What’s wrong with clichés?

What is a cliché? 

It’s simply a phrase or saying in frequent usage, easily recognised and understood.  We use them all the time in conversation and avoiding them would result in a rather affected manner of speaking.

Writers become deeply concerned about clichés and see them as a deadly sin.  And yet in our newspapers, we find them scattered like confetti – that’s a cliché by the way, but we all know what it means.  I could have said that they are to be found randomly distributed within the text of most newspaper articles.   But scattered like confetti is much more visual.  It has been over-used for a reason.  It’s been over-used because it has meaning.

I wonder why we have all become so super sensitive about clichés.  Perhaps it’s the fault of the professional and non-professional critiquer.  It’s so easy to pick one out of an excellent piece of writing and say disparagingly, “a pity about that cliché in the first sentence.”  To me one cliché on a page is nothing to get upset about.  It’s when there’s one in every paragraph that it can become distracting.

A particular cliché can become irritating when it gets too much exposure.  Politicians are guilty of using expressions like “hard working families” until the phrase begins to lose its meaning.   Too many clichés can be indicative of sloppy or lazy writing.  It can mean the writer hasn’t taken the trouble to seek out a more original or apt analogy.  However, avoiding them altogether can result in writing that is less explicit and less accessible. Certainly clichés should be allowed their place in dialogue because an attempt at eliminating them will result in conversation that is stiff and wordy.

Writing is all about communication and as long as we are communicating in a way that the reader understands, it’s serving its purpose.   We all know not to judge a book by its cover and that it’s little use flogging a dead horse.  How sad if writers were to avoid these picturesque expressions and allow them to die out of common usage.  Sometimes it’s possible to be too clever by half!

These expressions are a sort of shorthand.  They say a lot in a few words.  We shouldn’t sneer at the hard-working cliché when it is conveying exactly what we want to say.   Of course, we should look for new and original ways of expressing what we mean, but beware, if successful, that clever phrase may soon become a cliché. 

Fiction Therapy

Long before I started writing fiction, I was aware of the therapeutic benefits of writing, particularly for someone like me who is not quick thinking and articulate.  It takes me time to put words together and by then the opportunity to speak them may have passed. 

I first started to understand how it could be therapeutic for other people when I worked for a number of years for a boss who had an unfortunate habit of always speaking his mind.  Some saw this as a virtue, but it didn’t always make him friends.  However, outspoken remarks can be glossed over, re-interpreted and explained.  The written word is less forgiving. 

It became a problem when a letter came into the office that contained a complaint.  He found any criticism difficult to cope with.   ‘Let me draft something for you’ I would say. ‘No, no need.  I can reply to this’.  He would take it away and cover several sheets with angry scribble, pressing so hard that his words punctured the paper.  The sheets would then be put on my desk for typing.  ‘This is what I want to say and I don’t want you to change anything.’ Having read through the pages of vitriol, I would set about drafting a response that took quite a different approach, one that would promote better understanding while avoiding antagonising the recipient.  He always signed without a murmur and once it was in the post, I could shred the closely written sheets. This made me recognise how important it was to him to be able to write down his feelings, but how equally important it was to be careful how these words were shared. 

When I started writing fiction, I realised what a perfect vehicle it is for feelings and emotions that can’t otherwise be easily expressed. Fictional characters almost always develop from real life models.  The unpleasant characters are sometimes the easiest to create. 

When I shared my first novel with work colleagues, one of my characters made them fall about laughing.  This was not because the character was in any way amusing, but because they recognised the source.  I had been on the receiving end of this person’s unpleasantness many times and writing the character had given me great satisfaction.  Perhaps I shouldn’t have given him a name and occupation so similar to the model.  I’ve now changed a few non-essentials, but kept the essence of this character’s unpleasant nature.  Every story needs a villain or two.

Another aspect of writing villains is that you have to explore what makes them the way they are.  This can bring greater understanding and even empathy. The characters closest to the writer tend to have something of the writer in them.  They are the characters that the writers may use to express their own emotions, feelings and views.  Probably they will have some personal enhancements that the writer quite fancies.  They may be bigger and stronger or prettier and more agile.   Almost certainly, they will be more articulate, able to express themselves exactly as the writer would wish.

 One of the great things about writing fiction is the opportunity it provides for exploration.  This can be the exploration of relationships or the environment. Most of my writing has involved the exploration of relationships.  We all want to know what makes other people tick. Once you place one character you have created in the vicinity of another and allow them to interact, the result can be quite unexpected.  As you start to ask the big ‘what if’ question, you can allow your characters to act out your deepest anxieties and desires without any real life bloodshed.  It can be a very liberating experience and teach you a lot about human nature and incidentally about yourself. 

