The other day I found this quote by Hawthorne:
Words—so innocent and powerless as they are, as standing in a dictionary, how potent for good and evil they become, in the hands of one who knows how to combine them
I believe he hit the nail right on the head. Did you ever think about the effects your writing will have on others? It is a challenge to writers to write for the good of society. I also wonder how many of us will benefit society by our writings.
My journalism teacher has given me many words of wisdom. One of her most recent admonitions was for her students to set to work removing clichés from their writing. Clichés are phrases that have been used over and over in journalistic writing and have lost their original force of meaning. Therefore, journalists should avoid them.
I will not get involved in any heated arguments to keep clichés. However, it has been a real challenge to cast aside every vestige of the cursed cliché.
Journalists face an uphill battle in finding them in their writing. Some journalists charge a dime a dozen for clichés. Many times, it is so crystal clear that someone’s writing contains too many clichés.
I personally believe that they are blessings in disguise. They force the writer to thin about what he is writing. Then he must implement a reign of terror to destroy them.
In my writing, I believe I am trying to go beyond the tip of the iceberg. I believe only a few clichés are still at large in my writing. And I can smell a rat! If I find one, it will be sudden death.
The scales are tipped in my favor now that my teacher has helped me find them. It seems like such a clear-cut issue to me now. I am trying to implement clear thinking to track them down.
My teacher’s admonition did not fall on deaf ears. Only time will tell if clichés have been eradicated from my writing.
For those of you who don’t know if you struggle with clichés, go look up what a cliché is and several examples of them. Then re-read this post. I think it will provide some helpful insight onto how to remove them from your writing.
[Edited Sept. 23 at 5:12 p.m. Changes include several verb changes, paragraphing and one confusing illogically connected sentence.]
