Lush and overwritten

[pjthompson]

So, what is the difference for you between lush prose and overwritten prose?

I’m not asking to be a smart aleck or because I have an ax to grind (I don’t), I’m genuinely curious what the breaking point is for any of you who would care to comment.

I know that one person’s lush is another’s overwritten and vice versa, so some of it is a matter of taste, but I’d still like to hear your thoughts on this if you’re willing.

For myself, yeah, I do sometimes hit a wall with some lush prose where I want very badly for the author to tone it down several notches. Usually for me it involves the use of a lot of two dollar words when simpler ones would flow better, but it can also involve a great deal of artery-clogging images piled one on top of another. Still, other people lap that kind of thing up like cream—arteries be damned.

There probably isn’t a consensus. But, please, discuss…

Mirrored from Better Than Dead.

Comments

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I think really a lot of it is a matter of taste, but beyond that, I agree with safewrite. The story needs to be capable of supporting the lushness, and the lushness should enhance the story. And really: if you're going to use lush language, make sure you understand grammar and word meanings and so on; otherwise you just look ridiculous.

I like rich language sometimes, and I like simple language other times. I guess... I want to be able to understand what's being said, and I want what's being said to be worth thinking about. Like this, which mojodragonfly quoted, from Wild Comfort, by Kathleen Dean Moore:

Suddenly, streaks of light splatter toward our boat. They leap from the sea and patter against the swell, thousands of them flying clear of the water. They hit the boat like pebbles, clunking and bouncing off the hull, sparking back into the sea. I duck reflexively and brace my paddle for balance, but the lights strike the paddle blade too. The sea is alive with them, plunging toward our boat. They dive and flash. In the midst of the melee, a large blur of blue light surges toward our bow. Sparks glint to the heavens. Starlight plummets onto the sea, the fallen stars, the Lucifers. Their spread wings blaze one last time, then slide under the dark waves.

It's describing bioluminescent algae and single-celled organisms, and how strange and beautiful they look at night on the sea. In the following paragraphs, the narrator reflects on seeing just as much beauty and feeling just as much wonder in common things. The language here seems appropriate to me--it's to make us feel the wonder and strangeness and beauty--and THEN, the author's going to take the extra step and make us see that in the commonplace.

[marshallpayne1.livejournal.com]

Yes, there's an example of where rich language works well. I want the choice of words to cast up images in my mind. For me, it succeeds there.

[pjthompson]

Yes, that's exactly it. She's doing a conjuration that makes sense in terms of the story she's trying to tell. It's wonder-full and we flow and glide and dive along with it. As safewrite said, in service to the story.

I don't always manage to walk that line myself. I'm always reining myself back in. It's beautiful to read when someone uses it so expertly. But the other stuff, the pyrotechnics with no purpose but to say, "See how brilliant I am and all the sparkly words I can use!" doesn't really burn. It freezes.

[safewrite.livejournal.com]

A "conjuration." See? That's a precise use of lush prose: in one word you compared that lovely passage to an act of magic, and it made us see that it was one.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Yeah--that is a perfect word choice