Writerly Rambling: Repetition, Repetition, Repetition

One of my friends pointed me towards a rather strange sentence recently, and after reading it over and over and over again, I eventually caved and went to see its wikipedia page. The sentence, which makes grammatical sense, reads as follows:

“Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo, buffalo Buffalo buffalo.”

Okay, on the count of three, everyone say ‘huh?’. One…two…okay just kidding. But to give you an idea of how it works, check out this WikiWorld comic:

Cool huh? Says a lot about the cyclical nature of bullying amongst cattle-like creatures (yes, cattle can be dangerous). But perhaps more importantly, as a writer it raises a very important point about repetition. Repitition is confusing, amusing and in some cases tedious. So if you’re going to use it, make sure you have a really good reason to do so.

One of the most obvious words that gets overused with repetition is the humble ‘said’, typically used as a dialogue marker. For example:

“Hi,” Warrick said. “Hi yourself,” Leon said. “Okay, looks like someone got up on the wrong side of bed today,” Warrick said. “There’s only one side of my bed to get out on,” Leon said. “The left. The right hand side is up against the wall.” “Uh, that’s a figure of speech, Leon,” Warrick said. “Is it?” Leon said. “Should I be wearing a sign saying ‘Note Sarcasm’?” “If this is about last night, “I’m sorry okay?” Warrick said. “I just get protective about my things.” “I am not one of your things,” Leon said. “Okay, that came out wrong,” Warrick said. “I meant about people I care about.”

Note how the constant use of “Leon said,” and “Warrick said,” bog down the dialogue and make it drag, not to mention rather boring. What this has lead to is a lot of people trying to find other things to use as dialogue markers. For example.

“Hi,” Warrick waved. “Hi yourself,” Leon laughed scornfully, not looking up from his textbook. “Okay, looks like someone got up on the wrong side of bed today,” Warrick said hesitantly. “There’s only one side of my bed to get out on,” Leon grumped. “The left. The right hand side is up against the wall.” “Uh, that’s a figure of speech, Leon,” Warrick said. “Is it?” Leon scathed. “Should I be wearing a sign saying ‘Note Sarcasm’?” “If this is about last night, “I’m sorry okay?” Warrick apologised. “I just get protective about my things.” “I am not one of your things,” Leon snapped. “Okay, that came out wrong,” Warrick whined. “I meant about people I care about.”

Once again, this is different, and removes *some* of the ubiquitous ‘said’s, but they’re still there, and the actual flow of the piece hasn’t improved. Also some of it just does make sense. While you can wave in greeting, you can ‘wave’ a vocalisation. You can wave and vocalise, but that’s two separate actions. . . . → Read More: Writerly Rambling: Repetition, Repetition, Repetition