| The author/publisher, Dane F. Baylis |
LIPS AS RED AS A ROSE, NIGHT FELL LIKE A CURTAIN, WHORE WITH A GOLDEN HEART.
IF THIS IS THE ONLY WAY YOU CAN THINK TO SAY IT - DON'T!
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I'm talking about cliches. We hear them all day long. They spew from televisions, radios, recorded music, and our own mouths. They should never make the full journey from your mind, through your fingers, to the printed page. They should be taken out with all the vicious intent of bad guys caught in an ambush.
Now then, let's ask that ever recurring question. WHY?
Because the minute you use a cliche, whether in fiction, poetry, or expository writing, you signal to the reader that you are, at the least, lazy or, at the worst, incapable of formulating an original idea. Cliches are another one of those devices that are instantly apparent. They are, by definition, repetitious or hackneyed. Take note of the first part of the second descriptor, "hack". If you are prone to using the over-used, trite, and unimaginative, you are a hack writer.
Why do I bring this up? Perhaps because, in the course of listening to a young poet read what could have been a stirring emotional elegy, I was stopped repeatedly by phrases that were just so obvious. If you are in the process of writing something and you have the tiniest hint that what you have put to paper might be the product of someone else's cleverness, rethink how you are saying whatever it is you want to communicate. If there's just no other way, well the risk is yours.
Cliches undermine the representations of characters, plot, and theme. They leave the reader with that, "I've heard this before" feeling, which results in them turning to some other writer's work where they won't feel they're being treated quite like idiots. It leaves the editors and publishers who end up trying to fix these errors in the exact same situation. After all, why would they want to put their imprint to something that an author felt so little about, expecting instead that someone else would lend it polish?
Sure, it's possible for a cliche here or there to get by a writer. I have it happen in my own work, and I get called out for it. Occasionally things get past our eyes and brains, either because we just don't recognize them, or because we are so engrossed in other aspects of the project that we fail to notice the slip. It is my job as a writer to correct these faults. An editor and publisher can only point them out, if they have time, when they send the work back for revision (Unless they do the usual and reject it outright). They will only point out how you might do a better job - you get to do the work.
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Meanwhile...live, love, write.
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