Cliche Spot - Cliche Swat

ceka

Cliches are like buzzflies. They get everywhere. I was lambasted for these myself some time ago and then, alerted, kept picking them up in friends' work I've been reading, and today when I went back to a children's novel of mine that I need to upgrade ... OMG did I need to upgrade it! Cliches! AARRGH! Now I know what to look for, they just punch up off the pages at me. The delete button has never been so energetically used!
Watch it, everyone. Cliches are Story-killers, editors hate them but the sneaky little sods keep creepin' in ... Spot 'em and swat 'em!

flyingtart

Cliches to me are like a red rag to a bull.

lexia

I have a stock of cliches that I know like the back of my hand.

Carol

Trouble is some old clich

Nutmeg

[quote=lexia]I have a stock of cliches that I know like the back of my hand. [/quote]
*looks at the back of my hand*
oo, that's new

:D

sorry...old joke

Michael Scott

[quote=ceka]Cliches are like buzzflies. They get everywhere. I was lambasted for these myself some time ago and then, alerted, kept picking them up in friends' work I've been reading, and today when I went back to a children's novel of mine that I need to upgrade ... OMG did I need to upgrade it! Cliches! AARRGH! Now I know what to look for, they just punch up off the pages at me. The delete button has never been so energetically used!
Watch it, everyone. Cliches are Story-killers, editors hate them but the sneaky little sods keep creepin' in ... Spot 'em and swat 'em! [/quote]


The strangest thing. . .

There are all these "rules" according to teachings (not least from 'How to') books that writers like to discuss and frown upon those who do not follow. However, in discussion with agents, editors, or upon reading parts of published novels, these rules seem to be random myths.

If you write a basic three-act story -Hero, villian, love interest, and optional dog, and tale contains conflict and resolution, by definition - your entire story is a cliche! ;o)

Phots Moll

[quote=Michael Scott]If you write a basic three-act story -Hero, villian, love interest, and optional dog, and tale contains conflict and resolution, by definition - your entire story is a cliche! ;o) [/quote] I wouldn't call that a cliche. It's not an original formula, but each time it's used, it will (or should) create an original story.

Cliches have a place, but should be reserved for the occassions when you actually want to use a cliche. The danger, I believe, is in allowing them to slip unoticed into your stories.

btw, I once had a short story published some time after it'd been published. When I read it in the mag, I was surprised by the number of cliches. I checked my original ms and discovered the editor had added these. So, use of cliches will vary according to the market.

ceka

Several people I know got a very long way in a competition last year with their novels, a very reputable literary agency was looking for work to put forward and the remit was 'Are you ready to submit'. Despite having got to the last 14 from 1000 entries, two of us were pulled up sharply for 'cliches'. We went looking for them and found quite a lot! A similar comment on another work damned 'cliches' too. So from experience I have learned that, for the sort of writing I do (and I want to be published not just in my lovely womags but Out There one day) to avoid them where possible - and can only suggest that you be very aware of what you are writing, the market you are writing for - and maybe ask if the cliche is a buzzfly or a honeybee.

Bill

'...avoid them where possible...'

Usually, when we find them we re-word them. Sometimes it is not possible to actually avoid what the cliche is saying, we just have to be more inventive and use them in a different way.
Whereas single words have become compressed metaphors, cliches [in context] are compressed paragraphs - shorthand signposts taken off the shelf.

When a writer avoids the cliche the reader THINKS it.
If the character goes to her local beach, a remote beach she uses every day and never ever sees anyone, and one morning see she sees, strolling along the sea's edge ...

... I can hear you thinking...

LeeH

I was horrified the other week when Ceka pointed out how many cliches I'd used. I'd never noticed them before. It certainly wasn't a plain as the nose on my face to me... so it's now one more thing on the cecklistt before submitting. I'm a computer programmer by trade so might write a program with all the cliches I can find and it'll do a sweep of your file for them. It'd also check for new sentences starting with either 'And' or 'Then' count up th amount of ;'s and basically any other bad habits I get pulled up for lol

ceka

(No you can't, my thoughts move very very quietly,Bill!)

Cliches are comforting, following on from what you say. The reader thinks them, as above, and if the writer then puts them in the story, the reader can connect with the story. Nothing wrong with that - up to a point. But if one wishes to be original and produce as original a piece as possible, using one's own words and descriptions ... then one ought not to be so bloomin' lazy as to use ...

Oh sod it, I can't think of a single cliche to do with a beach!

Someone else will have to take up your story, Bill!

Jay Mandal

Think films with the actor who was in African Queen; and Lauren Bacall or the other one. Oh, what's it called? Not Marrakhesh [sp]. Two words.

Jay Mandal

Also, not the only pebble on the beach/fish in the sea.

Jay Mandal

You know, "Play it, Sam."

Jay Mandal

Casablanca. (Morocco = M.)

Bill

CEKA

heard this on tv last night:

' an owl friend of mine got engaged, I said "you twit, to who" ' ;-)

Carol

The only time you can actually get away with cliches is when you have a character who is the sort to use them! ;)

*SA*

My new MS word has a grammar and style option on the spellcheck thing. It picks up on everything, waggling a stern, green electronic finger at me if I even try to use cliches, passive voice, etc. I was very glad when I discovered that tool, and pleased when I realised I hadn't used much in the way of cliche or passive voice, though there was enough in there that may have caused a problem had I submitted my MS to agents two drafts ago. ;)

*SA*

Jay Mandal

I'm not sure why the passive is considered such a problem.

