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SECRETS OF YOUR SENSES
Just as fine actors make us forget they are acting, fine writers make us forget we are reading. And sensory detail is the key, says regular contributor Hugh Vaughan-Williams. If we have the right sensory information the writer vanishes from our view and our brain is plugged directly into the scene.
Read this: Stopping the children at a blackberry bush, Alice pointed out clusters of ripe fruit. She picked one and ate it.
Now this: Stopping the children at a raspberry bush, Alice pointed out clusters of plump, pink fruit. She reached carefully between the thorns, took a berry and popped it in her mouth. A wave of tart, sweet juice flooded her tongue.
The first paragraph is perfectly okay and conveys its information well. But the second comes to life.
Being told the raspberries are ripe is one thing. Seeing them, (plump and purple) and tasting their juice (tart and sweet) is quite another.
Good writing is all about sensory detail.
Of course, it’s no surprise that sensory information is so powerful. Our senses are the way we experience life: they feed us information and our intellect interprets it. And that is exactly what a good writer does: supplies readers with sensory information and let’s their intellect interpret it: Bingo! The illusion of reality.
Actors know this. Think of Anthony Hopkins in Silence of the Lambs. Think of that strange, staccato sucking noise he made after saying he’d eaten someone’s liver with a fine Chianti. We still remember that sensory detail long after we’ve forgotten the plot.
And there’s a sensory detail about Hannibal that I’ll bet you never knew. Remember those eyes? You didn’t know the sensory detail that made them so chilling. but your subconscious did. Hannibal never blinks. Hopkins practised keeping his eyes open for long periods before making the film. Next time you see a re-run, check it out: No blinks.
Just as fine actors make us forget they are acting, fine writers make us forget we are reading. Again sensory detail is the key: if we have the right sensory information the writer vanishes from our view and our brain is plugged directly into the scene. Remember: When we read that the raspberries are ‘ripe” we are being told they are ripe. But when we see them “plump and pink” we know they are ripe without being told it.
The illusion is complete; we are there.
Film and television have swamped the written word because they are usually more effective at conveying sensory information: filmmakers have to show us things, rather than telling us about them.
But don’t despair: writers still have three real advantages over filmmakers. We have access to senses that filmmakers don’t.
1) Taste: In an article on rattlesnakes, writer Terry Dunkle, knowing the power of sensory detail, decided to find out what rattlesnake tastes like. He asked
an old hunter to catch a rattler and cook it.
He wrote: I ate it – some of it – and it wasn’t like chicken at all. It was white, and rubbery and bland, with a hint of musk, like squid cooked in mutton fat.
So powerful are these details, that they come back to me years later, every time I hear about somebody eating a snake.
2) Smell. First this: Next morning the suburb of Turramurra was returning to normal after the storm of the night before. The ground had begun to dry and men were out mowing their lawns.
Now this:
The puddles from last night’s storm in Turramurra were now only damp patches on the footpath and the air smelled of wet concrete and freshly-mown grass.
When we are told that the ground in Turramurra is drying out and the lawns are being mown and that life is returning to normal, it’s the writer who is telling us that. But the moment we smell newly-mown grass, we know that things are getting back to normal. We are getting our information direct; there is no writer in the way.
Oh, and just in case you think sensory detail wastes words, it doesn’t. That first paragraph is five words shorter than the second. It is written more effectively and uses fewer words to do it.
3) Touch: There was a gush of warm wind and the subway platform trembled slightly under Melissa’s feet. A train was coming. Enough said: Try showing that on film!
How can you use these techniques to bring life to your public affairs and business writing and make it more compelling?
Let’s say you’ve been asked to do a piece on a corporate publishing centre – one of those places that does bulk printing. You could start like this:
The car parks at Global Headquarters are just beginning to fill, as I push open the main door of the publishing centre. I’m met by a warm gust of air, the clatter of the presses and the smell of hot coffee. “We start early here,” smiles supervisor Alice Page.
We are right in the room, feeling the warm air, smelling the coffee, surrounded the clatter of machinery and seeing Alice smile.
Whenever you want to bring something, or someone to life, just give readers some well-chosen sensory clues. It’s as easy as that.
Let me leave you with one last example of the power of sensory detail.
Like all of us, I watched the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Centre on television. But, after seeing it unfold and then reading thousands of words about it, I still didn’t fully comprehend what it was like to be right there. Until I read this: As they jumped from the ledges, some office workers held down their skirts. Others, in groups, held hands as they fell into the void.
I see gentle, modest, ordinary people caught up in an unimaginable horror. Now I understand what it was like.
Hugh Vaughan-Williams is an internationally recognised authority on magazine writing. As a managing editor for Reader’s Digest in the US, he was responsible for the content of 28 international editions. He has worked as an editor and writer on magazines and newspapers in Britain’s Fleet Street, in South Africa, Australia and the US where he now runs his own editorial consulting and training agency.
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Great article - love it!! Leanne.Quote