Charm (sic) Protection Theory; Was (Re: Jame s gave his life)

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 107205

charme wrote: 
> Stephen King, who reviewed OoP (he loves JKR, and has used the
"Golden Snitch" in his Dark Tower series,) chided her somewhat for her
overuse of adjectives in her writing.  Anyone got any ideas?
> 
> 
Gina responded: 
>Ever read or listened to his book "On Writing" he HATES adjectives!
He goes on and on about how that are just not as good as a more
forward/firm  sentence. <snip> Maybe it is
> just that this is her first big series and she has not left the
adjective nest yet - who knows?

Carol adds:
Presumably he wants he to rely on concrete nouns and strong verbs in
the active voice, a view any professional writer, editor, or English
teacher would agree with. But no adjectives at all would be pretty
dull. We wouldn't know that Ron had red hair or that Umbridge was
toadlike with short, stubby fingers or that Dumbledore had a long,
crooked nose. We couldn't talk about Lily's green, almond-shaped eyes
or note how many of the more powerful wizards appear to have long fingers.

Just for the fun of it, I turned to a page of OoP at random and found:

"'You received the note I sent to your cabin this morning?' said
Umbridge in the same loud, slow voice she had used with him earlier,
as though she was addressing somebody both foreign and very slow" (OoP
Am. ed. 447).

Take out just the adjectives and you have the obviously impossible
sentence: "'You received the note I sent to your cabin this morning?'
said Umbridge in the voice she had used with him earlier, as though
she was addressing somebody both and very."

The whole subordinate clause beginning with "as though" is dependent
for sense on the adjectives "foreign and "slow," so it would also have
to be eliminated if we were doing away with adjectives. Which leaves
us with: "'You received the note I sent to your cabin this morning?'
said Umbridge in the voice she had used with him earlier." Okay, it's
a clear, grammatical sentence (unless you want the "was" changed to
"were" for subjunctive mood), but it doesn't fully convey the intended
meaning. So I vote for adjectives in small doses as needed but I agree
that overreliance on them is an amateurish flaw.

Did Stephen King cite any particular passages that he considered
objectionable for the overuse of adjectives?

Carol, who hopes this post will be regarded as OT even though it
discusses style and not content