: How do I incorporate Vocabulary in my writing that I already know? I seem to have this problem where I know a lot of words but can't always seem to think them up when I write an article
I seem to have this problem where I know a lot of words but can't always seem to think them up when I write an article or a story. I know the meaning of most of these words, but when I write, some everyday phrase or idiom comes to my mind first or I write elaborate wordy sentences even though a succinct alternative is clearly there but I fail to think them up.
Anyway what would you people suggest me to incorporate advanced vocabulary into my writing so that I can use the words I know instead of just identifying them when I read?
Hopefully this is not off-topic. Sorry if it is.
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I am surprised that no one has advised you to read.
The use of a language is primarily based on exposure to it and mimicking. That's how everybody learns their native language and masters foreign ones.
Most answers have recommended you to practice writing, wich is sound advice. But for your practice to be effective, you need base material.
Pick a word and collect examples in dictionnaries, books or ask people to make a few sentences with it. If possible (although these are harder to find) don't limit yourself to written examples. You will soon see that the word comes to your mind more naturally.
I'm going to try the practice-practice-practice answer, but what has been helping me up until now is editing.
Go ahead and write the first draft with whatever words come to mind. Don't let searching for the right phrase interrupt your creative flow.
As you re-read your draft, take note of where
you stumble over verbose phrasing,
you haven't conveyed the precise meaning or mood you wanted (or needed),
you have distracting, unintentional repetition.
Those are the places where finding the right word or phrase pays off. That's when you head to the thesaurus, not to learn the right word, but to remind yourself of the choices available to you.
In particular, I find that verbs that aren't pulling their weight are the easiest to find and sharpen because the weak ones are propped up with -ly adverbs.
Plain language is fine, and you don't want to inject twenty-dollar words where ten-cent ones do the job. You certainly don't want to do that too often. Overusing sophisticated vocabulary can be off-putting.
Occasionally, however, a plain word doesn't cut it, and you need the mot juste.
I'm disappointed whenever I read a novel that doesn't send me to the dictionary once or twice.
I face this issue a lot. I used to worry about misusing a word, but over time I've decided that if the original thought includes the word, then it probably deserves to be used.
Another test to use is: can I express this thought adequately without using the word?
In fiction writing, you can make excuses for sesquipedalianism by claiming that a character would want to use exotic words (and then if you don't use it properly, you can simply say, that was the character misusing the word, not me!).
Often I use a long word and later edit it to use a shorter word. On the other hand, sometimes long words can seem more terse -- also for non-English natives, sometimes longer Latin-based words are easier to understand than seemingly simply verbal phrases.
I wrote an article about building your vocabulary:
Don’t worry about using words incorrectly. It happens. I frequently
discover that I have learned a word partially or even wrongly. Sure,
don’t rush to use a word after you discover it, but really, the
public shame of misusing a word in conversation is vastly overstated.
(I am much more cautious when I write though). When writing, if the
word doesn’t fit snugly into the context you need it for, chances are
that either you don’t need this word or don’t know it well enough to
use it. (Yes, a simpler word is almost always better if it conveys
what you want).
I recommend three pillars:
1. Practice
2. Thesaurus
3. Drafting
The more you write, the better your writing will become. This means finding the best word, and the best order to put the words in.
Thesaurus. Personally I don't think a writer should ever use a thesaurus to find a word you don't already know - that's the sort of use that gives thesaurus use a bad name. However, in exactly the situation you describe above, I think a thesaurus is perfect. Type in the word you know isn't quite right, and browse until you find the one (which you already knew), that is.
Drafting. I think it's best to first write any old words to get the gist and the feel of the story down, rather than getting bogged down on finding the right word, when you may end up cutting the entire scene anyway. Then every time you do a reiteration see if a better word springs to mind, or use the thesaurus, as mentioned above.
The Carnegie Hall method: Practice, practice, practice.
You know those Word-A-Day calendars? We joke about them, but they're not bad as a starting point. Each day you pick a word you want to start using more often (from the calendar, the dictionary, or list you create). Spend 10 minutes writing it in a bunch of sentences. Write a little story if you want; it's okay if it sounds ridiculous because you're using the word so much.
The next day, pick a new word to write sentences about. Then practice using yesterday's word in context in your speech as often as you can. The day after, you'll use Day 3's word in sentences and Day 2's word in speech.
The reasons for focusing on two words in two different media are
sleep helps you learn and assimilate information better in the long
term
writing and speaking use slightly different parts of the brain
you're forcing yourself to remember something from a previous day,
so you're embedding the word into your longer-term memory
For a grand finale, try using all seven words from a week over the course of a weekend.
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