This week’s video uses Catherine Palmer’s Sunrise Song to demonstrate how even just one sensory detail can animate your settings.
Video Transcription: Unlike movies, which are inherently visual and auditory, written fiction depends solely on the author’s power of description to evoke reaction of the senses from the reader. This is tricky business, since we want to bring the scene to life, but we don’t want to bore the reader with lengthy explanations. The solution is to use highly evocative phrases to pique all five senses. Too often, we focus on sight and sound to the exclusion of taste, touch, and smell. But, because of the limitations of our medium, we can’t afford to waste even one of these senses.
In the opening chapter of Sunrise Song
, Catherine Palmer does a marvelous job of raising her Kenyan setting into the three-dimensional realm thanks to her deft use of a single sensory detail. She writes that “a rich smell of heat and soil and fragrant grasses hung thick in the air.” In an instant, I was transported from merely visualizing the African bush to actually participating in it. Experts claim that smell is the sense connected most integrally to memory, and, as a result, it holds significant power in bringing moments to life.
As you’re writing and rewriting, pay attention to the senses. Look beyond just simple descriptions of how things look, and start thinking about how you can use small telling details to evoke all five senses. Of course, there’s no need to bombard the reader with five descriptions of every scene. But try to balance your use of the senses over the course of your entire story. If you can do that, you’ll be able to pull your reader out of his chair and right into your book.
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Plans are underway to launch a non-fiction series of how-to books on the craft of writing, incorporating some of the information on Wordplay. I would appreciate your input on what subjects you would like me to cover. Please take a minute to vote in the poll and tell me what topic you would find most helpful.
Related Posts: Details: Bringing Fiction to Life
How to Make Your Prose Sing
Are You Using Too Many Settings?
Story by K.M. Weiland
Tags: Description , details , senses , Setting , settings , telling detail , telling details
there's a similar post today on Oasis for YA about using the five senses in makeout scenes (LOL!) but also v. good. Thanks for the insights; this is good stuff~
You always have such awesome vlogs! I definitely leave smell out, when it comes to describing my scenes... time to add it back in, especially as memories are so important to my MC! Glad I watched this today!
Thanks for the reminder! It's so easy to devolve into visual explanations at the expense of the senses that really suck the reader into the scene.
@LTM: Senses just come in so handy all over the place, don't they? ;)
@Elegant: I think the reason we often neglect smell is that it can seem difficult to evoke. But we need just one detail to make it pop.
@Jonathan: Thinking outside the box, in regard to senses, can really bring your writing to life.
I tend to forget smell and touch most often. Thanks for the reminder.
Taste and smell are probably my most neglected senses.
Just remember: a laundry list of senses doesn't help. All it does is tell the reader, "Oh, yeah. I'm supposed to incorporate the senses. Here we go."
Remember to stay in your character's head, too. Make sure the character actually WOULD notice those sorts of things. No waxing poetic about the glorious sunset if he's not the type to use that kind of vocabulary.
Description is all about finding the telling detail. Paragraph after paragraph of description doesn't have near the power of just one precise detail.
I'm actually going back right now and adding smell to a scene... see? We do learn--LOL! No, THANKS!
Love your Vlogs! Always so helpful. For me, the sense of smell is so important. Today I passed a chestnut in bloom and the smell immediately transported me to an event in my childhood. Thanks for the reminder.
I think the reason the mention of the smell of warm dirt was so evocative to me in the example sentence was the connection to fond childhood memories of playing in the dirt. (I was a very dirty child. ;)
Stopped by to vote! Good luck on the writing books!
Thanks so much, Kathryn!
I love that you've touched on this today.
My husband and I took our youth to the Holy Land Experience in Ocala, FL. While I was there, I forced myself to used all five senses, and wrote about them.
I enjoyed working past the usual 'bright sun, green leaves' routine, and went even deeper in the descriptions after I'd written down the basics of them.
This was a fun exercise and I look forward to doing it ALL the time.
I'm still trying to train my mind to notice these things :D
Thanks for the post!
I enjoyed it.
Great post! I've noticed the sense of smell is forgotten sometimes, at least in some stuff I've read. I agree, it really completes the scene. A particular scene in SHIVER by Maggie Stiefvater, uses the sense of smell deliciously. it really opened it up for me. I have to admit description is not my forte, but I'm getting better!
Great topic! Another awesome Vlog ;o)
@Kelly: Sounds like a super exercise. Good for your memory and your imagination both!
@Erica: You're the second person to mention Shiver this week. I'm going to have to take a look at it now!
I have a wolf nose, so of course my main characters often relate to their surroundings through their sense of smell. Evoking a visceral reaction in your reader, either a relaxing of the body and an ahhhh by usuing beautiful sensory imagery, or an ugh and a tightening of the body when describing a bad smell can really make a difference when grabbing the reader. Choosing which to use is just a matter of whether you want to grab them by the throat, or ...laughing...by their imagination.
Great vlog today.
:0)
PS:I voted in the poll. Good luck with the project!
I temporarily warped my sense of smell after a bad cold years ago. I was glad to get it back and put to work researching!
luv this... I am learning to bring my 5 senses to every aspect of my writing. Thanks for the affirmation!
It's a fun exercise. Definitely opens the writing horizons!
Yes! I remembered to add smells and touch. Let's hope it works for the reader. Great video, thanks :)
Good for you!