Ask the Authors: Friday

The real world is full of foul-mouthed people. Especially if you are writing a story with an urban setting, how do you depict this without treading on the sensibilities of your readers?

I've never seen the problem in this. It's no more difficult to say something as simple as "he swore" or "he uttered an oath" instead of turning the air blue with trash-talk as it is to say "he lost his lunch" or "he threw up" instead of describing in detail the regurgitated contents. One of the laziest forms of writing I've seen has to do with the unprofessional and immature practice of peppering the text with profanity or clinical sexual descriptions. That's not creative--it's simply childish and an insult to the reader. It's no great challenge to find a workaround for profanity and graphic sex. And our readers aren't stupid--they get the picture. --BJ Hoff

Is it possible to write a story about war and sailors on a ship without them swearing? Herman Wouk did, and he won the Pulitzer Prize for his effort. Here’s what he says about the subject in the front matter of The Caine Mutiny—

“The general obscenity and blasphemy of shipboard talk have gone almost wholly unrecorded. This good-humored billingsgate is largely monotonous and not significant, mere verbal punctuation of a sort, and its appearance in print annoys some readers. The traces that remain are necessary where occurring.”

My comment: It has been my observation that the use of profanity is a cheap way for an author to portray evil, a shortcut in characterization. Evil and villains are best portrayed by actions, not because characters cuss. The same can be said for portraying a cultural setting (say, Jr. High). To reduce a coming of age story to the fact that young people cuss in an attempt to appear grown up is a lazy approach to storytelling. — Jack Cavanaugh

This is easy. I write, "He cursed" or "He uttered a foul curse." If your reader is someone with delicate sensibilities, she might read "cursed" and hear something in her head as mild as "darn." But if that person has lived in a tough urban setting or watches movies with lots of foul language, that person will read "cursed" and hear something far darker, grittier, more foul. As writers, we aren't required to spell everything out. It can be good to leave some things to reader's imagination. This is one area where I think less is more.

I wrote thirty books in the secular market before I answered God's call on my heart to write for Him. I was free to use curse words in my books, and I did, although they would be considered mild by most. But looking back, I can tell you that not a one of those words strengthened my writing or improved the books or made them more realistic. Not a one. -- Robin Lee Hatcher

I can only speak for myself. I don't write stories with urban settings, for the most part. I live in a rural setting, so that's what I write. My books don't contain obscenities because I choose to filter my novels through the realities of my world. I don't hear a lot of swearing around me--in our area of the country, people tend to watch their language more carefully. My characters say what I want them to say, and if a reader doesn't like that, then the reader has the freedom to choose not to read any more of my books. I've never had a lot of trouble with this situation. --Hannah Alexander

Fiction is representative of reality, not reality itself. Law & Order,
the 1990's version, is a great example of a show that was able to
represent street crime without using foul words. To me, that's a
greater accomplishment of writing technique than unbridled use of
language. It can be done. -- James Scott Bell

The real world is also full of people who use the bathroom daily, but most writers don’t feel the need to put that on stage, even though it would be natural and realistic. I think there are many more creative ways to get the point across without risking offending even a few readers. It can often be far more effective to simply say “He cursed under his breath” or whatever. Those who desire more realism can let their imagination fill in the blank with what they know to be reality, and those who would be offended needn’t fill in the blank at all. –Deborah Raney

I just finished a novel about undercover cops. Knowing several, and having researched it extensively, I knew this was no place for "aw-shucks". Here's the key: Write around the place that would be natural to have a cuss word. What I mean by that is to start the scene late, after the cussing has occurred, or get out early, before it starts. Or, if you can't do that, focus the reader away from the dialogue on to something else. You can give the appearance of it being there without it being there. It's when you try to replace it or substitute something else for it that you get in trouble. If you creatively write around it, though, your readers will get the idea and if you're really good at it, will be so focused on the story that they won't even realize there isn't a cuss word there. It takes some finesse and some thinking, but it can be done. -- Rene Gutteridge

Again, I can return to Flannery O’Connor who warned about the temptation of gratuitous writing yet herself took risks writing in a Southern grotesque genre. I will be honest. There are times when my character should swear. So I’ll sort of plug in what the character actually would say. (My editor probably sees that but she never says anything.) Then on revision, I concentrate on artful characterization but try not to “sanitize’ that character. If she is foul, she acts foul and her language is still prickly but not so much that I’ve ever gotten a complaint. But if I do, I’ll accept it graciously because it isn’t my aim to offend, but to be true. Emotions are potent tools that if used artfully can convey the things we need to convey. --Patty Hickman

The beauty of writing historicals is such language concerns are largely a non-issue. If I need to have a character say something disparaging or utter a mild oath, I simply do it in Scots! When Rose in a fit of anger calls her sister a howre, we can easily figure out in context what she's saying without having the English word on the page. --Liz Curtis Higgs

This is one I sort of allude to in my posts this month, having to do with authenticity and historical accuracy versus honoring sensibilities. I think a writer has to find a way to create the emotional level of foul-mouthed people without using the foul language. Sometimes it might be talking "about" the person's foul language without ever using it. It might be creating a word that is made up but that the character uses as though it was foul but the reader can read it without being offended. It takes more work for the author but just as it takes more work to create really romantic scenes or very touching scenes without using graphic images I think we can do that without being explicit. Language is our friend here. Word choice will get us through. --Jane Kirkpatrick