SAY WHAT YOU MEAN

While watching a movie, we are spectators. While reading a book we are participants. As readers, we don’t see action. We see words that we translate into action. The more accurate the words, the more immediate the experience. If words don’t say what the writer means, our minds are forced through a process of interpretation that dilutes the experience.

An expression like the following commonly appears in fiction: “From the top of the hill he could see the ocean.” Does the writer mean he saw the ocean or that he was able to see it? He said the latter but probably meant the former.

“She only danced for an hour.” What else might she have done? Yodeled? Or did the writer mean “She danced for only an hour.”

“I will find out if he’s interested.” What won’t I find out if he isn’t interested? Or does the writer mean “I will find out whether he’s interested?”

Say what you mean!

One hears people say, “I wish to thank everyone for….” Why not just thank them?

“Every evening he would go to the movies.” Does the writer mean “he would go? Or he went? Probably the latter. So why not say so?

“I would appreciate it if you would pick that up.” You would appreciate what? Presumably “it” stands for the action of picking something up. Why use all those words for the reader to untangle? Why not say, “I would appreciate your picking that up.”

“I suppose you don’t like this, do you?” demanded George. George didn’t demand “I suppose you don’t like this.” The writer is trying to say too much at once.
Commonly one hears “I wish he would have gone” when what is meant is “I wish he had gone.”

“I had seen that thing before.” Is “before” necessary?

“Something fell between the cracks” is commonly meant to mean that something fell through a crack. What’s between the cracks is solid. If the writer said, “Something fell through the cracks,” how many cracks are involved?

And his eyes didn’t “drop to the floor” unless he went blind.