your knowing it.

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"How poor are they that have not patience!
What wound did ever heal but by degrees?
Thou know'st we work by wit, and not by witchcraft;
And wit depends on dilatory time." - Iago

mi is happy

Most people now days won't read a book filled with, to them, confusing words, loads of symbolism, and the such. They want something easy to read that still has an interesting story line. That's just at lest what experience has taught me. Though, I am young so someone older probably has more creditable input than me.

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WARNING: VERRRRY HAPPY PERSON!

Loulou

Symbolism and metaphors don't have to be complicated or wordy. They can be beautifully simple. Writing doesn't have to be dense to be deep. There's nothing more fickle than twelve words describing something that can be wonderfully said in three.

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You attempt to pull four story lines together in two-thousand words and nearly pull it off - Eggo
We rarely buy unsolicited manuscripts, but my editor and I thought that this was a superior piece of fiction - Sunday Express magazine

Alex Kostin

Thank you all. I started using the thesaurus often. I almost made a big mistak

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Aliens exist. Look in the mirror!(I saw two of 'em today).They looked just like me.

Charlie_Eleanor

If you are trying to be simple the reader will know.

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The Backward OX

I’m confused. My natural style is to use words outside the “normal” range, outside the vocabulary of the masses, and I have been criticised for it by a reader, who says if he wants education he’ll read a text book and that fiction is meant to entertain not educate.

Should I heed this reader’s criticism or take note of what you say – that there’s an audience for everything?

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Originally Posted by Wildcard
I view with distaste the excretions polluting this site, suffering when I read another by-product of the boredom of one with access to a computer and the internet. As I read I feel I am being defecated on, and cling to an idea that one day I may find solace in the words of one who takes pride in their work.

edropus

I'm curious as to what the motivation behind this is. Normally, if I were to read something that indicated that the above was the author's intention, I would assume the author was just trying to 'sound smart', a kind of self-congratulatory exercise in proving how much smarter they are then the reader, or what they expect the reader to be. If that's not the case, I'm curious as to what else it could be.

The only other thing I can think of is 'writing for people who are as smart as I think I am'. I've never seen vocabulary as an impressive sign of intelligence. Any word that you can write on a piece of paper you can teach a parrot to say. Not so impressive in my book.

(time you're willing to spend memorizing words) x (the memory capacity to remember words) = Vocabulary

The Backward OX

Yes, you may be correct in your definition of vocabulary. I erred in not stating that I know the meaning of words I use, which is somewhat different to simply parroting a word.

In the sentence “The doorway decanted the room’s residents directly onto the street”, I was criticised for the use of “decanted”.

In the sentence “A week yesterday, at shortly after noon, I had repaired to Calpurnia’s Caff with the avowed twin purposes of sating my appetite and diluting some bile”, I was criticised for the use of “repaired”, “avowed” and “sating”.

In both cases I was told people don’t use words like these.

Strange, I just did.

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Originally Posted by Wildcard
I view with distaste the excretions polluting this site, suffering when I read another by-product of the boredom of one with access to a computer and the internet. As I read I feel I am being defecated on, and cling to an idea that one day I may find solace in the words of one who takes pride in their work.

lisajane

Most people don't, unless their story is set in the early 1900s or the author is just trying to make themselves feel like they're better than everyone else - and failing.

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'Beauty stands and waits with gravity to start her death-defying leap. And he, a little charleychaplin man, who may or may not catch her fair eternal form spreadeagled in the empty air of existence.' - Laurence Felinghetti, 'The Acrobat'

lin

Oh, come now... "better than". Shit girl, it's called style.

I'd say the "decanted" is reaching, but the other are words people I know use. And they certainly fit the style of the Boswellian thingie you're doing there.

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