"And Then No Words Were Needed" (Except for Those!)

[Prestidigitweeze]

Does anyone else find it annoying when an author makes excessive use of phrases indicating that words can't express a particular action, idea or event? H.P. Lovecraft seems an exception (since his attempts to convey realms of sensation and emotion which are common to the Old Ones but beyond the capacities of human beings are so unintentionally amusing they approach a different kind of transcendence), but I particularly hate sex scenes, glimpses of the horrific, and spiritual epiphanies that end with the phrase "beyond words" or "and then no words were needed" -- either of which seems more coy than a 1940s film's sudden focus on a distant palm tree in the window of a hotel room.

Here's what I want to say when a writer ends a chapter or passage with phrases like, "and then no words were needed":

If no words were needed to express what happened, then why have you just said so in words? Why can't you be arsed to do your job: Find a telling place to end the scene and imply the very thing which you've just assured us does not need saying?

When a writer makes excessive use of phrases like beyond words, I tend to stop reading and open a book by another writer -- one who demonstrates that things can be expressed (else why would we read about them?).

In his novel, Time Must Have a Stop, Aldous Huxley shows his version of the thought processes and experiences of a character who dies, leaves his body and is reincarnated as a baby who remembers nothing. If Huxley can do that, then what's the excuse of a neo-beat poet, pseudo-transgressive romance writer or breathless horror novelist?

[Xanthe]

I really haven't come across that many examples of it to notice it. Usually in the books I read, especially the romances, I really wish they would use it more often. I've reached the point where I view authors who include chapter after chapter of descriptive sex as cheats who add it as a ploy to up the word count of a book and to try to increase sales, and I usually just skim through those pages because they normally add nothing to the storyline and merely serve as filler.

Though I do agree that ending a scene with "it was beyond words" is just poor writing and shows a lack of imagination and skill on the author's part, especially when I've read authors who've summed up an experience succinctly within a paragraph or even a sentence or two.

[Fluribus]

I don't see that enough to get exorcised over it. Unless it's so constant that I get bored. Usually, I'll just have fun with quirks.

"Beyond words." There are people who have gone beyond words. We call them mimes. (I'm currently working on a novel called "Mime Time". 200 pages of blank prose. Saves on ink. Ebook formatting is a breeze.)

"No words were needed." I can't fault someone for being right. I like words, but they are something of a luxury. (The reader (me (nested parentheticals)) of my novel can bask in the luxury of 4 words "Mime Time by Fluribus". I never publish anything due to a general misanthropy and a specific fear of Stockholm.)

I'm actually hoping that I'll run into some of those phrases in the next book I read. Maybe my lack of exposure is due to my reading habits. I never read romance. I rarely read horror (unless one counts eldritch classics by the ancients of the early 20th). The only current poet that I ever read is myself (and usually only when I'm writing it).

[Graham]

There are no words to express how I feel about this, but I had to use these as blank posts are not allowed.



Graham

[Fluribus]

?????

[cromag]

Words fail me. Again.

But I hate it when they fail authors.

[issybird]

I also am irritated by the inverse. Some variation of "It goes without saying" and then the author follows it with exactly what was supposed not to need saying.

[Quexos]

Well, hyperbole, exaggeration, superlatives and other magnified ways to convey meaning are common in literature.
If you must question "beyond words" then you must question:

- Are you mad ? (as in are you serious)
Of course not, If I were mad I would not be there talking to you, I'd be in a mental institution.

- You're killing me ! (as in you're so funny or you're one of a kind)
If I were killing you, I'd be your enemy and I would be dangerous instead of simply being funny or odd to you

- For the millionth time, I did not tell him you were here !
If you had told me for the millionth time, we'd actually have to be very old, not sure a lifetime would be enough to hear the same thing an actual million times. Beside no one could actually take it to hear the same thing a million times and no one could possibly need to hear it that much ...

So in conclusion, exaggerations of all kinds are part of literature and provided they are harmoniously used and fitting to the situation, I believe they are a natural part of the the art.

[JD Gumby]

Meh. 9 times out of 10, "...and then no words were needed" (and similar phrasing) indicates that sex is about to happen offscreen. Unless you want most of your books to devolve into porn, it's nothing to get worked up about.

"Beyond words" and other shortcuts exist so that the author doesn't have to turn into a Stephen King and pad out their stories with an extra hundred or two pages describing every single little detail.

[Fluribus]

Originally Posted by cromag

Words fail me. Again.

But I hate it when they fail authors.

The fault, dear cromag, is not in our words, but in our shelves.

[Antoinekamel]

"No words needed" when there is nothing to say is the same kind cheat as "No one laughed" when something tragically-comical is said. They would not be bothering if not repeated in the same book, but the few that use them use them a lot.