✍️ How to Avoid the Trap of Insidious, Pedantic, Boring Over-description

or, Sometimes a Sunset is Just a Sunset

Ah, Terry Fallis. Such a wealth of information!

I fear that, like with Fitzgerald, some might feel like I drop his name too many times in these pages. But what can I say – the guy inspires me!

Most recently, a post of his hit the nail on the head of an issue I identified in myself years ago: over-describing. I used to think that my job was to paint this perfect picture the reader could walk into and inhabit. So, I didn’t have “curtains” or even “white sheers”; I had three-panel drapes woven from the finest silks and dyed an impossible sapphire blue that made the Pharaohs of Egypt blush with the ostentatiousness of it all. My scenes didn’t take place in a “bar”; they took place in a dimly lit basement dive with a horseshoe bartop in the middle with exactly 32 stools – except when Moe was shooting pool on Saturday afternoons and pulled one up to his favourite billiard table ‘cuz he didn’t want to stand the whole time with his bad back and all, so that left 31 stools at the bar. My characters didn’t…

You get the picture.

When this idiosyncrasy was first pointed out to me, I could understand the reasoning. But I couldn’t connect to it. I couldn’t understand how to fix it. How much description is too much?

On the other hand, I found that I was not describing other things well enough. Like, when I said something like, “Well, love with tear us apart, I guess.” I assumed that everyone would immediately latch onto the reference to the famous punk/post-punk UK band Joy Division from 50 years ago. (What? How could readers not get that?!? It’s their most famous song!)

This type of under-describing is another problem for another day, but the point as far as this post goes is that I found that description calibration to be confusing and frustrating.

Here’s how Terry sums up the issue:

“As readers, we don’t need, or often want, too much description. Based on the details the writer provides, our imagination—consciously or unconsciously—promptly conjures a restaurant scene in our mind’s eye. We can see it. Now, that restaurant mental image is going to look different across different readers, because we’ve all used our own imaginations, sometimes based on scant input from the writer, to paint this picture in our mind. We’re not all going to create the equivalent mental image.”

The answer I glean is to give as much description as possible in as few words as possible so that readers form their own images themselves. The corollary (or caveat) is that there has to be enough information so that they get an image that will suit the story you’re trying to tell without getting confused, but not so much info that they skim.

In short: Do mention Joy Division explicitly. Don’t spend a paragraph talking about lead singer Ian Curtis’ T-shirt.

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How to Not Over-describe – Four Ways I’m Working On It

I’m still a work in progress. But here are a few ways I’m changing my descriptions so that they convey just enough information to paint a good enough picture.

• Don’t spend more than a few words describing something (unless its intricacies are crucial to the story). Take the description of a ballroom. If I mention “elegant” and “chandelier”, the reader will fill in the rest. If the raised dais on the far left is crucial to the story in some way, mention that. If it’s not, don’t.

• If I need to describe something, avoid info-dumping. Maybe the object reminds my character of a previous time, so I’m unfolding the backstory as the character explores the object. Or, I could describe it in little bits over time. Talk about the dull brass beer taps here, talk about the nicotine-stained window above Moe’s head there. Find creative ways of conveying information so that my descriptions don’t overwhelm readers.

• Use similes and metaphors for big impact in fewer words. Here’s an example from Martin Amis in his novel, Money: “His hair was that special mad yellow, like an omelette, a rug omelette.” Thirteen words that don’t just describe his hair, but also suggest a wacky personality, big eyes, and frenetic energy. (At least, it does for me.)

• Over-describe, then fix it in editing. I like over-describing. There, I said it! There aren’t any wasted words, so maybe I keep that indulgence and just cut it all out later. Besides, if I over-describe now, I’ll have more great words to choose from later.

• Use clichés. I’m breaking the rules here, but clichés can be fast shorthand. My rule of thumb: avoid clichés when you want to have impact, but use them to pass along info quickly (like, “rule of thumb”).

Final thought: another thing I’ve learned along the way is that readers want to create their own images. Describing everything to the hemline takes too many words, and frankly is boring to the reader. Let them participate in your work. Allow them to paint their own pictures.

Over to You: How Would You Describe Your Description Tendencies?

Any other tips for beating the over-description blues? Let us know in the comments below!

Until next time, keep writing with wild abandon!

~Graham

email me if you get lost.