Literary Cliches To Avoid
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Literary Cliches To Avoid
Personally, I try not to make too big a fuss over avoiding cliches -- I don't like feeling like I can't do something just because it's been done before. It's just too limiting. And if you really think about it, the very act of avoiding cliches has become something of a cliche. But I digress. To some extent, they definitely do weaken writing, especially when overused. So what goes on your all-time list of literary cliches to avoid?
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Avoiding a cliche isn't a cliche:
"A cliché or cliche (pronounced UK: /ˈkliːʃeɪ/, US: /klɪˈʃeɪ/) is an expression, idea, or element of an artistic work which has been overused to the point of losing its original meaning or effect, rendering it a stereotype, especially when at some earlier time it was considered meaningful or novel."
It is still meaningful to avoid cliche as, by avoiding it your writing retains meaning and cannot therefore be a cliche.
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Top of the list: 'It was all a dream'.
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I just read Philip K. Dick's A Maze of Death.... so yeah, feelin' this one real hard. ಠ_ಠ
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Oh but at least you know the PKD was one of the first. That's just his style. He's a genius, and to stop myself from going on and on about PKD, I'll ask, have you read Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
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Verily.
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Am I wrong or is that the book that that Harrison Ford from from the early 90s was based on? Vague statement, I know...
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Blade Runner? Yes.
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Yeah that's the one! Haha.
Thanks.
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I used to read WordUp magazine.
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hahah i didn't see that you posted this
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This one kills me, tbh
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I used to read Word Up magazine
Salt'n'Pepa and Heavy D up in the limousine
Hangin' pictures on my wall
Every Saturday Rap Attack, Mr. Magic, Marley Marl
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Good vs. evil.
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Agree with sixleaf.
Beyond Good and Evil anyone?
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less evil vs. evil is always fun. i think of Marv from Sin City
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(Unrelated side note: I like how the first three people to post in this thread have cats as user pictures.)
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Women with cats is a cliche to avoid :-)
Good vs. evil reminds me of any/other dichotomies; strong versus weak, black versus white, all or nothing, weak and poor, etc. We need some shading and shadows in there!
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As another woman with a cat I'd like to add writers with cats. (Mark Twain anyone?)
I agree with dichotomies as a cliche. They smack of simplicity to me and life is just not that cut-and-dried. At least mine isn't.
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Hemingway loved cats
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Dichotomies, I suppose that's one to avoid. Though, even though my characters seem like exact opposites at first, who says black and white can't be similar in the sense that they're both 2 bit and colours?
Also, another pretty common cliche would be male bosses. Hey, who says females can't own coffee shops or diners?
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All plots and character arcs can usually be distilled into a simple dichotomy: positive versus negative. How we dress it up is what matters.
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Too much talking & thinking & feeling and not enough acting & interacting.
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Also: name-dropping & quotations without any clear reason why those people or passages are relevant to the character arc(s).
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"Strong" female character, and then suddenly the only "strong-enough" dude in the entire world shows up to win her.
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That's the worst.
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Testify! You hit the nail on the head;) Also: redemption after fall from grace.
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When people think "strong female character" means they have to be a warrior or a goddess, when "character who is strongly written and relatable" would be a better guideline. I don't like reading about perfect women-- I can't relate to them!
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YES. My character is kind of on the edge. She falls over the edge during the story. But I like her. I think if she weren't a figment of my imagination, we'd have coffee together. Would NEVER have coffee with Artemis. Kinda scary.
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Egad... I was in a writing program wherein people always complained that women (and girls) who made bad decisions were poor representations of women and didn't we need stronger women??? I remember we read a book about the development of a feminist and it started with her childhood and teenaged years--you know, all those years where she is figuring out her place and she finds that she is used and manipulated in a multitude of ways, and all this eventually helps her form herself into a person of self-worth and strength. The writing students all sat around complaining about her being a weak representation of a woman... it was annoying. You don't come out of the womb strong and self-sufficient. It has to grow and be built. I believe in showing that in my characters. (Of course I was always criticized for that by the other students--my characters had weaknesses! gasp!)
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So with you there! Ugh. "Strong female character" has become one of those phrases I can't stand. Why can't we just have characters who are female and developed? It seems that the harder someone tries to write/portray a "strong female character", the less developed she ends up being.
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This is the moment the reader has been waiting for; the prose is beautiful and the action is intense, the two are staring each other down, a knife flies through the air, and then,
OUT OF NO WHERE SOMEONE ELSE SAVES THE MC AND THE DAY WOO.
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Completely satisfying and fulfilling endings. You know, the kind that make you feel great about the world. "Happily ever after" and whatnot
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Oh, even worse than that though is a story that is clearly intended to make sure that you leave the book feeling really crappy about how crappy the whole world is... as if the writer just really wants you to be as depressed about life as s/he is. Crazy indulgent and annoying to me.
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This. Although in fairness, I don't mind whether an ending is happy or sad as long as it feels appropriate for the story being told. In either case I prefer a couple of threads left loose for my imagination to work on :)
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Where's the "LIKE" button!?
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The opposite error from good-vs.-evil and other dichotomies is gray-vs.-gray or, even worse, black-vs.-black, to the point of darkness-induced audience apathy (hello, I'm looking at you, Cormac McCarthy). And the opposite error from the cliché Hollywood happy ending is the "shoot the shaggy dog" downer ending out of contempt for happy endings, for the same reason. Happy endings should be earned, and so should unhappy ones.
