When I interview Elmore Leonard a couple of years ago, he
told he he only uses the speech tag "said" in his books. He
likes the look of the word, that it doesn't interfere with
what information needs to get said in the dialogue, and all
that. But he also told me he likes starting off the sentence
with "he said", as in
He said, "Get in the car." By
beginning the sentence with "he said", Leonard makes sure
that the reader knows instantly who is talking. Leonard also
likes to have more than one
"he saids" in a paragraph, for the rhythm that he has set up.
Leonard told me about a feud he had with one copy editor at
the publishing company who refused to accept Leonard's
"stets." But then Raymond Carver was the master of multiple
"he saids" in a paragraph.
Speaking of adverbs ending in "-ly" (okay, so I'm playing
catch up), I used to complain to students, "What do you mean,
a house sat quietly at the end of the street? Did you ever
hear a house sitting loudly at the end of the street?" Until
one wise-acre wrote about "the house that sat loudly at the
end of the street where the rock and roll band lived."
A PI writer friend of mine just emailed me to tell me about
his original Christmas story he sends out every year to old
friends. He writes, "You'll get a kick out of this though:
sent (Name withheld), an editor/friend at Doubleday a copy of
my annual Christmas story, the one I sent you. Signed to him
and everything. So guess what I get back in the mail? Right:
the story and-you guessed it-a rejection letter from THE
EDITORS. Some days..."
So tell me more about Miss March. In like a lion and out like
a lamb?
Best wishes
Frederick Zackel
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