by Jill Amadio
Three simple words. Three common sentences.
I love you!
I hate you!
Leave me alone!
A world of emotion is expressed in each of the above and spoken or written countless times a day. Writers add drama, suspense, surprise, and expected reaction with similarly timeless ways to characterize fictional and non-fictional inhabitants of our books. The phrases are translated into practically every language under the sun – even, perhaps, Mars – because they provide us with a succinct, precise, and in some cases ruthless attention-getting way to pinpoint the exact feelings we wish to evoke in the reader or listener.
Even inanimate objects can be subject to the love or scorn of the writer. On rare occasions, I have shut down my laptop in disgust when I have failed to figure out how a sub-plot could end.
Yet, there they rest, those three-word declarations, ready to serve you. Needs if we can only make a decision or two.
In one of my favorite and frequently consulted books, the International Thesaurus, there are more than 30 categories of love, including many forms to express it, such as infatuation, and how to describe a character who is a philanderer.
As for the opposite emotion, hate, the Thesaurus offers a plethora of nasty versions from which to choose.
It is not unusual to read the first like of a book using a love or hate expression. It can lead to further reading as one wants to know who is talking, and to whom, and the reason for the love/hate word.
It is tempting to write the beginning of Chapter 1 as: “I hate you!” Bang!
This could end the book there and then if the protagonist is shot by the antagonist. There is no puzzle to solve, no cliffhangers to ponder, no flashbacks to urge one on.
Yet, do the simple sentences, “I love you,” “I hate you,” seem too pat, too worn-out?
Can’t we be more creative? Certainly, shooting someone dead is one way of expressing dislike of that person, and locking up one’s beloved in a room or elsewhere can be construed as going a bit overboard, but in fiction, all solutions are possible, if not creative.
Dullness is the death of a mystery. It can cause irritation and frustration, and the reader claiming they can write a far more interesting book than the author. Can this be true?
Agatha Christie writes in her autobiography, which incidentally reads more like a travel guide than a writer’s life, that she began concocting and writing her first mystery as a dare. Happily, she had connections to gents and a publisher and went on to write several dozen more. In her memoir, she tends to flip off her success and says she preferred to go with her archaeologist husband to digs in Syria, where they had a second or third home.
I often wonder if writers in other parts of the world have more descriptive nouns and verbs than English-speaking countries. Perhaps their foreign forms of thriller are more gripping, compelling, or surprising. I have to admit, some of these translations sometimes lack commonsense answers to all the questions aroused in their book, in my opinion, although there are plenty here, too. .
However, it is fascinating to read the translations and, if need be, try to figure out the plot. Occasionally, the rhythm and flow of the writing is unexpected, a good way to grab one’s faltering attention or its opposite. Resonance can also be a neglected area, yet our three simple short sentences fit the bill in those cases perfectly. Some writers struggle to express love/hate declarations differently, and often succeed, but why mess with those three wonderfully descriptive words needlessly?
Yes, we are free, thank goodness, to write as we wish without, I hope, government interference or discipline. All writers need is their own sense of compelling writing that offends few book buyers, to say nothing of agents, publishers, and marketers.
The most magnificent, powerful three words?
“We the people…”
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