Words Fail Me (8 page)

Are your ears ringing yet?

The lesson is listen. Think about how your modifiers sound alongside the words they modify. If you don't want to call attention to them, don't make them rhyme or jingle. If you do want to attract attention, be certain it's the right kind. You wouldn't want to use the lighthearted term
legal eagle,
for instance, in a solemn eulogy for a dignified lawyer. Ask yourself: Is this the effect I want? And remember that jingling references to people may have derogatory overtones:
fat cat, plain Jane, shock jock, wise guys, rude dude, wheeler dealer, boy toy.
Those are just the clean ones.

Be sure there's a reason for your rhymes. You'll turn out more inviting writing.

One of the big stories of the 1970's, when I was a copy editor for the
Des Moines Register,
was the energy crisis. If people weren't at home fiddling with their thermostats, they were waiting in long lines at the gas station. (Luckily, I drove a Beetle.) Everyone seemed to be talking about OPEC and the geography of the Middle East, home of oil-rich Kuwait. No, not Kuwait—
oil-rich Kuwait
. The name "Kuwait" never appeared alone.

Oil-rich Kuwait
introduced me to a literary phenomenon: the prefabricated phrase that appears on cue, saving writers the trouble of coming up with fresh modifiers. These preassembled packages, as I soon learned, are almost everywhere. In a prefab weather report, for example, plain old hail never falls from the sky, only
golf-ball-size
(sometimes
baseball-size) hail.

You've probably read articles that sound like this:
Hastily summoned,
the world leaders
seriously considered
the
broad initiatives
and issued a
measured response
that promised
sweeping change
to deal with the
overwhelming odds
that threatened their
inextricably linked
economies.

When descriptive writing is prefabricated, the reader is never surprised. A
question
is
searching, a grip
is
viselike,
a
bungalow
is
modest, clouds
are
threatening
, a
source
is
reliable,
a
transfusion
is
life-giving
, an
escape
is
narrow
, a
hopeful
is either
young
or
presidential, reactions
are
knee-jerk,
and that famous
knoll
is always
grassy.
Still, if you insist on
using a prefab expression, at least get it right. I recently saw a real estate ad declaring that a house was "one of its kind." Yes, I'm sure it was.

Modifiers should be fresh, alive, interesting, not predictable. So if a descriptive phrase springs to mind, preassembled and ready to use, put it back in the box.

Adjectives and adverbs are supposed to add flavor to your writing, but puny, useless ones only water it down. We toss around these disposable modifiers without really thinking. Come to think of it,
really
is a good example.

It's easy to find throwaways in your writing—just use the Search function in your word processor and look for
very, a little, a bit, pretty, somewhat, sort of, kind of, really, rather
, and
actually
. If a word does nothing but take up space, it's disposable. So dispose of it.

Very,
in particular, can become a meaningless tic. Imagine a speech before the Chamber of Commerce:
I'm
very
proud, and
very
honored, to accept this
very
distinguished award on behalf of Mr. Dithers, who is
very
sorry that he could not be here on this
very
special night.

A latecomer,
overly,
has started showing up in negative sentences. These days, we aren't overly surprised to read sentences like this:
Ariadne's dissertation is not
overly
original.

I'm not saying that these words are all bad all the time. If what you're after is an informal, chatty tone, perhaps in first-person fiction or a breezy office memo, then
very, a bit, somewhat,
and the rest of the crew might be appropriate. And if you're legitimately using them to
make a point, go right ahead.
How late is Ariadne's dissertation? It's
very
late.

When they're overused, though, such words as
very
are no longer modifiers. They're mere filler, really. (Or do I mean
actually?
)

No matter how we love them, modifiers aren't much good if they're in the wrong place. A word or a phrase may be colorful, even essential, but it can't properly describe something if it's attached to something else.

Here's the kind of unsuitable attachment I mean:
At sixty,
those tight swim trunks still make Burt look like a hunk.
The descriptive phrase
at sixty
is supposed to describe Burt, but it's attached to
those tight swim trunks.
Unless the trunks are sixty years old, the modifier is in the wrong place. Put it closer to Burt:
At sixty,
Burt still looks like a hunk in those tight swim trunks.
(Okay, Burt, you can breathe now.)

That one was easy. You could have guessed that Burt was sixty, not the swim trunks. But some sentences with badly placed modifiers are harder to figure out:
Tina surprised Harry
wearing her new pumps.

Who was in the pumps, Tina or Harry? Hey, you never know. Since two people are mentioned before the modifying phrase,
wearing her new pumps,
the reader has to guess who's being described. One possibility:
Wearing her new pumps,
Tina surprised Harry.
Another:
Tina surprised Harry as he was
wearing her new pumps.

Most of the time, poorly placed modifiers are harmless. The writer may look silly, but the reader knows what's
meant. Only a mind reader could figure this one out:
Paul didn't see Vincent
well.

Try this:
Vincent wasn't
well
when Paul saw him.
Or:
Paul didn't see
well
when he met Vincent.
For the second meaning, I'd prefer
Paul didn't see Vincent
clearly.

