Showing posts with label description. Show all posts
Showing posts with label description. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Do Colors Have Character?
I'm reading something written by another author I know who is also writing a police procedural. When offering him comments, I ask about his habit of giving subjective qualities to colors. He speaks of eyes being a "rich hazel" color, for instance. I can see light hazel, dark hazel, speckled hazel, hazel with a dark rim, but how can the color hazel be "rich?" I assume he means a medium brown with yellow in the coloration. He speaks of a carpet being "lush green." Again, I see green as light, dark, blue-green, mottled, whatever, but not "lush." If a piece of slime were the exact same shade of green, would it also be "lush?" I think not. I think the carpet is lush, its color is green. His room also has "lush avocado" drapes. My old refrigerator was avocado green; was it also "lush?" This is such a minor point, and the reader still understands what the author means, but I wonder if it isn't the beginning of a slippery slope. If we do that little descriptive side-step with colors, what shortcuts in our writing will come next? Thanks for reading. Joan Sween
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