1. Iceni

    Iceni Member

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    Overuse of pronouns

    Discussion in 'Revision and Editing' started by Iceni, Feb 14, 2023.

    I'm editing my first WIP, and although not really at the stage of a line edit, I am conscious about my overuse of 'she' and 'he', especially in action and fighting scenes. I've looked online at some examples and suggestions but I am struggling to apply the techniques to my work. Can anyone direct me to some examples of such scenes that I can take a look at? It is a dystopian/fantasy-type novel, which I am attempting to write in deep third-person.
     
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  2. Homer Potvin

    Homer Potvin A tombstone hand and a graveyard mind Staff Supporter Contributor

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    Well, it's either the pronoun or the proper name, so you only have two choices. Pronouns might not be binary, but choosing whether to use them are. Unless you use epithets/nicknames on top of pronouns and names, but that gets confusing. Especially in a fight scene, which I assume it quick pace.
     
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  3. Bone2pick

    Bone2pick Conspicuously Conventional Contributor

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    There are a few strategies writers can employ to help breakup pronoun and proper name usage in combat scenes. One strategy is to inject direct thoughts. Another is to highlight the conditions and unfolding chaos outside of the POV character. For instance, moving beyond the he/she actions to describe the environment and objects within the environment.

    To give you a better idea of how something like that might read, I’ll drop a fight scene excerpt from the 40k book The Unremembered Empire by Dan Abnett. Maybe it’ll help. For context, the protagonist, Guilliman, a genetically modified (superhuman) warlord, has just been ambushed in his residency by a group of assassins.

    In that first moment, in that first eye blink, time hung in the air, as weightless as a bar of sunlight. Guilliman’s transhuman physiology accelerated from nothing to hyperfast response.

    Practical. Read. Move. React. Read everything. No other thoughts. Practical.

    He read the storm of bolter-rounds spitting from gun barrels. He read the white-hot muzzle flashes almost frozen mid-belch by the suspension of time as his heightened reactions propelled him to a new state of response. He read the mass reactive shells in the air, traveling, burning towards him—

    Guilliman was already moving, already turning. His right hand was grabbing the edge of a heavy sunderwood chart table, and pulling, overturning it.

    Practical. Read everything. So many variables, but so few that will make a difference. Extreme close quarters. Outnumbered and outgunned. Not even the slightest margin for error.

    Time seeped like resin. The top of the flipping table, heavy as a drawbridge gate and suddenly rising to meet Thiel like a bulldozer blade, took the first four rounds virtually point-blank. The mass-reactive shells detonated, biting vast wounds out of the dense, aged hardwood, filling the air with splinters and burning fibers. One leg of the table came spinning away.
     
  4. Xoic

    Xoic Prognosticator of Arcana Ridiculosum Contributor Blogerator

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    Probably not the answer you're looking for, but one way to reduce use of she and he is to write in first person. That way some pronouns are I and me. This approximates the way we actually experience life, where everybody else is a she or a he but I'm a me. The only me. There can be only one!
     
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  5. big soft moose

    big soft moose An Admoostrator Admin Staff Supporter Contributor Community Volunteer

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    if the issue is lots un named combatants the way a lot of authors handle this is for the protag to give them temporary nicknames based on their appearance or attributes.

    "Pointy beard's eyes went wide as he collected my boot in his balls, I side stepped his shower of puke and slammed my elbow into squinty's cheek bone. Maga hat took one look at his fallen comrades and ran"
     
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  6. JBean

    JBean Active Member

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    Interested in this thread as I struggle a lot with this too and anytime I get on a roll discussing my WIP with my boyfriend he yells at me that he can't keep track of who I am talking about lol I try to be cognizant of this, especially when I am actually writing and it starts going back and forth. Just in experimenting the last day or so with switching from third person POV to first person POV... it actually really does help, as suggested by Xoic above. I mean you can still run into the same problem referring to "I" and "me". I find myself just structuring my sentences when I can in a way to avoid it.

    Curious to see what outcome or resolve you find with this!
     
  7. Xoic

    Xoic Prognosticator of Arcana Ridiculosum Contributor Blogerator

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    Actually there may be a different cause for this problem. Let me see if I can find the other thread, from a few days ago.

    Here it is: Repetitive Name Usage
     
  8. petra4

    petra4 Active Member

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    Readers in general don't like reading it this way and understand that this is not "proper".
    (Note: it's doesn't bother me either way). Another way of writing and expressing oneself :)
     
  9. Xoic

    Xoic Prognosticator of Arcana Ridiculosum Contributor Blogerator

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    Another reason writers sometimes overuse pronouns is if they get stuck in a pattern of only writing what someone did—"He got a coffee and sat down at the desk. He looked over what he had written yesterday. He didn't like what he saw."

    It helps to shift from what a person is doing to what he's thinking or seeing now and then, or other things going on around him: "He got a coffee and sat down at the desk, looked over what he had written. It didn't look as good as it had yesterday."

    It is still a pronoun, but it's a nice break from endless repetition of he or she.
     
  10. Xoic

    Xoic Prognosticator of Arcana Ridiculosum Contributor Blogerator

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    I don't understand what this means. Writing in first person is not proper? Last I checked it was a completely viable POV.
     
  11. big soft moose

    big soft moose An Admoostrator Admin Staff Supporter Contributor Community Volunteer

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    Yeah that's nonsense, hundreds of books are written in first person every year.. its very common in thriller and crime (think Spenser for hire for example)
     

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