The thing about minimalist writing is that the small things are always about more than they appear. A woman taking a bath is about her failed suicide attempt, a man playing basketball is about him cheating on his wife, or whatever, so this takes care of itself. In other types of writing it is important to not let unpacking turn into hoarding. Action, movement, purpose, these are things to bear in mind. The goal in unpacking strong verbs is to connect the reader with the character through their actions. First the character has to be involved in what they’re doing, then the reader can become involved. So if Johnny loves Mildred, revealing this while he sits in his bedroom with a dopey grin on his face is not involving anyone through action. Verbs denoting emotions are some of the worst offenders when it comes to verbs acting like clichés. And these are the one you most want to impact the reader, you want them to feel it. To unpack these verbs you have to put the characters onto the field of play. What are the individual steps that demonstrate Johnny’s feelings. Describing the look in his eyes or the beating of his heart is static and not very engaging. In order to unpack verbs, you need actions, movement, purpose. What situation can you put him in that will allow his love for Mildred to come out so that we see it for ourselves? What does he do for her? How does he act around her? What does he say about her? What is the action that illustrates the emotion? What are the action verbs involved? Unpack that. So, as well as breaking down emotions into actions, unpacking also forces the writer to show not tell, another pillar of minimalism. The key here is to look at important moments that you want to have the greatest impact on the reader, and then unpack them so the reader and character experience them in tandem. Linking verbs such as think, feel, seems, and appears make weak prose: Don't Say-- He thinks he really likes his job. Say-- He likes his new job. Don't Say--She feels bad about that mistake she made. Say-- She regrets her mistake. Don't Say--It seems that every time I try to help, I mess it up. Say-- Despite my best efforts, I make things worse. Don't Say--It appears to be time that we should leave. Say-- We need to go now. Jobs as Verbs Another noun type that works well is names of occupations. We often use doctor as a verb, as in the following sentence: She doctored the paper until it was perfect. Doesn't that evoke the image of a woman hovering over a piece of writing, tools in hand, crafting and nurturing the paper to perfection? What other occupations could paint such a clear scene? How about police? Mrs. Parsons policed her garden until it was completely pest free. You can get very creative with unusual verbs: bubble-wrapped the insult (to suggest that the insult was surrounded by "softer" words) tabled your idea But you do have to use colorful verbs tactfully. Use good judgment and don't overdo the creativity. Language is like clothing--too much color can be just plain odd. WORD LISTS 104 POWER VERBS February 2, 2007 By Oscar O. Very powerful verbs abolish, accelerate, achieve, act, adopt, align, anticipate, apply, assess, avoid, boost, break, bridge, build, burn, capture, change, choose, clarify, clobber, confront, connect, conquer, convert, create, decide, define, defuse, deliver, deploy, design, develop, diagnose, discover, drive, eliminate, ensure, establish, evaluate, exploit, explore, filter, finalize, find, focus, foresee, gain, gather, generate, grasp, identify, ignite, implement, improve, increase, innovate, inspire, intensify, lead, learn, leverage, manage, master, maximize, measure, mobilize, motivate, overcome, penetrate, persuade, plan, position, prepare, prevent, profit, raise, reconsider, reduce, refresh, replace, resist, respond, retain, save, scan, shatter, shade off, sidestep, simplify, slash, solve, stimulate, stop, stretch, succeed, supplement, take, transfer, transform, understand, unleash, unravel, use, win what, exactly is a strong verb? Let us take a look: All variants of the verb to be are weak verbs. (Sorry, to be it is a harsh judgment, but it must be said.) Poor old to be is so over-used that it does not pull up any fresh imagery (or any image at all). To be is the work horse of the verb world, and work horses age early and get tired and sick and feeble. So send your to bes out to pasture and find some young fresh fillies, or colts if you prefer. Verbs with an ing ending are weak verbs. Yes, I know, the justification for using the ing ending is that it indicates time passing. Such as "I was reading while I waited for the train." However, a simple ed ending accomplishes the same thing in a crisper fashion: "I read while I waited for the train." I have a tragic propensity to fall in love with ing endings and so once in awhile, I must whip myself soundly and rid my manuscript of as many of them as possible. Put those ing endings out in the back 40 with the workhorse to bes, where they can have AARP parties together. Verbs based on nouns are strong verbs. A fun verb exercise is to sit in a room, look around and start naming every noun you see. What you'll discover is that many of our most beloved verbs are based on nouns. And in the process of turning nouns into verbs, you might stretch your mind a bit to discover some hot new verbs. Strong verbs stand alone, on their own two feet. They don't need helpers like had, or would, or any other words that exist mostly to suck up to the handsome strong verbs. For instance, "The policeman had run so fast he was out of breath." How about "The policeman ran so fast he was out of breath," instead? You get the gist. Banish the helper verbs. They can rent the room next to the AARP verbs and hold a wake for themselves. These creative writing tips show how to harness the tremendous power in action verbs: #1: Vivid Verbs Are Powerful Verbs Verbs energize. An action verb generates more drama and emotion than a noun, adjective or adverb of similar meaning. Compare: The children wept when their dog died.(Strong verbs: wept, died) The children shed tears over the death of their dog. (Nouns: tears, death) The children were sad when their dog was dead. (Weak verb to be + adjectives: sad, dead) Use vivid verbs, powerful verbs, to fizz up the action, paint word-pictures, and evoke feelings in your readers. #2: Active Verbs Grab Attention Use active verbs rather than passive. Active verbs rivet readers' attention; passive verbs weaken your writing. Compare: Kim broke the jar.