Grace Louisa
Apr 14, 2024

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I couldn’t agree more. I cringe when I see those cartoonish “creative” descriptions of smiles like “the corners of her mouth tugged slowly upward.” I think that in addition to misunderstanding “show don’t tell,” there are writers who limit themselves by picturing their scenes like something on a TV show, forgetting that writing provides many more ways to convey emotion while TV is stuck mainly with actors making faces. Writers would do very well to replace every single facial expression (including eyerolls and eyebrow quirks) in a scene with “made a face” and see how it reads. Overuse of facemaking will become painfully obvious.

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Grace Louisa
Grace Louisa

Written by Grace Louisa

Saltier than a cocktail peanut and here to get ignored by a much wider audience.

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