{"id":31591,"date":"2023-01-20T12:11:36","date_gmt":"2023-01-20T16:11:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/?p=31591"},"modified":"2024-05-22T02:32:42","modified_gmt":"2024-05-22T06:32:42","slug":"avoid-cliches","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches\/","title":{"rendered":"Avoid clich\u00e9s by using metaphor"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>Replace dead language with vibrant figures of speech<\/h2>\n<p>In 1832, French printers noted the sound metal plates made when they were cast from the original and then used to make copies:<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_31592\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-31592\" style=\"width: 600px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"31592\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches\/avoid-cliches-2\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches.png\" data-orig-size=\"457,300\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"avoid-cliches\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Get your ducks in a row&lt;\/strong&gt; Or better yet, don\u2019t. Because that\u2019s a tired, worn-out cliche. &lt;a href=&quot;https:\/\/www.shutterstock.com\/es\/image-photo\/yellow-bath-time-ducks-row-on-222123841&quot; rel=&quot;noopener&quot; target=&quot;_blank&quot;&gt;&lt;em&gt;Image by David Pimborough&lt;\/em&gt;&lt;\/a&gt;&lt;\/p&gt;\n\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches-300x197.png\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches.png\" tabindex=\"0\" role=\"button\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches.png\" alt=\"Avoid clich\u00e9s\" title=\"Avoid clich\u00e9s\" width=\"457\" height=\"300\" class=\"size-full wp-image-31592 lazyload\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches.png 457w, https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches-300x197.png 300w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 457px) 100vw, 457px\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 457px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 457\/300;\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"31592\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches\/avoid-cliches-2\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches.png\" data-orig-size=\"457,300\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"avoid-cliches\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Get your ducks in a row&lt;\/strong&gt; Or better yet, don\u2019t. Because that\u2019s a tired, worn-out cliche. &lt;a href=&quot;https:\/\/www.shutterstock.com\/es\/image-photo\/yellow-bath-time-ducks-row-on-222123841&quot; rel=&quot;noopener&quot; target=&quot;_blank&quot;&gt;&lt;em&gt;Image by David Pimborough&lt;\/em&gt;&lt;\/a&gt;&lt;\/p&gt;\n\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches-300x197.png\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches.png\" tabindex=\"0\" role=\"button\" src=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches.png\" alt=\"Avoid clich\u00e9s\" title=\"Avoid clich\u00e9s\" width=\"457\" height=\"300\" class=\"size-full wp-image-31592\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches.png 457w, https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/avoid-cliches-300x197.png 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 457px) 100vw, 457px\" \/><\/noscript><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-31592\" class=\"wp-caption-text\"><strong>Get your ducks in a row<\/strong> Or better yet, don\u2019t. Because that\u2019s a tired, worn-out clich\u00e9. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shutterstock.com\/es\/image-photo\/yellow-bath-time-ducks-row-on-222123841\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><em>Image by David Pimborough<\/em><\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<h5 class=\"standalone\">Click.<\/h5>\n<p>Or, in French<\/p>\n<h5 class=\"standalone\">Clich\u00e9r.<\/h5>\n<p>Fifty-some years later, somebody borrowed that jargon to refer to phrases that sounded as if they\u2019d been copied from something else. And that\u2019s where the word \u201cclich\u00e9\u201d comes from.<\/p>\n<p>Clich\u00e9s make your writing sound like copies of copies of someone else\u2019s original language.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s lazy writing. Writers should avoid common clich\u00e9s in writing.<\/p>\n<p>Don\u2019t let your writing be a copy: Substitute original metaphors for overused clich\u00e9s.<\/p>\n<h3>Why avoid clich\u00e9s?<\/h3>\n<h5>\u201cWords have power; the words strung together in clich\u00e9s have lost some or all of their power. Clich\u00e9s are a sign of a mind at rest. Writing is work. Your job as a writer is to suck people into your world.\u201d<\/h5>\n<h6>\u2014 Sol Stein, author, playwright, poet, editor and publisher, in <em>Dialogue for Writers<\/em><\/h6>\n<p>Why substitute vivid metaphors for worn-out clich\u00e9s?