"Don't repeat things." Common advice, alongside "show, don't tell" and the like. But also-like, it's oft thrown without context, depth, reasoning—and its hearers as-oft learn wrong lessons with maybe a few right. So: my hat, ring.
We are pattern-seeking minds. We react to repetitions. We latch strongly on threes. But also twos, because when he says this and he says that, we're now primed for him to say his other thing. So if we are told he is handsome, and then he hands us something, yet the pattern is disjoined and nothing more comes of it—our reflexes misfire. We notice. We judge.
Writers are told to avoid this. So they introduce their girl, then call her the blonde, then the lady, then the woman; all to avoid that awkward repetition in and across sentences. But that idea's still repeating, is it not? And the more we flail our thesaurus, the more our efforts come conspicuous. Worst-case, we reach for synonyms so far outside our reader's frame of reference that confusion creeps in.
We can avoid repeating in other ways, such as by holding focus longer on our girl and relying on the range of pronouns instead of nouns. Or we can move our focus more rapidly—tell of her conversation partner, play them off elements of the space, bring in beliefs or memories or predictions, and only after a while of not-repeating do we turn our language back to her. Pieces of our world can move without merely moving: let her leave her house, then tell of the sidewalk down the hill, the corner store at the bottom, the curve of road behind, and at last place her on the library steps 'round that bend. Of course, this may require structural changes to our tale. Of course, this is our tale to change how we will. And as prose serves story, so story may serve prose.
Now, not every repetition of word or sound or structure is to be avoided. Unintentional patterning draws reader attention to places it should not; intentional patterning draws it where we wish. He was handsome—his hands were there only some of the time. True, too-much or too-arbitrary patterning can muddle our points; yet strong patterns in strong places make our writing more than a rattling-off of idea or few.
And when we must repeat ourselves without a clever echo, we can still acknowledge our act. He set his stone upon the sand, and that sand began to sing. Now it is not incongruous, now it is not an accident.
That's all from me, for now. Trick in your bag, tool in your box. Happy hunting.
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1 year, 3 months ago
16 Jun 2024 23:04 CEST
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