Imagine you're a food consultant who's been asked to revive a failing restaurant's bill of fare. Your initial proposal might read:
I recommend a radically new menu featuring
pumpkin
ravioli, fettuccine, and linguine.

Now read the sentence again, and keep your eye on the
pumpkin.
Since it comes at the head of the list, it could refer to all the pasta in the series, not just the ravioli. How fond of pumpkin are you? Do you really want to serve
pumpkin
ravioli,
pumpkin
fettuccine, and
pumpkin
linguine? If so, lots of luck. But if there's supposed to be only one pumpkin dish on the menu, this is a ridiculously easy problem to solve. When an adjective garnishes only one item in a list, put that item last:
I recommend a radically new menu featuring fettuccine, linguine, and
pumpkin
ravioli.

The same problem can crop up with an adverb in a series. You might write this in a brochure for a health spa:
Our clients
vigorously
exercise, diet, and meditate.
Or:
Our clients diet, meditate, and exercise
vigorously.
Oh, really? In each case, the modifier,
vigorously,
seems to cover the whole list. Unless these dynamos believe in doing everything vigorously, even meditating, make it:
Our clients diet, meditate, and
vigorously
exercise.

Putting the modified item last is usually the best solution. With a list of verbs, though, that's not always possible.
Back at the fat farm, suppose you're describing a normal day's routine and you'd like to keep things chronological:
After lunch, clients
lightly
nap, lift weights, and shower.

Huh? Your patrons probably don't lift weights lightly or shower lightly. But you'd like your list of activities to stay in the same order. In that case, move the adverb (
lightly
) to follow the verb it belongs with (nap):
After lunch, clients nap
lightly,
lift weights, and shower.
There's no way a reader would misunderstand that sentence, even skimming lightly.

A phrase that's placed inappropriately in a series can contaminate all the items that follow. Here's a sentence you might find on a Web page for gardeners:
Fungicides are useless against bacteria
that infect plants,
viruses, and insects.

Exactly how helpless are these fungicides? Are they useless only against bacteria—the kinds that infect plants and viruses and insects? Or are they useless against three different plagues: bacteria, viruses, and insects? If we assume the writer means all three plagues, the solution, again, is to move the confusing phrase,
that infect plants
, to the end of the sentence:
Fungicides are useless against viruses, insects, and bacteria
that infect plants.

For some writers, once is not enough. They don't beat a dead horse; they beat a
totally
dead horse. They use modifiers that say the same thing as the words they modify. For them, every fact is a
true
fact. They don't expedite; they
speedily
expedite. They don't smell a stench; they smell a
malodorous
stench. In other words, they're redundant. Or as they might put it,
superfluously
redundant.

You might receive a business memo like this from one of these writers:

My
final conclusion
is that
preliminary planning
and
exploratory research
by
qualified experts
have
assuredly guaranteed
the
successful triumph
of our
latest new
product. Now that it's
completely finished
, and the
initial debut
is
imminently approaching,
I'm
happily elated
to report that any
perplexing problems
have been
definitively resolved.
Our only competitor of
major significance
is
rigidly inflexible
and
indifferently oblivious
of
market demand.
It's not an
unexpected surprise
that consumers are responding to our
campaign drive
with
positive affirmation.
I suggest that we not only
doggedly persist
in our
prearranged strategy
but also
widely expand
it by offering
free gifts.
Don't you feel like that totally dead horse by now?

Back in junior high, my friends and I used to trade Tom Swift jokes. The pattern was always the same: a remark by the fictional Tom Swift, followed by the punch line—an adverb. One in particular had me rolling on the floor: "
That's the last time I'll put my arm in a lion's mouth," said Tom
offhandedly.
(I was easily amused in those days.)

Tom Swifties were funny because their modifiers could be read two ways, one of them apparently unintentional. The more outrageous they were, the funnier. But if you don't intend to be funny, beware of descriptive words or phrases that could seem ridiculous if taken literally. Readers will do a double-take if you describe a painting as
priceless
and then give the price it sold for at auction. Likewise, don't say that an invoice is
generally
specific
, or that a stock fund has
gradually
skyrocketed
, or that a squabbling committee is
wholly
divided
. Unless you're making a play on words (
Canapès
lead a
hand-to-mouth
existence
), be on the lookout for collisions like these:

You may leave the table, Dennis, when your plate is
fully
empty.

Fashion models are
largely
size four.

Dad
clearly
misunderstood.

Kirstie finds acupuncture
intensely
relaxing.

The gnat is
vastly
minuscule and its brain is
immensely tiny.

Yves likes his coffee
mildly
strong.

Little Ricky will grow taller
shortly.

Boris's intentions became
vaguely
clearer.

Marcel will
presently
fill us in on the past.

The Blandingses bought the house
completely
unfinished.

For the Cratchits, poverty was
richly
rewarding.

Madalyn
religiously
attended Atheists Anonymous.