In Defense of Adjectives and Adverbs

They will tell you not to write with adverbs. In fervent whispers, they will warn of adjectives, too.

Bullshit and bollocks.

Write however the hell you want to. If it entertains, people will like it.

I spent many years trying to write the way they told me to. You know how they do, those English professors, critics, and copy-editors. If only I’d just written what was inside me instead of editing so much, I’d have written a lot more.

All the adverb chopping they recommend won’t make a dull work entertaining, and it damn sure won’t make you any happier.

My recommendations: Read a lot of good writing. Read a little bad writing. Learn from both. And try to find your style, your voice, the way the words flow out from you. Molest that style as little as possible.

Adverbs and adjectives are good writing. Nothing wrong with them at all. Why would they exist otherwise? If adverbs are weak it is only due to a preponderance of weak verbs, right? Adjectives are good, too. They can rescue many a noun that otherwise would need a Thesauran rescue.

You could use too many of either one. Sure. But you can use too many nouns and verbs as well: She stepped into the forest and admired the oaks, pines, sweet gums, birches, willows, dogwoods… You get the idea. When the writing is a snooze, you lose.

If you’re writing from the voice in your head, the voice you inherited, the voice you picked up from reading good authors silently and aloud–please read aloud–then you’ll use the correct number of adjectives and adverbs. And if it’s your voice well executed, then it’s your voice. Maybe your voice needs more adjectives or adverbs.

Of course, you need to use strong descriptive nouns and verbs. The strongest and most specific you can summon without the thesaurus, without deviating from our modern vocabulary. If you do this, surely you can’t overuse adjectives and adverbs.

So, use as many as you want. Use them for color, for pacing, for rhythm, for reason. (When did we forget that words carry a rhythm?) Use them whenever you need them. But what you must not do is use weak words. I think this is the true but poorly stated intention of those who warn against these fine parts of speech.

All words should be as strong as possible. And yet, don’t wreck your mind and style over it. Don’t do as I did for years and ruin all the flow of your writing, slavishly chopping the sentences until they follow the rules of someone who didn’t base their rules on Dickens or Tolkien, Faulkner or Twain, Leiber or Moorcock, or any other superb writers.

Some Examples:

He painted the wall.
He splashed paint on the wall.
He splashed red and gold paint onto the wall.
Methodically, he splashed red and gold paint onto the stucco wall.
Cursing in violent spasms, he slung red and gold paint onto the weeping stucco wall.

Nothing wrong with any of these sentences, though the first two without adjectives or adverbs are a bit boring. And yet, maybe the first isn’t so dull. Maybe it’s leading somewhere:

He painted the wall. Red and gold. Methodically. Violently. The stucco had wept for ages, yet it wept for good reason now.

So, when they tell you how to write without adjectives and adverbs, conjure many grains of salt and remember: Since they are not you, you must do the writing. It is your writing, not theirs.