In this series of blogs, Writing Woes, I will share with you some amusing insights on the mistakes people inadvertently make when writing, based on my work as a professional tutor and as a writer for Summit University. (You can visit my tutoring website here: https://lynnthetutor.com)
Here we go!
“The leaders poured over the map.”
They did what? They poured something on a map? What? Oh, the writer meant to write pored; they pored over the map.
How disruptive of the mood in a novel, during a scene of intense danger for example, when a homonym mishap like the one above makes the reader stop and laugh. Writers, be more careful!
Pour — To stream or flow continuously and profusely; American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language 5 (AH5).
Pore — To read, study, or examine something carefully and attentively; (AH5).
Spell-checkers won’t discern wrong homonyms if the words are spelled correctly. It’s up to us to double check that we’ve used the right one.
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“She gave him free reign to determine the plantings.”
It almost sounds plausible, doesn’t it? Can we still swallow it when:
“She tried to reign in his over-use of sunflowers.”
English has a rich vocabulary of idioms taken from the days of the horse and buggy: rein in, free rein, light rein, give rein to, keep a tight rein on, and more. But our younger writers seem never to have met a horse and so they give their characters free reign in their actions. Delusions of grandeur, I say.
Rein — Either of two long narrow straps attached to each end of the bit of a bridle and used by a rider or driver to control a horse or other animal; (AH5).
Reign — Exercise of sovereign power, as by a monarch; (AH5)
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“The crew erected the polls to support the lights.”
This one strains credibility, doesn’t it? Is it possible that the writer doesn’t know the difference between a poll and a pole? Maybe the writer never knew that there are homonyms?
Poll — The casting and registering of votes in an election; (AH5).
Pole — A long, relatively slender, generally rounded piece of wood or other material; (AH5).
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“Those must be the miners.”
“Well of course, they’re minors. They look like little children.”
“Miners, not minors!”
The above is a quip from Galaxy Quest, one of my all-time favorite movies.
Miner — One whose work or business it is to extract ore or minerals from the earth (AH5).
Minor — One who has not reached legal adulthood (AH5).
All of the above examples are real, though paraphrased. I’m finding these same outrages in many of the novels written by young writers in the past twenty years. Something is amiss in our education system. People are graduating high school with fifth grade vocabularies. It’s possible that these writers never even knew that words like pore, rein, pole, and miner existed.
There is no substitute for a large vocabulary. If one didn’t hear one’s parents speak it, if one wasn’t taught it in school, then gaining it is simply hard work. Coal miners and wait staff don’t absolutely require it. Writers do.
Lynn The Tutor
(My tutoring website: https://lynnthetutor.com)
I love the combination of photographs and facts. Homonyms are one of my favorite figures of speech! Congratulations, dear Lynn, on expanding your career to include gifts of writing for friends of Summit University.