(Active verb) The jar was broken by Kim. (Passive verb) The first example is strong, precise and concise; the second sounds insipid. The active verb in the first example charges the sentence with a vitality and directness that compels attention. In the second example, however, the passive verb has slowed down the action and made the sentence unnecessarily wordy. #3: Active Verbs Add Vim and Vitality Active verbs get things done fast; passive verbs impede action. Compare: Jack fired the rocket.(Active verb) The rocket was fired by Jack (Passive verb) Use active verbs to quicken the pace. Like this: ...the carriage dashed through streets and swept round corners, with women screaming before it, and men clutching each other and clutching children out of its way. At last, swooping at a street corner by a fountain, one of its wheels came to a sickening little jolt, and there was a loud cry from a number of voices, and the horses reared and plunged. (From A Tale of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens) #4: Concise Verbs Are Strong Verbs Some forms of verbs are more concise, direct and dramatic than others. Compare: The clock is striking twelve. The clock strikes twelve. Verbs ending in -ing (for example, striking, prowling, shouting) are weaker than their shorter forms (strike, prowl, shout). #5: Powerful Verbs Are Concise and Precise Be as concise as possible; prefer the single verb to the roundabout phrase. Do not say: He did not remember to feed the dog. She did not pass the music exam. Say instead: He forgot to feed the dog. She failed the music exam. #6: Examples of Action Verbs A strong verb creates a mood or an image simply by its sound or connotations: for example, instead of the word walk, use more evocative words like saunter, stride, strut or swagger. Water can gush, gurgle, spurt or squirt out; villains may scoff, sneer, jeer or taunt; and as for the loot, let it gleam, glitter, sparkle or dazzle. Vivid verbs appeal to the reader's senses of sight, sound, touch or smell. Like these: Falstaff sweats to death, And lards the lean earth as he walks along. (From Henry IV, Part 1, Act 2, Scene 2, by William Shakespeare) Tonight the winds begin to rise And roar from yonder dropping day: The last red leaf is whirl'd away, The rooks are blown about the skies; The forest crack’d, the waters curl’d, The cattle huddled on the lea; And wildly dash’d on tower and tree The sunbeam strikes along the world. (From In Memoriam, by Alfred Lord Tennyson) #7: Strong Verbs & Verb Music Strong verbs also evoke the music of words. When choosing verbs, discern with your inner ear: do the sounds of the words carry the meaning and mood you want to convey? Is it melody or discord that you hear? Do the verbs stimulate this word music for readers? Look again at the description of the brewing storm in the previous section (Creative Writing Tips #6: excerpt from In Memoriam by Alfred Lord Tennyson). Feel the intense vigor of the verbs, hear the roar of the music. Compare it to the following example, where the verbs march to a different beat, a tongue-in-cheek portrayal of exuberant activity: But as soon as the Mariner, who was a man of infinite-resource-and-sagacity, found himself truly inside the Whale’s warm, dark, inside cupboards, he stumped and he jumped and he thumped and he bumped, and he pranced and he danced, and he banged and he clanged, and he hit and he bit, and he leaped and he creeped, and he prowled and he howled, and he hopped and he dropped, and he cried and he sighed, and he crawled and he bawled, and he stepped and he lepped, and he danced hornpipes where he shouldn’t, and the Whale felt most unhappy indeed. (From Just So Stories, by Rudyard Kipling) When to Use Passive Verbs When is it better to use passive verbs? When the story calls for a change of pace: for example, to slow down the action, reduce tension, or stretch the narrative. Choose passive verbs also when you want to emphasize the receiver of the action; like this: He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief... He was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment for our peace fell upon him, and by his stripes we are healed. (From The Bible, Isaiah 53: 3a, 5) Source: http://www.creativejuicesbooks.com/action-verbs.html 3 MAIN TYPES OF VERBS 1) Action Verbs: tell what nouns/pronouns DO 2) Linking Verbs: link a subject w/ info about it 3) Helping Verbs: help the main verb do its job Avoid there is Say you are trying to describe a standard school chair: There is a curved seat. There are five slats on the back. There is a school identification mark on the bottom of the chair. Nothing's wrong with these sentences. They’re all grammatically correct, and they’re all accurate. But they probably made you yawn. There is and there are are standard (and therefore boring) expressions. How about swapping them for something stronger? Here you go: The seat curves to fit your bottom. Five slats support your back. The school stamps an identification mark on the bottom of each chair. In a writing sample for the SAT or other standardized test, graders watch for sophisticated usage. They want to see that you can manipulate language. There is/are sentences aren't very sophisticated, though they can sometimes be useful. When you find yourself constructing a sentence this way, pause. Can you come up with a more interesting verb? Don’t overuse havein your writing Forms of the verb to have can also put your reader to sleep faster than a sedative. Sometimes nothing works better than to have, and of course you need some forms of this verb to indicate tense —the time of the action or state of being. But too often has, had,or have ends up in a sentence because the writer is too tired to think of something more creative. Try changing The chair has a shiny surface. The slats have rounded edges as big as my finger. to The chair shone under the fluorescent light. The rounded edges fit my finger perfectly. Shone and fit are more interesting than has and have. Plus, after you plop in a good verb, other ideas follow, and the whole sentence improves. Don't just "say" and "walk" away when writing To say and to walk are fine, upstanding members of the verb community, but they don’t give you much information. Why say when you can declare, scream, whisper, hint, bellow, assert, remark or do any one of the zillions of alternatives available to you when you're describing communication? For movement, consider stroll, saunter, plod, strut, rush, speed, zig-zag, and look for verbs that go beyond the basics, that add shades of meaning to your sentence. Here are some before-and-after sentence sets to illustrate how more specific verbs pep up your sentences: Before: Heidi said she was tired of climbing mountains. After: Heidi contended that she was tired of climbing mountains. (Now you know that she’s speaking with someone who may not believe her.)