A Quick Craft Series On Sentences

Those Awkward Clumsy Sentences: #2

Hemingway Throwing A Baseball in a Bar

The Three Beat Drum:

Think you’re Hemingway? Live for short sentences? Hemingway liked bars, so let's start there and go histrionic/erotic.

He grabbed the drink. He splashed it. The waitress mopped him up. He thanked her.

The basic problem or lack of craft here is the lack of variety in the paragraph. The writer is reiterating the basic shape of subject-verb-object without giving the reader a break from the thunk-bang-thunk of English's most primitive shape.

a. Consider compound sentences:

He grabbed the drink, and he splashed it. The waitress mopped the mess up, and he thanked her.

b. Consider subordinate clauses.

As he grabbed his drink off the table, he splashed it down his front. When the waitress mopped his shirt and lap up, he thanked her.

c. Consider better verbs and building an image. If it’s important enough to take out of narration (a choice already made), then bring it to the reader. Consider what needs to be expanded to make a scene live and offer something with tension and consequence:

Already wobbling from the two previous Negronis, he scooped up the third from the table as the waitress set it down. The dark liquor sailed into the air, splashing him from his collar to his thighs. She whipped out her bar towel and started mopping him up, lingering in his lap, toying with his lapel with her free hand. Trying to focus his eyes, he wondered if it were a come-on or if she was picking his pocket. Slapping his wallet hanging in the inside pocket of his sports coat, he gasped out his thanks, staring up into her laughing face. She leaned over him, sighing a mint smell into his nostrils.

d. Consider varying rhythm, playing with verb tense, and using sentence fragments:

Already wobbling from two Negronis, he scooped up the third from the table as the waitress set it down. The dark liquor sailed into the air. A spatter from his collar to his thighs. She whipped out her bar towel—mopping him up—lingering in his lap. Her free hand toying with his lapel. Trying to focus his eyes, he wondered if it were a come-on. Maybe picking his pocket. Slapping his wallet that nestled in the inside pocket of his sports coat, he gasped out his thanks. Stared up into her laughing face. She leaned over him. Her breath was sweet with mint.

e. Consider varying narration with floating dialogue and interior monologue (we have to switch italics here):

Already wobbling from two Negronis, he scooped up the third from the table as the waitress set it down. The dark liquor sailing in the air. A spatter from his collar to his thighs. She whipped out her bar towel—mopping him up—lingering in his lap. Wow. Deep dive. Her free hand toying with his lapel. Blinking to focus his eyes, he wondered if it were a come-on. Picking my pocket? Slapped his wallet that nestled in the inside pocket of his sports coat. “Thanks. So kind.” Her grin. “No problem, sir.” Stared up into her laughing face. She leaned over him. Her breath was sweet with mint. His eyes dropped. He watched her palm the room key off the table, drop it into her apron.

disclosure - This set of rhetorical classes, like the three-beat-drum is directly borrowed from The New Strategy of Style by Weathers and Winchester, but the examples are from Scott.