This post is about some writing advice. It does relate, I
promise, just bear with me for a minute.
In the small town of Bloomington in southern Indiana, home
of Indiana University, there are a shit-load of pizza places. I haven’t been
back to that town in several years, but I can remember several off the top of
my head: Pizza Express, Mother Bear’s, Crazy Aver’s, Bistro, Domino’s, Pizza
Hut, Papa John’s, Uncle D’s, Buccetto’s, Rocket’s and Café Pizzeria. I got my
degree in Economics there and I actually wrote a paper on the market for pizza
in town. Needless to say, there were a lot of commercials on TV for the various
pizza places. But I only remember the commercials for two of them: Mother Bear’s
and Crazy Aver’s.
I remember the Mother Bear’s commercial because it was
ridiculous. It had a grown man with stubble wearing fairy wings, a blonde wig,
and a tutu. It was weird, but not terribly effective except for being memorable
for its weirdness.
The commercial for Crazy Aver’s, however, was just fucking
genius. The commercial was just dead silence with non-moving images of
delicious pizza. The reason this is so brilliant was because TV is full of
noises. When the TV goes silent, it grabs your attention. If you’re having a
conversation, or if you are watching and nodding off, you turn back to look at
the TV to make sure it didn't turn off. These commercials always played late at
night. In a college town, that usually meant a drunk and/or high audience that
was easily distracted.
So you turn to the TV to see why it has suddenly gone
silent, and you see a picture of a delicious, melty-cheese, pepperoni covered
culinary masterpiece. Your mouth starts watering. Another pizza appears, this
one some kind of specialty with meat and vegetables. Another pizza appears,
this one with a cold, sweating glass of soda next to it. Then the voice comes
on: “Crazy Aver’s Pizza, Order now!” and the phone number appears on the TV.
Fucking. Brilliant.
I have no idea how many pizzas they sold me this way, but
everyone I knew said the same thing. That commercial is genius. This doesn't
even consider that this was probably the cheapest commercial to make in
history.
Anyway, there are two writing-related points to this:
First, with regards to the opening line(s) of a story: You
don’t have to make a lot of noise to grab attention. Your story doesn't have to
open in the middle of an epic battle. You don’t need to curse like a sailor, or
say something poetic, or paint beautiful word-imagery to hook someone. You just
have to give them a reason to look. A few examples:
“It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were
striking 13.” – George Orwell, 1984
“The trick to walking around in someone else’s body is not
getting caught.” – Rick Wayne, The MinusFaction
“Marley was dead, to begin with.” – Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol
“Aliens suck at
music.” – Rob Ried, Year Zero
They make you want to know what the fuck is going on, don’t
they? I've noticed a lot of sci-fi novels drop you into a battle right at the
beginning. Anything by Dan Brown is probably going to open with a grisly murder
scene. A lot of classical literature will try to open with a lot of detail of
the setting, or what the author wants to be a clever and memorable line,
usually one that doesn’t really have a lot to do with the plot (This does not
apply to Jane Austen, that woman was a genius). I'm not saying any of these books are bad, but you don't HAVE to start your story that way. The lines above, they hook you
without trying to throw a lot of noise at you. They get your eyebrow raised and
your eyes locked on the page.
The second bit of wisdom from this commercial is something
you’ve heard a thousand times, “Show, don’t tell.” Aver's didn't have to tell me anything about their pizza. They just showed it to me and made my mouth water. This little nugget of wisdom
is tough, because we are using words. Using words, by their very nature, is
pretty much the definition of “tell”. Confusing? It was to me for a long time,
until I figured it out by watching one of the greatest movies of all fucking
time, Star Wars. It does a great job
of showing a lot of information without having to tell you anything. Let’s
novelize that scene:
As the men in faceless
white armor examine the bodies of their recent kills, a heavy robotic breathing
sounds from the blown-open doorway. Both stormtroopers immediately drop what
they are doing and come to rigid attention. A tall figure, dressed all in
black, face covered by a black mask, and figure shrouded by a black cape steps
onto the ship. He looks down at the corpses littering the hallway. None are who
he is looking for. He moves on, followed by his guard.
What did I just show you about Darth Vader? First, he’s
important. The troopers came to attention. Second, he’s a cold bastard. He took
just long enough to see that his prey wasn’t among the dead. Third, he’s scary
looking. I didn't say he was scary
looking, but the description, with a few choice adjectives (shrouded, repetition
of “black”) pretty much ensures you know he’s scary looking. That paragraph is
82 words, and it advances the story while also conveying what I want you to
know about Darth Vader. If I wrote the next few scenes out, you’d know Darth
Vader is powerful, evil, and someone you do not
fuck with. I wouldn't have to say any of that, because what he does, along with
a few short descriptions, will get the point across.
I hope you enjoyed this, now go write something!
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