Descriptions: How Many Words?

Are you a victim of common words? Do you use the same words over and over to describe a character, place or thing? Take a look inside this column to see the many sides of common and mirror words.

Descriptions: How Many Words?
BY: Miss Hanako Megumi



When writing a story, book or novelette there are many things to consider. Some of these things can be so overwhelming that we forget to remember our words.

Common Words-

I call them common words because they are words that are always used as describers.

Angry, tempted, annoyed, used, remembered, sad, mad, selfish and loving.

All these words are common words or ROOT words. Being the main word with many different meanings. In writing it is possible to use common words in a sentence many times over, but think about how it reads, looks and sounds.

EX.

Daniel was so mad at Elisa, his anger caused him to be mad several times a day. Being mad at Elisa was indeed a good talent of Daniel. Since they were brother and sister being mad at each other was almost common in their house.

end EX.

See how "Mad" used over and over again seems over used? In the first sentence I replaced "Mad" with "Anger" both mean the same thing, but both are two different words.

You'll find that often people, or even yourself, fall victim to using common words over and over again. Here is your solution.

Depending on what type of computer you have, and what type of word processor you can look in your dictionary. Most word processors have built in dictionaries. Including Neo-Office, Microsoft Word and many others.
ALSO, computers themselves such as G4's, G5's, New Dell Computers and even Laptops have built in dictionaries.
For Mac users with G5 Computers your dictionary lies in your DASHBOARD, which can be found in APPLICATIONS or on your floating bar on the bottom of your computer screen.


If you DO NOT have a brand new computer there's still hope. For those less unfortunate to own a over priced computer there's a small place called Thesarus.com- and this small place is a very useful Thesaurus.

Simply go to-http://thesaurus.reference.com

Here you will be able to look at the many other words which mean Angry, Sad, Annoyed or any other you can think of! A place like this is well worth the visit every now and then.

MIRROR WORDS-

Mirror words are words with the same meaning as another. They mirror the emotion and are often used to make a sentence or paragraph easier to read.

EX. 1- ANGER (Noun)

Mirror Words-Her face was livid with Anger, Rage, Exasperation, Displeasure, Fury, Wrath, Fire...

Verbs- Infuriate, Irritate, Peeve, Vex, Madden and Annoy.



There are many different meanings, to many different words. Sometimes a sentence sounds better with the same "Meaning" but a different "Word"

EX.2

Martha was so angered by his reply that she infurtiated John even more by accusing him of maddening her. The two went on for a bit, arguing with each other till each of then had vexed each other to the core.

E.

So you see, by merely using different words we have made the sentence much easier to read. We're still announcing the emotion of ANGER, but we're using "Mirror" words to accomplish it.

Well, I hope that in some ways this helps you understand the need for different words. Remember, you can always over-use a word, and you don't want that to happen.

Sayounara!