• sense of sight, show don't tell
    how to,  writing craft

    Show Don’t Tell with Sense of Sight

    The writer’s mantra show, don’t tell has an obvious partnership with the sense of sight. We show the reader what we see with our eyes. We see shape, size, color, direction, and motion. How best to show these? Comparisons Beginning writers naturally gravitate to the sense of sight in description. We are after all, visual creatures. Be careful not to catalog what you see: the big blue house sat at the end of a long gravel drive. This example includes size, color, and distance descriptors-big, blue, and long. While these all paint an image for the reader, the image is bland and without character. Instead, use comparisons to tease out emotional…