*SA*

[quote=Jay Mandal]I'm not sure why the passive is considered such a problem.[/quote]

I know. I found I had to keep a couple of them in there, because if you're writing 1st person/ past tense, there's some times you can't avoid a bit of passive voice without changing the whole sentence into something completely different. What's wrong with saying "I was being followed"? I don't want to say "Someone was following me", because I don't like how that sounds, and how else would my character say she was tied up without saying "I was tied up"?
My main problem, it seems, is wordiness (saying "He was really gone this time", is a problem, apparently), and my overuse of fragments. I like fragments. I've fixed a lot of them, but kept most in, because that's just, well, my style. So there. :P
Should I change my style for fear of rejection? Hmmm...

*SA*

Lolli

mainly because it is used in academic writing rather than creative writing. It affects readability of a piece

louise

What about clique characters? The wild-haired scientist, the ditsy blonde, the "I'm free" gay man/hard-as-nails gay woman, geek wearing glasses (if a woman, she's ends up taking off her glasses, lets down her hair and is TRANFORMED. Do they matter?

Stan2

The squeaky voiced vicar. The rebellious teenager.

ceka

Do any of them with enough originality and they'll probably pass!

Michael Scott

Firstly, you need to separate narrative and plot cliches from dialogue cliches. There is nothing wrong with dialogue cliches - people use cliches.

Narrative cliches, are fine in 'active' narrative - Although forbidden in simple US writing.

I have a story that 'writers' hate. In the 'real world' it is very popular. In 20,000 words, it references or parodies over 300 other works, characters and cliches - because it's supposed to. Many comedies are written this way.

Nefertari

I agree Michael. I have written a book in first person- a teen voice. She's bound to think in the odd cliche isn't she?

doodle

Ceka - Life's a Beach...
Avoid cliches - altogether now - LIKE THE PLAGUE. As writers, we can think up new ones, then they're not cliches to start with and when they become cliches it means your writing has spread wide and you're famous, hurrah!
As thin as...

... a 'B' movie plot
Your go...

Michael Scott

Avoiding an obvious cliche is more embarrassing than using it. It sticks out like a sow's ear.

Stan2

And at the end of day, standing out like a sow's ear is a cliche and must by all means be avoided.

Stan2

Once upon a time, in our day and generation, a grey haired old man said....

Island Girl

Perhaps everyone is a bit more base and rank down here because I've always heard it to be "it sticks out like dog's balls." (Sorry, but that's what it is) Although as with everything else here, it's often given the abbreviated treatment so you'll most likely hear, "it sticks out like doggy's". The "sow's ear" one is when someone is trying to turn a sow's ear into a silk purse, or make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, or something like that.

Oh, I just thought of another one. It sticks out like a sore thumb. (Or is it a toe?) Hmmm...

fay

It is fairly easy to spot an old, well used cliche, but how about thinking up new cliches? I have tried this and it is really hard. "Bleeding like a motorway rabbit" was one I used recently. I think "sticks out like a dog's balls" is great. Who can come up with a few more?

LeeH

Well, I trundled away and have made a cliche checker. Although I got carried away and it's now also a text editor, has a random name generator, a little scratch-pad text box for making notes etc. Only have 2500 cliches at the moment. But just ran it on a 37,000 word manuscript and found the likes of.

Flown the coop
part and parcel
sweating like a pig
ugly as sin

So gonna run all my stories through it.

Nefertari

That sounds good how did u do that?

LeeH

I'm a computer programmer for a living.

Just added a character creator part too, to keep details of your character only a click away.

I'll polish the code over the weekend and then if anyone wants a copy (for free) they can.

Also added a Bad-Traits checker. It goes through looking for occurences of starting a sentence with 'And' or 'Then'

If anyone else can think of anything useful to add by all means let me know and I'll see about adding them.

Jay Mandal

Favourite words is another - but, if you're aware what they are, Word will find them for you (and may even count them). I scatter 'just' everywhere.

LeeH

If anyone would find that sort of thing useful I'll add it in. You type in what word you wish to know amount of usage of and click a button.

Lolli

wow Lee. It sounds like a really useful tool. I'd definitely like a free copy when it's been teaked to cater for everything.

Carol

I have to keep an eye out (:)) for sentences starting 'well'.

ceka

Dear Lee,
I'll be watching and waiting ...

Stan2

I have a habit of asking too many questions.

Liz

Poetry is easier as you have to think about every word and part of poetry is thinking up new ways to describe things. But I still find my self using terms I have before, and phrasing in a similar way... we are creatures of habit, part of our codes which help us to do every day tasks without having to think them through each time...

It's a hard life being a writer.

Stan2

I overuse 'very' but then cut them out when editing.

LeeH

I'll add in the starting with 'Well' too.

I'll release a beta version that I know works this weekend. The text editor is up and running smoothly and prints as you'd want. The name generator doesn't crash, the cliche spotter hasn't failed either. The cliche checker could do with help from everyone, I've added over 2000 but need more, so if you email me a list of things you want to look out for or cliches I can add it easily into the code. Email can be found in accounts info.

Col B

Nice one, Lee.

I'm 'at the end of my tether' with this cliche lark.
But opinion-wise I suppose it's all 'swings n roundabouts' anyway.
;)
I cringe when I find one n it's too late, so I'm interested in your 'checker program' Lee.