<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Through time and overuse, clich\u00e9s have become old, tired and worn-out.<\/strong> \u201cSome writers still imagine that \u2018Where\u2019s the beef?\u2019 has resonance,\u201d says John Early McIntyre, ACES president and assistant managing editor for the copydesk at the <em>Baltimore Sun<\/em>. And don\u2019t you want to shake writers who still use \u201cBuild it, and they will come\u201d?<\/li>\n<li><strong>Some clich\u00e9s have become meaningless.<\/strong> \u201cRepeats like a broken record,\u201d for instance, doesn\u2019t mean anything to audiences born after 1980 who were raised on streaming audio.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li><strong>A clich\u00e9 is something we say without thinking \u2026<\/strong> so how could it help our audience members think any differently about our topic?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Many clich\u00e9s started out as \u201csimiles (hard as nails, like taking candy from a baby), metaphors (the mother of all battles, a web of lies), or analogies (throw the baby out with the bathwater, up the creek without a paddle),\u201d write the editors of <em>Publication Management<\/em> magazine.<\/p>\n<p>That makes these comparisons the perfect substitute for clich\u00e9s.<\/p>\n<h3>Avoid literary taxidermy.<\/h3>\n<p>Or, here\u2019s another way to look at it: Clich\u00e9s are dead language.<\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s how Bert O. States, professor emeritus of Dramatic Arts at the University of California, Santa Barbara, puts it:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen metaphors die \u2026 they become idioms: idioms being what we know so well that we see straight through it, as Shakespeare\u2019s \u2018Not a mouse stirring.\u2019 Indeed, as Francis Sparshott has put it, \u2018a language is nothing but a necropolis of dead metaphors.\u2019 Or, as Stanislaw Lec, another aphorist, put it, \u2018In the beginning there was the Word \u2014 at the end, just the Clich\u00e9.&#8217;\u201d<\/p>\n<p>If clich\u00e9s are dead language, then writing with clich\u00e9s is a form of literary taxidermy.<\/p>\n<p>We writers keep propping up lifeless phrases, pretending they can live forever, however stinky and disgusting their corpses get. Still, we keep displaying their remains, sometimes for centuries after they\u2019ve passed away.<\/p>\n<h4>Does it paint a picture?\u00a0<\/h4>\n<p>Take the phrase:<\/p>\n<h5 class=\"standalone\">He got the sack.\u00a0<\/h5>\n<p>Or:<\/p>\n<h5 class=\"standalone\">He got sacked.<\/h5>\n<p>Today, we use it to mean \u201che lost his job\u201d or \u201che got fired.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Do you see a sack? Probably not.<\/p>\n<p>And that\u2019s one test for a clich\u00e9 in writing: Analogies are meant to bring your message to life by painting pictures in your readers\u2019 minds.<\/p>\n<h5 class=\"standalone\">No picture? No analogy.\u00a0<\/h5>\n<p>You need to refresh the phrase.<\/p>\n<p>The reason you don\u2019t see a sack is that the phrase \u201cto get the sack,\u201d according to Charles Earle Funk\u2019s A Hog on Ice &amp; Other Curious Expressions, goes back to the Middle Ages, when it referred to the ancient Roman punishment of stuffing condemned people into sacks and throwing them into the river to drown.<\/p>\n<p>Anyone who\u2019s ever lost a job knows that is exactly what it feels like. So \u201cto get the sack\u201d was a fabulous metaphor \u2014 when Roman officials actually stuffed people into sacks and threw them in the river to drown.<\/p>\n<p>But now that we don\u2019t practice that custom any more, the metaphor has lost the power and meaning of the original. It has become a clich\u00e9.<\/p>\n<p>Remember:<\/p>\n<h5 class=\"standalone\">If we don\u2019t do it literally any more, we can\u2019t do it literarily any more.<\/h5>\n<p>If we don\u2019t really stuff people into sacks and throw them in the river to drown, we shouldn\u2019t refer to that custom in a metaphor.<\/p>\n<h3>Substitute metaphors for clich\u00e9s.<\/h3>\n<p>The good news is, metaphors make the perfect substitutes for clich\u00e9s. That\u2019s because most clich\u00e9s were once fresh, exciting metaphors.<\/p>\n<p>Through time and overuse, though, they\u2019ve become old, tired and worn out.<\/p>\n<p>Dead.<\/p>\n<p>Bury your literary corpses. Replace your taxidermied phrases with living, breathing metaphors.