Fiction Craft: Brevity

by Robert Ferrier

In the woods beyond the far bank a rectangle of Christmas lights framed a home at dusk. I walked, listening to the leaves rustle across Literary Lane. The surrounding oaks and elms stood in stark outline against the sky. Only the river smells remained timeless against December winds.

I looked down at Bear. The fat gray tom reminded me of the first draft of my novel. Overwriting breeds a strange malaise.

Then I felt another presence. A slender, white-haired man with bushy eyebrows materialized from the gloom. He wore dark pants, a jacket and a cap. A shaggy West Highland Terrier at his side tried to goad Bear into a chase.

"No chance, Susy," the man said. "That cat won't run."

The man's face looked familiar. I'd seen it on a book cover.

He looked at me. "Words are not the enemy."

"Excuse me?"

"You wrote, 'To a writer, words are the enemy.' That's wrong. Are bricks enemy to a bricklayer?"

"I was trying to make a point."

"You missed the point -- an excess of words ruins prose."

I thought about that as we walked around a curve. Who is this guy? I wondered.

"And the irony?" he continued. "You've forgotten how to achieve brevity in your work, even after recommending Strunk and White's book to readers."

Recognition dawned. I walked beside E. B. White, co-author with William Strunk of The Elements of Style!

What could I say to this man? Then my thoughts returned to the problem -- a sick manuscript.

He seemed to read my mind. "You haven't practiced what you preached."

"I suffer farsightedness with my work."

White smiled. Suzy returned to him for a love pat, and then the terrier dropped back a few paces behind Bear. Dominance had been established -- by both E. B. and the cat.

White said, "Let's talk brevity in writing. Pull out William Strunk's 'little book.' Everyone's got a copy, though they may have forgotten it." He glanced sideways at me.

I felt my face burning, even in the chill.

"Omit needless words," he began. "Cut adjectives and adverbs and words ending in 'ly.'" His voice softened. "I learned that from Will and Professor Sampson at Cornell in our meetings of the Manuscript Club, on winter Saturday nights...." His eyes looked as if he had retreated back to Ithaca for a moment.

He paused, as if checking a mental list. "Use active voice. Kill 'is,' 'was,' 'are,' 'will be.'" He blew his nose and waved the handkerchief at me. "Find an active verb! You'll shorten sentences by default."

I remembered having circled the "killer bees" in previous manuscripts. Over time I'd surrendered to laziness. "Mea culpa."

"Put statements in positive form." He waved his hands as if brushing through a jungle of negative assertions. "Kill tame, colorless, hesitating, noncommittal language."

"Murder the mundane."

He stopped and jammed a finger against my chest. "Don't patronize me! Or readers!"

He continued walking, and I hurried to catch up. Susy romped down to explore the riverbank. Bear stayed with us; he liked our visitor.

"I added a chapter to Will's book in revision," White continued. "A few reminders. Place yourself in the background. Never fog the lens with opinion."

"Or too much research."

He nodded. "Avoid fancy language. I liked that exercise you wrote using single syllable words:

A scribe is but a lens who guides light to the 'screen.'
The work is all. When you have
read the page, do you talk of the lens?"

He glared at me. "You forgot your own advice. You padded your novel with research, opinion, and extra words. Now you whine about bloat."

We passed through a stand of trees. Susy rejoined us. To the north, I saw the glow of street lamps.

I felt admonished and educated. "Why do people keep visiting me?"

White seemed to think about his answer. "Hemingway said, 'That guy has a global readership. He'd better get it right.'"

Then he and Susy disappeared faster than a comma splice at the Manuscript Club.

Suggested Reading

Strunk, William, and E. B. White. The Elements of Style. Third edition. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co. Inc., 1979.

Copyright 2002 Robert Ferrier.