Following from the previous post, I was going to jump straight into the next part (the writing of dense, cumulative descriptions), but then I realized that post might have left some points unanswered or not appropriately explained. So, in this post, an intermission of sorts, I will try to show, almost quantifying it if possible, the limits of the “painting with words” approach to descriptive writing.
Continue reading “More limits of description (II)”Month: November 2020
The limits of description
There are four broad categories of text you can write (exposition, narration, description, and dialogue,) and descriptions are what can give more problems to a fiction or genre writer. To sum up, description isn’t even a good kind of text. We tolerate it because it is required, but the least there is, the better, for reasons I hope will become clear in a moment.
Textual versions of visual phenomena are not good conveyors of information, at least not the kind of information most novice writers believe they should convey (raw visual data.)
Continue reading “The limits of description”
Emperor's Notepad 