<\/p>\n<p>____<\/p>\n<p>Sources: Curt Hazlett, \u201cBecome an Inventor of Fresh Language: Avoid Clich\u00e9s,\u201d BusinessJournalism.org, May 30, 2007<\/p>\n<p>Bert O. States, \u201cTroping Through Proverbia,\u201d <em>The American Scholar,<\/em> September 2001<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTake my clich\u00e9 \u2014 please,\u201d <em>Publications Management,<\/em> July 2007<\/p>\n<p>Ann Wylie, Make Magic With Metaphor, Wylie Communications Inc., 2004<\/p>\n<div id='MC-AOS-MP' class='widgets_on_page wop_tiny1  wop_small1  wop_medium1  wop_large1  wop_wide1'>\n\t\t\t<ul><li id=\"custom_html-40\" class=\"widget_text widget widget_custom_html\"><div class=\"textwidget custom-html-widget\"><a title=\"Master the Art of Storytelling - Ann Wylie's creative-content workshop\" href=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/corporate-communications-training\/writing-classes\/business-storytelling-training\/\" target=\"\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/02\/storytelling-workshop.png\" alt=\"Master the Art of Storytelling - Ann Wylie's creative-content workshop\" title=\"Master the Art of Storytelling - Ann Wylie's creative-content workshop\" width=\"auto\" height=\"auto\" border=\"0\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 250px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 250\/250;float:left; text-align:left; margin: 0 auto; margin-right: 10px; margin-top: 1px; margin-bottom: 5px; background-color: #ffffff; font-size: 18x; line-height: 22px; padding: 0px; color: #FFFFFF; max-width:100%; max-height:100%;\" class=\"img-max lazyload\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\"><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/02\/storytelling-workshop.png\" alt=\"Master the Art of Storytelling - Ann Wylie's creative-content workshop\" title=\"Master the Art of Storytelling - Ann Wylie's creative-content workshop\" width=\"auto\" height=\"auto\" border=\"0\" style=\"float:left; text-align:left; margin: 0 auto; margin-right: 10px; margin-top: 1px; margin-bottom: 5px; background-color: #ffffff; font-size: 18x; line-height: 22px; padding: 0px; color: #FFFFFF; max-width:100%; max-height:100%;\" class=\"img-max\"><\/noscript><\/a><h3>How can you tell better business stories?<\/h3>\r\n<p>Stories are so effective that Og Mandino, the late author of the bestselling <em>The Greatest Salesman in the World<\/em>, says, \u201cIf you have a point, find a story.\u201d<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>Learn to find, develop and write stories that engage readers\u2019 hearts and minds at <a title=\"Master the Art of Storytelling - Ann Wylie's creative-content workshop\" href=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/corporate-communications-training\/writing-classes\/business-storytelling-training\/\" target=\"\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Master the Art of Storytelling<\/strong><\/a>, our content-writing training workshop.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>There, you\u2019ll learn how to find the aha! moment that\u2019s the gateway to every anecdote. How to start an anecdote with a bang \u2014 instead of a whimper. And how to use \u201cthe most powerful form of human communication\u201d to grab attention, boost credibility, make messages more memorable and communicate better.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div class=\"btn btn--depth\" style=\"text-align: center;  margin: 10px 0 20px; width:100%;\"><a id=\"btnTT\" style=\"\" title=\"BOOK NOW\" href=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/corporate-communications-training\/writing-classes\/business-storytelling-training\/\" target=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" data-width=\"91\">BOOK NOW<\/a>\r\n<!-- [if mso]>\r\n<p style=\"line-height:0;margin:0;\"><v:roundrect xmlns:v=\"urn:schemas-microsoft-com:vml\" href=\"https:\/\/www.wyliecomm.com\/corporate-communications-training\/writing-classes\/business-storytelling-training\/\" style=\"width:153px\" arcsize=\"8%\" strokecolor=\"#D96237\" filled=\"t\"><v:fill type=\"gradient\" angle=\"180\" color=\"#f16522\" color2=\"#f16522\"><\/v:fill><v:textbox style=\"mso-fit-shape-to-text:t\" inset=\"0px,11px,0px,11px\"><center style=\"font-size:16px;line-height:24px;color:#FFFFFF;font-family:sans-serif;font-weight:bold;mso-line-height-rule:exactly;mso-text-raise:4px\">BOOK NOW<\/center><\/v:textbox><\/v:roundrect><\/p>\r\n<![endif]--><\/div>\r\n<\/div><\/li><\/ul><\/div><!-- widgets_on_page -->\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Replace dead language with vibrant figures of speech<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":31594,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13085],"tags":[12997,13086],"class_list":{"0":"post-31591","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-metaphor-cliches","8":"tag-editors","9":"tag-metaphor-cliches","10":"entry"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v23.4 (Yoast SEO v23.6) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Avoid cliches by using metaphor<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Get your ducks in a row: Or better yet, don\u2019t. 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