Oh, and "deus ex machina" in any form must die 10,000 deaths.
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Agreed-- I think if you're gonna throw in magic gems that save the day it's worth it to go back and foreshadow their usefulness at least a little.
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Totally agree re: Cormac McCarthy. The first I read was 'The Road' and it got to the point where I wanted them all to die so I could stop reading.
My plot for this year has gods in it, so deus ex machinae are going to be heavily lampshaded.
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Yes. Need I say more?
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You make me think of Hubert Selby, Jr.
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Love at first sight. Or, as a friend has dubbed it, the "Twilight Insta-Love Phenomenon."
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So true. So true. XD
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hahaha I love your synopsis
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Surly, cynical character must for some contrived reason care for an innocent child, suddenly gets in touch with himself and turns into a likable person. Yuck.
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Like that whole sub plot in Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants with the Cynical Girl Meets Precocious Kid with Cancer...
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Awww...I kinda lerv darkness-induced audience apathy...it's why I find re-reading Cormac McCarthy's _Blood Meridian_ to be so relaxing. I read it over and over and over...it's a huge break from Real Life, where Good vs. Evil conflicts pop up all the time—at least in my life they do. When I wanna relax with some well-written LitFic, who needs conflict? Bleak bleak and more bleak is velly velly nice....(getting punchy waiting for my first ever NaNo to start, in case you can't tell =laugh=)
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The good guys are wonderul and fantastic in every aspect and absolutely right all the time. Likewise the bad guys are horrible and completely evil with no true emotions or personality past "evil".
All "good guys" have faults. All "bad guys" have reasons. I hate when authors forget that.
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Reasons taken too far can be annoying as well. Some people try to make the all the reasons for anything less than nice into "people only do bad things because they secretly think they can help the world." No selfish reasons, no anger or revenge, no desire to lash out at someone because it can be a rush... Just "no one is ever actually cruel or mean but really a saint in disguise" stuff that turns everyone into superficial caricatures.
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The damsel in distress. Enough said.
(How about the hero in distress saved by the daring damsel? Or better yet, the daring hero rushes to the tower of the damsel in distress only to find that she has not only freed herself and befriended the dragon, but is off on her honeymoon with the villian.
If anyone writes that, i'll give you a virtual cookie.)
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On the turn of the same coin, the damsel being a supercilious badass who kicks all kinds of butt, basically can do anything and everything without anyone's help, and is completely perfect at it. This is becoming its own cliche, and it's getting kind of annoying.
Again. All good guys should have faults, don't think making your hero a woman means you don't have to give her faults. All good strong female characters have them.
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Agreed, but I would change the wording slightly.
All good characters have them.
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Well, yes, but I was making a specific example out of good "strong female characters". Which a lot of writers seem to enjoy writing, but most of them don't give them flaws, because they seem to have it in their head that somehow doing so would be sexist or anti-feminist.
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I agree it's a cliche, and it bothers me as both an artistic person (lazy writing!) and a feminist.
Here's my theory:
1.) Our society is still very sexist.
2.) Women are almost always presented as one cliche or another.
3.) Any attempt to write a woman is seen as a message about women in general because for so long, our sexist society has been running off of mean stereotypes.
and then
4.) Actual women feel that they can't relate to each other because they internalize the idea that other people who are women are like these cliches.
5.) Actual women sit down to write a story. For some reason, it's so tempting to write a male character. They just seem so much more relatable gee wiz. But no, gonna try to write a female person, but are to varying degrees aware that any character who is a woman will be read by someone as speaking about women in general. Disaster ensues.
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Just to jump on this conversation ...
I totally agree with you. I spent an enjoyable morning in despair at our society, reading various articles on (strong) female characters and (strong female) characters etc., and it was very interesting. I'd point you in the forum where we were discussing it, but I can't find the link (it was a thread on cracked.com).
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If you do a content analysis of the way both men and women are described in traditional media you will find that men fair substantially worse, attracting a higher number of negative adjectives than women. This isn't exactly what you are talking about but demotic story telling relies on trope characterisation to impart what little meaning the lousy careerist has to show and tell just before their Friday deadline (before golf).
In one sense description is an act of discrimination and that is something that writers have to deal with.
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I was just writing about this above. It's like strong woman aren't allowed to have developed out of anything. They aren't allowed any complexity or contradiction. I'm sorry critics: humans (yes, even strong women) are walking, talking, breathing contradictions.
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I have to mention one of my writing household's pet peeves, the uptight-loser-gets-brought-out-of-his/her-shell-by-quirky-free-spirit trope.
If anyone here writes this, ever, my wife will find you. And she will hurt you.
-Shem
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Oh golly day, THIS. XD
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Oh yeah. You mean the Manic Pixie Girlfriend trope. Avoid.
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Haha so true!
But ain't Zooey Deschanel just so adorable? And hot.
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"I'll hunt you down and gut you like a fish!" - Jim Carey's Grinch
:/
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Sweet baby Jesus - I love this thread! But now I have to go back over my outline to make sure I'm not cheese-ballin' it up! LOL!
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This thread. Is so useful. XD Thank you everyone for calling these out.
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LOL @ your icon.
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The whole "X family member dies and leaves MC a lot of money/magical amulet/map" scenario really grainds my gears.