by Pankti Mehta
The clock is ticking to the eleventh hour, and you’re at your wit’s end. You’re still at square one with your piece, typing and erasing, typing and erasing. The sun stopped shining hours ago, but your hay remains unmade. All you want to do is forget how procrastination reached its peak today and call it a day now that it’s late – so you end up writing a paragraph that looks a bit like this.
I’ve always been confused with the cliché. How much is too much? I remember going through a phase when I would avoid them except in titles or endings. At about the same time Holden Caulfield spoke about how his English teacher didn't like cliches. "But I like them," he said. "They're accurate, and in some situations, they hit the nail right on the head."
That made sense. They’re recognizable, those clichés, give your reader something to relate with. They work superbly for headlines, let you use puns, ‘catch-phrases’, but they don’t come without the danger of over-use. I’ve fallen into the snare myself, not that long ago, using the headline ‘Go green’ for a story about how to use the colour in your home interiors. It made me cringe then, too, knowing fully well it’s terribleness, but it fit the space exactly and it was late…oh well.
Using some figures of speech may be run-down too. Alliteration, for instance (eg: The curious case of the cliché). Certain metaphors are overdone – compare life to a box of chocolates, a teacher to a sculptor, a woman to sunshine, and you know the author’s either run out of time or imagination.
Cliches lay a larger trap out for fiction writers, though. When you’re creating a universe, it’s not just the words you’re playing with. Your character could be a cigarette-toting, trench-coat wearing private investigator with a bad marriage and a mistress, or a Gujarati girl crumbling under the pressure to get married. But they shouldn’t. Add shades that make them multi-dimensional, turn the cliché around when you can. Mix them up. A Gujarati girl with a passion for cigarettes, or a private investigator being pressured into marriage, perhaps? Those are juvenile ideas, but you know what I mean. Explore the character to build a world, make sure each has something unique. You have the chance to stay away from being ‘too real’ here – strike that balance between interesting and ordinary.
Speaking of turning clichés around, the best examples (clichés as they are!) truly are from Wilde and Mark Twain. “Beauty, real beauty ends where intellectual expression begins,” quips Wilde. Or the more common “Divorces are made in heaven.” Twain classics include “Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter.” and “Honesty is the best policy – as long as there’s money in it.” Adding an unexpected twist to an otherwise recognized phrase would gain you obvious witty-points, as you see.
I don’t agree with writing rules that say you should avoid clichés (“like the plague”). As long as you know that it’s a cliché, work it to suit your story. But know where to draw the line.
Like a line using ‘All’s well that end’s well’ in this space would be a bit much, no?
Pankti Mehta is a feature writer for Hindustan Times, Mumbai. On the other hand, she is a word-scrooge when it comes to writing a bio. To check out some of her fantastic feature work click here.
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