On Reddit. The answer on "Do you think use of "-ing" verbs can be a problem?" EalKat answers so much more than just that!!!
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"EalKat
Yep, yep. So much this.
What the OP is referring to is the grammar rule about "sticky words" or "glue words".
Specifically these words: "was", "were", "of", "as", "in", "from", "about", "and", "to", "would", "up", "beyond"...and more. These are what are known as "glue words" or "sticky words" because they glue the reader in place, causing the reader to get stuck in place like a slow motion scene. It slows down the action, and brings the reader out of emersion.
"Passive voice", "glue words", and "sticky sentences", take a perfectly okay, fast paced scene, and dragged it to a full stop, forcing your reader out of the action, out of immersion, and, most likely will also cause them to put down your book, give you a bad review, and never buy another book from you again.
These words are a problem because they are usually part of a long phrase, and can be switched out with a single word. Gerunds (-ing words) are often in the phrase.
So it is not the -ing word itself that is the issue, rather the issue is the sentence meanders on for 20+ words when the same thing could have been said with greater clarity in 7 or fewer words.
This is the #1 cause of why new writers pound out a 250k first draft, and then say they can not edit it down because everything is needed.
No, In most cases, you can remove 2/3rd of the words in your first draft, without removing any scene, without changing the plot, without deleting anything.
Simply diagram your sentences.
THIS is a sentence diagram: http://www.german-latin-english.com/diagramamend6.htm
Then rewrite your sentence in correct grammar.
It's incredibly simple.
Sentence diagraming is how, actual, real, professional editors edit your manuscript, and why they can take your 250k draft and rewrite it into a 80k novel without touching your plot or characters at all.
I don't know why so many writers think editing out words, involves deleting chapters, removing characters, or altering the plot. Really, all you need to do is a line edit.
Take one sentence out of your draft, write it on paper, diagram it, rewrite it in correct and proper grammar, type it into your draft to replace the sentence removed. Move on to the next sentence and repeat for every single sentence of your draft.
This is WHY editors rarely know what your story is about. Because they DO NOT READ your draft, they simple pull out one sentence at a time and diagram it into perfect grammar.
The sentence diagraming of the line edit process is the simplest, easiest part of writing your novel. And it'll remove 2/3rds of your word count. If you have a 300k draft, it'll be only 100k words by the time the sentence diagraming is finished, and nothing about your story, plot, or characters will have changed, no scenes or chapters deleted, just sentence reworded to remove clutter and increase clarity.
When you do your line edits, diagraming each sentence, which should be the 3rd or 4th edit you do of your draft, you are just going to naturally remove 2/3rds of your words, including you'll remove most every "-ing", "-ly", "was", "were", "of", "as", "in", "from", "about", "and", "to", "would", "up", "beyond"...and more.
It's the basic way you edit a draft, I don't understand why so few writers know how to edit. Your ability to do a line edit and diagram your sentences, removing the clutter and increasing clarity, really is going to be the reason you do or do not get published.
I am personally prone to over use "was" a LOT. It's to the point, where it slows down the reading pace way too much and actually distracts from the story.
Well, because of this I end up removing a lot of -ing words during editing, simply because (for me at least) they are often pared with a "was".
-He was cooking a meal.
-He was running on the beach.
-He was playing football.
-He was reading Harry Potter last night.
So in editing they become:
-He cooked a meal.
-He ran on the beach.
-He played football.
-He read Harry Potter last night.
I don't remove/change all of them. Sometimes the "was -ing" combo is the best wording for the scene in question.
Basically, in places where I want to make the pacing of the story flow faster, I remove "was & -ing" and replace with an active verb instead. This allows the reader to move through the scene at a much faster reading speed. But in places where I want the pace to be slower, where I want to reader to slow down and pay attention to some clue in the scene, I leave the "was & -ing" combo.
My goal is clarity.
I want my readers to be able to enjoy what I write.
I don't want my readers getting stuck, being slowed down, or tripping over my over use of words.
We as writers should care about our readers.
Here, read this:
https://prowritingaid.com/grammar/1000165/What-is-a-sticky-sentence
https://www.ingramspark.com/blog/how-to-identify-sticky-sentences-in-you...
https://www.kibin.com/essay-writing-blog/avoid-sticky-sentences-better-w...
https://readable.com/blog/what-are-glue-words-and-how-do-they-affect-rea...
https://readable.com/blog/what-are-glue-words-and-how-do-they-affect-rea...
https://write.co.nz/delete-glue-words-to-unstick-your-sentences/
https://successfulchristianselfpublishing.com/a-list-of-glue-words/
It'll help you understand why glue words are removed.
These articles will also show you that -ing words are not the problem, and that just removing -ing, does not fix the issue.
The issue is too many words, repetition of phrases in a single sentence, and slowing pace down.
If you just remove all -ing, you don't fix the issue and could in fact make the issue worse.
You need to actually know the actual grammar rules ad be changing stuff when you NEED to change it, as opposed to just hack and slash deleting every instance of -ing.
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Thank you.
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Welcome Jon, found this thread on reddit, when I was googling how many "ing" forns a script max can have. A bit of an impossible question, I know, but you never know where those lead to...
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I avoid writing glue words/take them out during rewrites, but I didn't know they had a name, Rutger Oosterhoff 2. I keep some glue words though because like you said, "Sometimes the “was -ing” combo [and other glue words] is the best wording for the scene in question." And you're right. "Just removing -ing, does not fix the issue. The issue is too many words, repetition of phrases in a single sentence, and slowing pace down." Visualizing action lines and reading them out loud help me see if I'm writing too many words or repeating phrases/things. I used to struggle with writing and editing action lines, but I got a lot better the more I wrote/edited them. Thanks for making this post. I'm sure it's gonna help writers.
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Thanks for the clear responce, Maurice!!
But I must be honest, - I did not give any of this cool advice, Maurice, I just recognised the quality, and reposted. But theire are some real pearls on the Internet, aren't there..?
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Haha, I remember, Neon Cactus had almost non of those errors, Philip. While doing an endles amount of rewrites on The Final Solution, I used "Your Screenplay Sucks" and your screenplay Neo Cactus, to compare with..
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You're welcome, Rutger Oosterhoff 2. Yeah, there are some real pearls on the Internet, and I put them there. Haha I remember reading Your Screenplay Sucks way back.
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You have done a lot for this website, Maurice!! You're a machine. Sometimes I wonder if you're the only human that doesn't need sleep. Again, KUDOS!!
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Thanks, Rutger Oosterhoff 2. I definitely need sleep. I just can't sleep sometimes, so I jump on Stage 32, work on a script, etc.
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Thank you for sharing this, Rutger Oosterhoff 2. It's really helpful to read and learn more. English isn't my native language, so when I first wrote a script in English, I relied heavily on words ending in '-ing' and '-ly.' My initial coverage notes focused almost entirely on this. I had to rewrite it. Now I am used to it. However, one thing still confuses me: many of the scripts I read include '-ing' and '-ly' words, even though the correct approach is to avoid gerunds. Why does this happen? Do you know?
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Good question I don't really know. I only know it isn't a problem of not being a native English speaker. Maybe it is the easy whay of writing, reflecting speach. If I ask you if you want to go/leave, I don't say " Will you leave now,?", but I ask " "Are you leaving now?"
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Yes, that's correct in a dialogue, but not when you are writing the action scenes. I write in the active present tense, without words ending in "ing" or "ly." Now, I am used to it Rutger Oosterhoff 2