Sin and Syntax: How to Craft Wicked Good Prose

by Constance Hale

Inspired by these examples, go to a favorite restaurant for a meal. Write three capsule reviews—no more than a paragraph in length—each from a different point of view. Notice how the point of view changes the tenor of the review, and whether a certain point of view allows you to write in a way that sounds like you—or like a different you.

the transformative power of verbs. They add drama to a random grouping of other words, producing an event, a happening, a moment to remember. And they kick-start sentences: without them, words would simply cluster together in suspended animation, waiting for something to click.

We often call them action words, but verbs can

also carry sentiments (love, fear, lust, disgust), hint at cognition (sense, know), bend ideas together (falsify, prove), assert possession (have, hold), and c...

static (is, seem, stay) and dynamic (whistle, ...

The ur-verb, the essential verb, to be, is chief among the static verbs, which either express a state of being or quietly allow nouns...

link starlet nouns and adjectives without demanding a...

Dynamic ...

are the verbs we tend to think of when we define verbs ...

to be as the ultimate existential verb, whether in its present-tense form (am, are, is), its past-tense form (was, were), or its other, more vexing forms (is being, had been, might have been).

wimp verbs (appear, seem, become). Often, these allow a writer to hedge (on an observation, description, or opinion) rather than commit to an idea:

sensing verbs (feel, look, taste, smell, and sound), which have dual identities: they are dynamic in some sentences and static in others.

static verbs lack punch.

the key bit of data to know about a verb is whether it is transitive or intransitive (that is, whether or not it takes an object). That’s why you’ll see that the first note provided about verbs in most dictionaries is v.t or v.i.

Grammarians and schoolteachers often prefer the terms “passive” and “active” for verbs, sometimes calling the former “linking” or “copulative.”

verbs also can have a quality known as voice, which can be passive or active.

the most important distinction to understand is how verbs function in a sentence, and how they interact with other words.

static verbs indicate stasis (nothing going on, a boring state of affairs) and dynamic ones indicate drama (intensity, high-powered happenings.)

Dynamic verbs, on the other hand, deliver punches, jabs, and left hooks. They are the classic action words,

They give us an instant picture of an image (to walk, to w...

third, subordinate class, verbs gather around other verbs, acting as accomplices. These auxiliary or “helping” verbs—may, might, could, should, would, have, can, must, will, as well as am, are, is, was, were—are mere sidekicks, symbiotically attaching themselves to a main verb in a combo called a “verb phrase.” Helping verbs exist mainly to conjugate tenses (she was swordfighting, she had been swordfighting) and to indicate volition (will swordfight), possibility (can swordfight), or obligation (must swordfight). They also step in to help express a negative (she does not swordfight), to transform a thought into a question (Would she swordfight?), and to emphasize (She will swordfight, won’t she?).

it is the verb that determines whether a writer is a wimp or a wizard.

Novices tend to rely on is and other static verbs and lose momentum by stumbling into the passive voice (more on that in a moment). The pros make strong nouns and dynamic verbs the heart of their style; verbs make their prose quiver.

static verbs pour out naturally when we write or speak—they ar...

Some writers devote one entire revision to verbs, circling every is and are and trying to replace as many as possible. Eventually, dynamic verbs will start flowing from the get-go.

just deleting is and are doesn’t suffice.

Verbs like has, does, goes, gets, and puts are all dynamic, but they don’t let us envision the action. Why have a character go when he could gambol, shamble, lumber, lurch, sway, swagger, and sashay? Why settle for a verb like...

thirty dynamic verbs and—count ’em—four linkers. (Every writer should adopt this eight-to-one ratio.)

doesn’t even let the reader remain static.

implores the reader to engage.

he lets verbs pinch-hit as adjectives.

The form of an active verb ending in -ing or -ed is known as a participle; participles give you another way to load up on action.

use active verbs to make inanimate things animate,

ANOTHER WAY TO PERK up prose is to eliminate what’s known as “the passive voice.”

Voice refers to the form of a verb that shows the relationship between the subject and the action expressed by the verb.

In the active voice, the subject performs the action. In the passive voice, th...

the active voice, the subject...

show, followed by a dyn...

The subject is the agent, the person or thing ta...

The action flows briskly from the subject, through the ve...

the passiv...

Here, the subject is the recipient o...

some of the flattest writing around suffers from inert verbs and the unintended use of the passive voice.