The Power of Words

Some years ago, I was part of the Abu Dhabi Writer’s Workshop.

A bunch of us met Wednesday evenings in a Café, talked about writing, wrote on prompts, and then shared and commented on what we had written.

One evening, we had a discussion around choice of words, and I pointed out that as writers, we needed to be careful about our words, because our words paint a picture in the mind of the reader, and if we are not careful, the reader would not see what we intended. The reader could misunderstand our words, would not be able to follow the story since the images were all contorted and unclear. There was some discussion, but I could not get my point across properly.  Yes, we had to use the right vocabulary (most of us were not native speakers), but choice of words is not only about vocabulary; it is all about meaning and the images words create.

I spent the following week on writing a short (less than 100 words) murder story, using words that hid the real story behind a veil of intended ‚unintended‘ images. I shared this with a few of my fellow workshoppers and, boy, did I get ugly comments!

Here is the piece in question:

‘Sorry, darling’, she breathed seductively, her mouth pouting, her eyelids flattering.

Herman recoiled.

With a surreptitious laugh, she turned, pushing her exquisite chest against his last erect member of staff: John was the only one left standing, Roger already succumbed.

Gloved fingers rubbed her sweet-smelling box against John’s body.  She took his breath away.  He fell flat on his belly.

‘Never overcharge me again’, Tatiana scolded.  Returning the black ebony, jewel-crusted poison chest into its leather bonds, she flung the satchel over her shoulder and on shiny high heels ticker-tackered out of the store.

I was accused of writing pornography, being into S&M and all sorts.  This was exactly highlighting my point: with the choice of words, we paint pictures.  If we use words that are tainted with a certain brush, this might alter the impact of the story we tell.

In the end, I called my piece ‘Dirty Thing’ – and I don’t mean Tatiana, nor the men involved.  The Dirty Thing is the reader who sees not beyond the distinctly sexually tainted vocabulary.  If you lift the veil on my choice of words, I am telling the story of how Tatiana went to a shop, got charged too much, and took revenge using her gift of a poison box that she handles, gloved, since the poison is so strong that on mere contact, people fall over and die.

When we talk to one another, our words paint pictures.  All of us do it, but sometimes we are not even aware of this power we have.  We need to control the images we paint.  We need to understand that our opposite might see an entirely different story to what we intend.  Words conjure up images, emotions, thought processes.  We need to ask ourselves if we share the intended images, or whether our words may be understood in a way that is counterproductive to our intention. And not only authors need to be aware of the power of words: this is something to keep in mind in all communication.