Sanderson/Writing comments

In the first chapter to Sanderson's Rithmatist, he uses "began" twelve times. Here's an excerpt online; just do a browser search and count the highlighted instances (if using IE, but I don't know/remember whether other browsers highlight.) The Rithmatist(Excerpt) | Tor.com

There is one "began" then a long stretch and we very quickly have multiple instances used close together. Interestingly, the other chapters in that excerpt don't use the word as heavily.

 

I see what you mean about began, in most instances it is redundant, don't think I've ever noticed it before but probably will now.

In a way I like to stay naive to these things as a reader so they don't jump off the page at me, but as a writer the little details are important.

 

Here's my count for the prologue-Chapter 4 of The Rithmatist:

Prologue

• began to draw a circle around herself

Chapter 1

• began to shift from the Matson Defense to [within dialogue]
• began to whisper
• began to draw
• began by drawing
• began to fly across the ground
• began to move across the ground
• began to wriggle about
• began sending across Lines of Vigor
• began to claw furiously
• began to draw
• began to gather up his books and notes
• began dispelling his creations

Chapter 3

• began to write on his paper

Chapter 4

• began to whir
• began to wolf down his food

I think Way of Kings must have been your door-cracking encounter:

The door handle shook, and then the wood began to crack as the guards threw their weight against it, one man calling for an axe.

Szeth crossed the room in rapid strides, weaving around the shrouded furniture that had been stored here. It was of red cloth and deep expensive woods. He reached the far wall and—preparing himself for yet another blasphemy—he raised his Shardblade and slashed horizontally through the dark grey stone. The rock sliced easily; a Shardblade could cut any inanimate object. Two vertical slashes followed, then one across the bottom, cutting a large square block. He pressed his hand against it, willing Stormlight into the stone.

Behind him the room’s door began to crack. He looked over his shoulder and focused on the shaking door, Lashing the block in that direction.​

This one seems more of an editing issue. The wood had already begun to crack. It can't begin again, can it?

For myself: I'm not sure that I would notice so many instances of "began" if I'm into the story—although now that you've pointed it out, I might! I do think it's very worth noting, especially in a discussion about improving craft. I've only ever read the first three Mistborn books. I have the fourth from that world in hardback, bought it on its release date, but have never read it. I have Way of Kings on my Kindle—also unread so far. I have the Writing Excuses collection of stories but haven't read it yet. I'm a huge Sanderson fan mostly because I think Writing Excuses is great, and I did love the Mistborn books when I read them although the strangest thing is that I don't remember much about them. (Mostly, the magic system.)

Edit: BTW, I vaguely remember in one Writing Excuses podcast, Sanderson admitted that his prose is fairly weak, or the area he has to give special attention to when polishing his books during revision. It may not come easily to him, unlike devising a great magic system, world building, and general story ideas. I've noticed that those podcasts also tend to focus on larger aspects of story building, with much less attention paid to the nitty gritty of writing great prose. I've often wished they spent more time on prose, but I assume that they assume most listeners should bring basic writing knowledge/skill to the table.

 

I think these observations are related to the topic here, even if not about Sanderson.

So I’m reading The Lies of Locke Lamora. I’m about a third of the way through and I like the book. It probably won’t be an all-time fav, but I’m enjoying it quite a bit.

I came to a part where a number of characters were being described for the first time—there were about five or six, I think. I noticed a couple of ‘was’ sentences, then I noticed a few more. So I took a moment to stop reading as a reader and just looked at the verbs. I found more, and more, and more. I went back to the beginning of the page and found that every sentence on the entire page used either ‘was’ or ‘were’ or ‘had’. No exceptions.

I had to go back several sentences on the previous page to find an active verb, and several sentences into the following page before I found one. It was an out-and-out passive-fest. (This was page 229 of the paperback edition if anyone wants to find this themselves.)

And then there was the day I found fourteen ‘ly’ adverbs on a single page of ‘The Grapes of Wrath’. If I had a nickel for every time I heard Steinbeck’s prose described as tough, unadorned, lean, sparing with modifiers… It’s just not true.

I seem to keep finding discrepancies between how good books are supposed to be written, and how they are actually written. Really makes me wonder.

I conclude that all the purging of passive verbs, adverbs, and other words deemed weak, like ‘began’ won’t make your story great if it isn’t great to begin with. On the other hand, I certainly believe it a good idea to keep an eye on these things so they don’t get out of hand. Personally, I think the best writing is writing that constantly mixes these things up. Prose should be dynamic, and be allowed to breathe.

 

I agree with judicious use... of pretty much anything and everything. And I also agree that extra-special care should be taken during openings.

But I also happen to be a weirdo who thinks writing was generally better fifty to a hundred years ago than it is today. No modern writer of fantasy can hold a candle to Steinbeck. Period. The thing I found interesting was not that he used that many adverbs, but that he is almost famous for NOT using them. Which turns out to be bogus, at least some of the time. Is it because people only look at the prose of the first ten pages and assume the rest of the book will follow suit? How did he get this reputation?

This particular rabbit hole seems to run deeper than it looks.

 

I'd fully agree that one of the best things an author can do is learn his safety blanket roads and go back searching for them in their manuscript.

I'd also agree with anyone who didn't want to read that way. I mean, if I notice them I'm not happy, but my default reading status is enjoyment and that means trying to enjoy things.

Most of all I'd agree with Caged Maiden - it matters far more whether the words mean anything, then whether they're pretty and elegant. The latter often leads to the former, but the former should be the goal. Or at least for entertaining me.

 

To each their own but being a grammar Natzi doesn't seem like a productive way to hone writing skills. Once upon a time, I used to worry about minutiae when writing and it slowed down my process. After suffering and struggling like this for a while, I decided one day that I didn't care anymore and never looked back.

