The Art of Reading with a Critical Eye
Like most of the posts I write, this one stemmed from a subject that interested me, about which I wanted to learn more. As a writer, I’m always looking to improve my skills. I can see where I’m doing well today, but I can also see ways in which my author-heroes have more experience and ability. Of course, the most obvious way to improve is to just write on a regular basis – daily if possible. We all know that already, so I won’t even discuss it in the rest of the post. But beyond that, how do we actively work to improve certain aspects of our writing? How can we apply ourselves so that our seventh book is profoundly better than our second? This post is the first in a series. In this one, we’ll look at how to write better setting descriptions.
Assess Your Abilities
Step one is to be real with yourself about what needs to change in your writing. That can be hard to know, especially when we’re freshmen writers, when we don’t have twenty novels under our belt. And I’m right there with you!
The first way to go about this is with your own [hopefully critical] eye. Set aside your glee about your storytelling and all of the hopes you have for it in the future. Stand back. Read sections of what you write and be real with yourself. Is your dialogue stilted? Are your settings really immersive, or are the descriptions more simplistic? Do your characters feel alive – so much so that they jump off the page – or are they somewhat predictable? Is your story emotionally evocative, or are you just showing readers what the characters are feeling?
Where are you strong(er)? Where are you weak(er)?
If you struggle to do this, as most of us probably do, one way to have a better sense for your strengths and weaknesses is to ask for it. Attend writer workshops, conferences, or online forums. Find writer friends, even if they don’t live near you. Exchange portions of your work. Let them know that you want the hard critique, the one that will help you to grow. And then accept it for what it is: one person’s assessment. Possibly an incorrect one, but also very possibly, something that will take your writing to the next level.
Another way to find help is to read very good quality writing, especially in your own genre, and to examine different elements of it with a critical eye. Your own eye. This is a practiced skill. In this post we’ll talk about how to do this with respect to setting descriptions. In subsequent ones, we’ll look at other areas and how to assess our writing for weaknesses.
Example #1: Lyrical & Rich
The following example is from the first couple of pages in a Fantasy novel, Daughter of the Forest, by Juliet Marillier.
“The swans are coming,” said Finbar at last. He sat up slowly to rest his chin on raised knees. “They’re coming tonight.”
Behind him, a breeze stirred the branches of oak and elm, ash and elder, and scattered a drift of leaves, gold and bronze and brown. The lake lay in a circle of tree-clothed hills, sheltered as if in a great chalice.
“How can you know that?” queried Padriac. “How can you be so sure? It could be tomorrow, or the day after. Or they could go to some other place. You’re always so sure.”
I don’t remember Finbar answering, but later that day, as dusk was falling, he took me back to the lakeshore. In the half light over the water, we saw the swans come home. The last low traces of sun caught a white movement in the darkening sky. Then they were near enough for us to see the pattern of their flight, the orderly formation descending through the cool air as the light faded. The rush of wings, the vibration of the air. The final glide to the water, the silvery flashing as it parted to receive them. As they landed, the sound was like my name, over and over: Sorcha, Sorcha. My hand crept into Finbar’s; we stood immobile until it was dark, and then my brother took me home.
Daughter of the forest, pp 1-2
Assess the Author’s Execution
This book is one that I love. It speaks to me. I’m fully immersed in the setting, the world that she created. That said, it might not speak to you, so keep in mind that the steps I’m outlining here can be applied to whatever writing you find to be beautiful.
When I look at this passage, what I don’t see is a lot of five dollar words. Marillier’s descriptions use simple, everyday language. The one unique word here, chalice, lends a sense of the time and place to the story, as the novel is set in early medieval Ireland – a time of Druids with only the earliest signs of Christianity moving through the region.
Notice how she describes the swans’ arrival. First she sets us down amongst the oak and elm, the ash and elder, beside a lake surrounded by tree-clothed hills. Though she uses merely a few sentences, we’re there. Then she slows the description and focuses in on the swans. Swans are the central figures of this story and thus this event isn’t merely lyrical; it’s crucial foreshadowing of the story to come.
We see the faint white sign of their wings against the dusk. They fly in an elegant formation, their wings buffeting the wind around them. And as they glide down to the water, Marillier doesn’t neglect the way that water flashes silver in the dying light as its surface is broken, or the sound of their collective rushing of wings settling on water. A sound so much like the main character’s name: Sorcha, Sorcha.
This is just one example of one way that one author managed to write description that is immersive and gripping.
Some authors have a powerful knowledge of an area, such as Anne Rice’s history in New Orleans. It comes through these writers’ writing by way of intimate details that others wouldn’t know to include: the smell of bougainvillea, the feel of the humidity, the historic details that add nuance and color to the story.
If we want to write like that, we need to have the knowledge already, or we need to acquire it through experience or research. Simply describing a place as hot or humid or bustling won’t be immersive for our readers. Portraying a plantation as a Greek Revival with columns doesn’t cut it. The readers need to feel the crisp sharpness of the peeling blue paint on the porch, the sluggish, gurgling sound of the muddy river just beyond, the way the gaslights glow with an orange halo in the fading twilight.
Compare
That’s where the next step comes in: taking a very critical look at our own writing. In our first example, you might look at your writing and ask the following types of questions:
- Have I given readers enough to pull them into time and place? Are my descriptions too general, or is there a way to do more such as Marillier’s lake “sheltered as if in a great chalice?”
- Have I focused in on something that matters greatly to the story, such as the swans in this case? Beware of jumping around the scene, describing any and every detail, or elements that don’t truly capture the essence of the story.