Exploring the environment is something else.  Perhaps you have longed to travel to other countries or closer to home to see what’s behind the door of that house half way down the street that doesn’t seem to fit in with all the other houses.  You can send your fictional character on a journey to find out more.  If your own street seems a bit dull, then you can carry this to extremes and build a whole other world. If you hate the political system, you can make up your own and find out how it could work.  The possibilities are endless and may help to reconcile you to life as it is on planet earth. 

You could start by collecting stories.  They really are all around you and people use them in all sorts of ways.  There may only be seven basic stories, but the variations are limitless. You only have to listen to a television debate or be present at a business meeting and sooner or later someone will come up with a story. It may not start ‘once upon a time’, but you will learn recognise the various openings that people use.  It will probably be a story that has been told a million times and each time it has been embroidered a little to make it more amusing or more interesting or to hammer home a point.  Names may have been changed to protect the innocent or not so innocent. It has become more fiction than fact so that in the end the two may be difficult to separate.

Most children are able to escape into imaginary worlds when the going becomes tough in this one.  At school we are encouraged to write stories.  As we get older and life becomes more serious, many of us lose this ability.  Day dreaming has no place in an adult world obsessed with facts and figures.  Perhaps fiction therapy could help people unlock this under-used area of the brain and find fulfilment in creativity.

Criticism

Criticism:  how to take it and what to do with it.

At last the book is finished.  There were times when you thought it never would be, but you’ve got there with all the strands drawn to a satisfactory conclusion.  You’ve read it through, corrected typos and inconsistencies.  You’re elated.  It isn’t at all bad.  However you’ve read the reviews on Amazon and know that even best-selling authors have the occasional damning one star.  What will other people think about your baby?

 The easiest way to find out is to ask your fellow authors, your supportive writing circle, whether round table or on-line.  It may be that some of them have already read bits of the story.  It’s time to put the whole thing up there for review.

 You are not prepared for the sheer volume of criticism and advice, a lot of it conflicting.  Is there too much action, or not enough?  Are the descriptive passages you liked so much really too long-winded and rambling?  Several people have commented on the dialogue.  They didn’t seem to find the Scottish dialect convincing.

 When the dust settles, you recover and read your story again.  Some of the criticism you can dismiss; your peers are telling you how they would have written it, but this is your story.  There are other points that are clearly valid.  It was worthwhile getting your fellow authors’ opinions, even if you are a bit confused.  You move your Scottish character down to the Midlands where he feels much more at home.  You change his name from Alistair to Joe and get rid of all that unconvincing Scottish dialect that was so difficult to write.

 Your story is much better, but you are still confused by the differing opinions you have received.  You’ve had a recent bonus, so decide to spend it on getting a professional critique.  The agency will make sure that the reader is attuned to your genre.  You wait several weeks until one the day, as you are about to leave for work, a large brown envelope pops through the letter box with the name and address written in your own handwriting.  You pick it up and put on the table and go to work, where you are unable to concentrate.  The image of that package looms too large.

 Later, after your evening meal and fortified by a second glass of wine, you slit open the envelope.  Well!  Who would have thought anyone could be so picky?  There’s pages and pages of stuff and all those notes in the margin.  It looks like they are suggesting a major re-write.  You read it through in anguish.  Could they find nothing good to say?  After a few days of depression, you read it again.  It’s not quite as bad as you thought at first.  In fact, it’s quite encouraging really.  Of course, there’s a lot to do, but it’s not impossible.

 The re-write takes ages and you suddenly realise you’ve spent longer editing than you did writing the original version.  That moment of elation when you thought you’d finished seems a very long time ago.  The story is quite different now, but better, definitely improved.  But is it good enough?  Your confidence has been shaken.

 The next step could be friends and work colleagues, people who may not know you write, but who share your taste in books.  People seem quite eager to read what you have written, perhaps they are a little curious and you wonder how much of yourself has been exposed in your writing.  This is much more stressful than sharing it with your writing circle.  These are real people, your potential readers should you ever get published.  Of course, they will say they like it.  They probably value your friendship or know they need to continue to work with you.  The feedback from these people will be different.  They won’t be criticising your writing style, your dialogue, character development, viewpoint, structure, all the stuff you got from your fellow writers and professional editors.  However, this exercise can tell you a lot.

 Once started, did they read it quickly, sitting up until midnight to finish it, or did they return it after some time explaining how the housework meant they simply hadn’t had time to finish reading it before?  Were they keen to discuss it with you and enthusiastic about the story, or were they a bit vague and didn’t seem to get your main character’s motivation?  This feedback may make you decide that you should put this one away and go on to the next thing, having learnt valuable lessons from the experience.  Positive feedback from these genuine readers could give you the confidence you need to send it out to agents and publishers or even to publish it yourself.

Pam

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