When I read books, it's for enjoyment. I don't care how many adverbs the author uses, or how they start their story so long as it's engaging. All that matters to me is that I write stories to the best of my ability. If a word is in the English language then I'm using it. Sure, there is such a thing as lazy or poor writing and I know what that means for my own work. But with another author's book their storytelling ability is all I care about.

Sorry but being a stickler about grammar seems counterproductive to me. It takes the fun out of writing.

 

I'm glad we can dismiss the figurative genocide early in this discussion. Any attempts to round up users of various words and keep those defilers of Perfect Writing segregated in a place from where, mercifully, their writings will never escape to be published can henceforth be considered verboten.

I think that Demesnedenoir's primary point is that an ability to recognize potential weakness in prose, or to see those things that can accumulate in an infelicitous manner within our writing, may be quite useful for anyone concerned about her own writing. A discussion like this can be useful; and, why not? I don't think anyone here has the power to take these dangerous ideas and institutionalize them, doling out punishment to some writers while unfairly advancing others. What's left over is a discussion that each person can take or leave however she likes.

 

I'm a little more prone to look at what a word does, within a particular usage, than to eliminate a whole class of words or any individual word as a matter of habit. So I think that your example is useful and interesting because it at least shows the process of critical thinking. Where we may disagree is the manner in which we come to such a point of applying discrimination. -ly adverbs and words like "began" appear to be triggers for you, drawing your attention to those points, and I think they are worth critical consideration; but I wonder if the assumption that these are black spots, or almost certainly signals of badness, may be taken too far.

I don't know. If I look at the way Sanderson uses "began," I, erm, begin to ask myself what he's accomplishing by the uses. Something like this, from The Rhythmatist,

seems to accomplish or address two things:

• The point at which the whispering begins is indeterminate, non-specific. The POV character notices the whispering at a certain point, once it's already begun; but the scope or shape of the whispering is vague. (I.e., like cacophony, a group whispering is made of multiple sounds, but how many? When would a cacophony begin? How many sounds, or instances, must there be before it's a cacophony? Similarly, with group whispering...how many students/sounds?)
  
  
• It's an on-going phenomenon—again, of indeterminate duration. If I said, "He whispered to Joel," I might be describing a single word or sentence delivered as a whisper. If I said, "He began whispering to Joel," I'm alluding to a series of whispers or an extended whispering of unknown length.

In The Way of Kings excerpt I previously linked, there are multiple similar examples:

• The newcomers began shouting immediately, continuing the alarm.
• The other guards in the hallway began to panic.
• The storm began to rage again.
• Some men began yelling, the roar taken up by others.

These describe either a type of cacophony or something vague without a clear beginning, either with uncertain duration or an extended duration.

With these examples, I'm not trying to dismiss the caution that a word like "began" might require, nor am I trying to justify heavy use of the word. I'm just feeling my way toward an appreciation of why Sanderson might sometimes use the word—even if he sometimes gets carried away. My guess is that he might be drawn to the word most often when he's trying to take readers "into the moment," drawing out a tense and uncertain situation. Things don't just happen and are over; no, a series of things of uncertain shape and duration are occurring.

 

Hrmm, perhaps this is just me, but I have a strange style, one born out of how I write most days. One thing that I do, constantly, is that when I find a word to describe a thing that is the word I use to describe that thing. So, in one of my works I have literal talismans. They are metal disks anywhere from the size of a quarter to the size of a friggin city. In a paragraph I am describing a character looking and analyzing his quarter sized fire talisman. I think in 6 sentences I use the word talisman three times. Once at the beginning to say this character had grabbed the fire talisman, once in the middle after calling it, it several times, and once at the end where he put it in his special drawer for talismans. There is no "variation" and some readers hate it. They consider it bland prose. I disagree. It is precise prose. It is not an amulet, it is not a charm, it is not a phylactery, it is a damn talisman.

I point this out for one reason, the definition of "good prose" is so very, very subjective. Granted, there is a threshold of quality. When someone meets that threshold I would call the prose acceptable. This is John Grisham. His prose is tight, accurate, but not pretty. It is acceptable. Sanderson is serviceable to good. Most of the time it is serviceable, however, there are points, like that final fight at the end of Words of Radiance, where his prose is good to great, but on average just good.

The question of "good prose" is not just a micro consideration. Often times, the strength of prose is judged in the macro perspective, over books and chapters, rather than by sentences and paragraphs. So, let's turn to your examples, Dem, and presuppose that an entire book is written in the style of sentence 3. The unfortunate truth is, while great as a single sentence, it would not work for the whole of a book. It would bog the book a bit too much. Why? Because, it would draw out so many unimportant, yet necessary details, that we would be describing things with such detail that the reader would get lost. While ther should be a presumption against passive voice or adverbs, that presumption is rebuttable. Passive voice should be used when deliberately obfuscating the actor. -ly adverbs should be used when the action is rathe unimportant and the information needs to be conveyed quickly. And any number of items for what makes "good prose" has an exception that can be met for a single instance. Just like in baseball you have all of these statistics telling what a batter can and cannot hit and where he hits or doesn't. But, on any given night that can change. Normally a batter is a 33% average. That is a really good batter, depending on HRs and RBIs he could be a player of the year candidate. However, on this night he is 0/3 with a groundout and fly into the 3d base area and a strikeout where he was caught looking. He's just having a problem on the micro level in this game, nothing to worry about. You shouldn't go out and rethink his game because of that one bad night. This same thing is with prose. You can have really good prose, like a batter with a 33% average, and still have micro level problems. You shouldn't go and oust your voice simply because you have some micro level problems that some readers might dislike.