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cried was as upset as the boy who sobbed?
Choosing words deliberately and thinking about what they imply as well as what they mean can help
you give life to your writing and story telling. Look at these verbs and see how many others you can think of
which mean the same but have stronger meanings.
Cry
Run
Talk
Love
Laugh
Enjoy
Eat
Sleep
Walk
Sail
Write
Now let s see how some of these verbs and their synonyms were incorporated into an e-mail from one
friend to another.
To: Mary
From: Jane
Subject: Disneyland Adventure
I just thought I d take a minute from dashing from ride to ride to let you know how
things are going here. We are having a blast. We haven t stopped wolfing down the
corn dogs and cokes, and when we fall into bed at night we are so exhausted that
we enter dreamland in seconds.
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NARRATIVES IN EVERYDAY LIFE EXPRESS YOURSELF
My brother sobbed his little heart out yesterday when he didn t meet the height
requirements for the roller coaster, and my mom could barely console him. He has
been having a great time, and he races to each activity with unmatched energy. I
can t keep up with him.
Yesterday was spectacular for me. I went sailing with friends of my dad s. I never
knew that wind and sun and water could be so exhilarating. As tired as I was when
we got back, I felt as if I could have gone on forever. I just adored the whole
experience.
Gotta run. I ll write more later.
Can you isolate out the verbs in this brief e-mail that gave it so much energy? First, dashing from ride
to ride rather than simply running; wolfing down corn dogs not just eating; entering dreamland instead of
sleeping; sobbing and not just crying; races instead of runs; exhilarating instead of fun; adored instead of
liked.
FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE
Another way to enliven your writing and your storytelling is to create effective similes and metaphors. Remem-
ber those? Similes are comparisons which use like or as and metaphors are comparisons that change one thing
into another without using like or as.
Here are some examples:
Simile: He was as tall as a skyscraper.
Metaphor: He was a skyscraper compared to the other kids.
Simile: My dorm room feels like a prison.
Metaphor: My dorm room is a prison.
Simile: Her face was as bright as sunshine.
Metaphor: Her face brightened the room with its light.
Metaphors accomplish many things for your writing. They demonstrate your creativity. They invite your
reader to use his or her imagination. They allow you to say in a few words what it might normally take you
many words to say. Remember the image of picked clean by desert buzzards to describe the feeling of being
rejected by a girlfriend. Need we say more about how awful the young man felt?
See if you can come up with similes and metaphors for these:
Your room
Your English teacher
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EXPRESS YOURSELF NARRATIVES IN EVERYDAY LIFE
Your car
Your biology textbook
Math
The prom
The yearbook
Christmas
Jell-O"!
Your pet
SENSORY DETAILS
Like similes and metaphors, sensory details invite your reader to participate with your writing. By incorpo-
rating the five senses into your images, similes, and metaphors, you connect your personal experiences and
insights to the physical world shared by us all. Most effective description relies on verbs, adverbs, and adjec-
tives. Consider these:
My dog is white and tan, small and very lively.
A whirlwind of white and tan fur, my dog loves to run.
Alexandra was a little girl who smiled and laughed and loved to hear the sound of her own voice.
A sunshine smile as broad as her face, a laugh that matched a symphony, little Alexandra charmed
everyone at the family reunion.
The car sounded as if the car battery was dead.
The engine struggled to turn over and gasped and gasped before it finally was silent.
Now try to use the similes and metaphors you created above, add sensory details or rewrite them com-
pletely using only sensory details. Try to use touch, taste and smell, as well as sight and sound. Can you pro-
vide sensory details to describe the following?
Your room
Your English teacher
Your car
Your biology textbook
Math
The prom
The yearbook
Christmas
Jell-O"!
Your pet
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NARRATIVES IN EVERYDAY LIFE EXPRESS YOURSELF
It s fun and challenging to create these images and comparisons without necessarily planning a big piece
of writing. If you start thinking this way and keep track of interesting images as you go along, you may find
that you have a collection to choose from when you need them. You may want to keep a journal or diary to
record your daily thoughts and activities.
JOURNALS AND DIARIES
Perhaps the most personal of personal writing is the diary. You know the one that has a lock and key that
nobody is allowed to read? If you don t have one, and it doesn t have to be locked, you should start one. Just
jot down your thoughts and images as they occur. Keep a written record of things you find amusing or sad,
things that make you angry or happy. You might even record scraps of conversation that you overhear. You ll
be surprised when you actually use some of the things you ve observed to invigorate a stale and boring piece
of writing.
You can also use a journal or diary to record lengthy reactions to your daily experiences. Many people
start writing daily snippets and snatches and then find themselves recording entire pages of detailed narra-
tion about their daily experiences. Not only do these recordings serve as reference tools for future writing,
they also provide a rich personal history for you to examine and re-examine as you grow and change.
Writing also helps you to fully explore the events and emotions of your everyday life. When you least
understand yourself or your friends or family, writing about them can bring focus. Similarly, when you least
understand your feelings, writing about them can give them visibility, and it s always easier to deal with a
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