C. S. Lewis’ Advice to Young Writers #8

In 1959, at the suggestion of her teacher, an American schoolgirl wrote C. S. Lewis a letter requesting advice on writing. Lewis replied, “It is very hard to give any general advice about  writing. Here’s my attempt.”

In this, the last in a series of eight blogposts, we’re covering each of the points Lewis offered. They are just as pertinent today as they were 66 years ago.

Be sure you know the meaning (or meanings) of every word you use.

– C. S. Lewis, letter of writing advice to an American schoolgirl, 14 December 1959

I was on a conference call a couple weeks ago with 100+ other people. We were being trained on some new software and the trainer was showing us how to grant access to a document. In doing so the trainer stated you can always go back and change a person’s access, you can do it “later, after the fact, or posthumously.” I must assume this trainer didn’t know what posthumously means.

As writers we’re pretty good at looking up words; however, there are two traps we fall into.  The first is failing to look up words for which we think we know the definition. I have found when I pause to look up a word, to verify its definition, I find it has a shade of meaning or context I didn’t know, or I learn the word was in use earlier or later than I realized. (Important for writers of historical fiction.) We don’t know many of the words we use as well as we think we do.

The second trap is using the thesaurus without consulting the dictionary. The trap I’ve outlined above is nearly certain if we dive into the thesaurus. When we go digging for words not in our common vocabulary, meanings are likely to be even less familiar.

A last and foundational thought: as writers, the words we use are the entire point of what we’re up to. Taking the time to look up more words than anyone else is part of the gig. If you’re not regularly in the dictionary, you’re falling short. The right word makes the difference between bland prose and pulsing realism—and may also save you from being the humorous illustration in someone’s blogpost.

So, as we come to the end of our series, let’s thank Dr. Lewis for his kind yuletide response to the schoolgirl, and to the schoolgirl for keeping the letter so we could benefit with her.