- Have I really captured all of the nuance of that thing [that matters most] or place from every angle – such as the swans’ orderly formation, their white forms against the dark sky, and the way in which the air vibrates before their wings?
- Is there a way to present elements in the scene such that they do more than merely describe the setting? For example: when the swans touch down in the water, Marillier presents this as the water’s “silvery flashing as it parted to receive them.” From this short passage, you might not know that Sorcha’s brothers will be transformed into swans for much of the story. Marillier also presents the land of their home as a secret place guarded by the forest and the lake. Thus, it recognizes them as its own. Notice how this description parallels that. As the water parts to receive the swans, it isn’t merely the silvery flash of the surface that sits so deeply with readers. It’s also the fact that the water’s embrace points to the fact that the swans belong. The water recognizes them and gathers them to itself. This is powerful and descriptive foreshadowing.
Example #2: Sparse & Pointed
Since I mentioned McCarthy, let’s look at another example: the first paragraph from Child of God. His style is so diametrically opposed to that of Marillier that it serves as a great example of a very different writing style that’s equally powerful.
They came like a caravan of carnival folk up through the swales of broomstraw and across the hill in the morning sun, the truck rocking and pitching in the ruts and the musicians on chairs in the truckbed teetering and tuning their instruments, the fat man with guitar grinning and gesturing to others in a car behind and bending to give a note to the fiddler who turned a fiddlepeg and listened with a wrinkled face. They passed under flowering appletrees and passed a log crib chinked with orange mud and forded a branch and came in sight of an aged clapboard house that stood in blue shade under the wall of the mountain. Beyond it stood a barn. One of the men in the truck bonged on the cab roof with his fist and the truck came to a halt. Cars and trucks came on through the weeds in the yard, people afoot.
Child of God, pp.3-4
Assess the Author’s Execution
The first thing you probably notice about this passage is the run-on sentences. McCarthy is known for his sparse use of punctuation. We could spend several posts talking about why that serves him well and may or may not work for another writer.
In the case of this passage, notice how the lengthy sentences emphasize the seemingly unending stream of cars and people caravaning across the hill and into the shade of a farmhouse. McCarthy hasn’t even told us who this character is yet. We don’t see him or know his name, and yet, we feel what the main character is feeling as he watches this scene.
The first few words portray a comical scene of people who are likely less than respectable. “A caravan of carnival folk” is not how a queen’s procession would be described. These aren’t elegant people. The fat man with the guitar and the fiddler with the wrinkled face are down-home folk. Perhaps even contemptible. There’s something slightly insulting about the way in which the protagonist sees these folk. As if they’re nothing but a carnival of comedy.
Readers also gain the sense of the country setting and there is, what appears at first glance, to be a charming pastoral reference to the swales of broomstraw and the flowering appletrees. However, McCarthy isn’t one to waste a single word on anything, let alone ornamental description.
If we look into the historical uses of broomstraw, it was primarily feed and bedding for livestock, particularly cattle. And apple trees tend to represent fertility, but given the theme of this book – the evil nature of all of mankind – it’s much more likely that McCarthy meant for the apple trees to point back to man’s fall from grace in the Garden of Eden. Thus, with these two brief descriptions, he’s already told us that our main character views these other townspeople as merely cattle who are depraved [as he is].
Lastly notice the way in which he describes the other items in the scene: the “chairs in the truckbed;” the “log crib chinked with orange mud;” the “aged clapboard house;” and the “weeds in the yard.” Though the people are celebrating and joyful, their surroundings are succinctly described in an inglorious light.
There’s something dark and ugly about this scene, made all the more striking due to its juxtaposition against the riotous carnival of music and merrymaking.
Compare
I think you can already see that when I said “sparse and pointed,” I didn’t mean lacking in any thematic depth. McCarthy is one whose every word contributes to the point of his story. He’s a master storyteller.
That doesn’t mean that we all love his style. I prefer Marillier’s lyrical, poetic settings, but we could argue that McCarthy’s setting descriptions are deeper and richer, albeit less beautiful. This is great writing.
When we look at all that he has accomplished here, we might look at our own writing and ask ourselves questions like these:
- Is my description evocative enough that I don’t even need to tell readers what my character is feeling? Are they already in his shoes?
- Does the way in which I describe the scene fit with the theme of the story and with its tone? For instance, in this case, McCarthy is subtly introducing us to a protagonist who is very angry, who has been cast out from a society that sees itself as greater than he is, but who sees that society for what it really is: a carnival of cattle who are no less evil than he is.
- Can I introduce elements like the broomstraw and apple trees that both paint the literal setting and also act as metaphors that tell us more about the theme?
- Are my uses of adjectives appropriate? For instance, if a scene is meant to strike the reader as heavy or heartbreaking, have I portrayed certain elements in a lovely, lighthearted way that reads as incongruous? (Unless, of course, there’s a very specific reason for introducing the incongruity.)
Conclusion
We could do this all day long – examining various well-written setting descriptions and digging into them to learn how we might also employ similar tactics. The power is in doing it – in studying them and then applying similar tactics to our own writing.
You could do this in the scope of a large manuscript in which you choose one description at a time and hone the detail using one or two things that you’ve observed from other writers. Or you could practice by giving yourself various writing assignments to describe settings. Lastly, you could join writing contests or submit short works to anthologies in order to give yourself the opportunity to practice outside of your current manuscript.
You’ll find, as I have, that the more you read with this kind of critical eye and then practice it, the more you discover how quickly your writing improves. Hard work does pay off.
Watch for the next post in this series, in which we’ll talk about how to improve our dialogue!
If you enjoyed this post, share it with your friends!