Why I Still Mind the Hooptedoodle
By Ben Potter, ACN Byline Editor, and Senior Editor, Farm Futures
I’m an avid reader, and this summer I decided to finish up the early westerns of Elmore Leonard.
You may not know Leonard by name, but you probably know his work. Some of his later mystery novels became the basis for movies and television shows like Get Shorty, Out of Sight, Jackie Brown, and Justified.
He’s one of my favorite writers for several reasons, starting with the fact that he was able to construct so many tightly written whodunnits with a lot of twists and turns. And then there’s the dialogue. No one writes better dialogue than Elmore Leonard.
As ag journalists, we should draw inspiration from our colleagues in the industry. This is a great benefit of ACN, in fact – you get ample opportunities to learn from the best in our business.
At the same time, if you like a particular fiction writer, why not try and emulate what you like best from him or her?
Fortunately for me, Elmore Leonard contributed a “Writers on Writing” piece for the New York Times in 2001 where he spells out the rules that meant the most to him. The essay’s first sentence had me hooked: “These are rules I’ve picked up along the way to help me remain invisible when I’m writing a book, to help me show rather than tell what’s taking place in the story.”
I revisit this essay from time to time. (You can read it here.) A lot of Leonard’s rules are geared towards fiction writers, but they still offer a unique insight into how he was able to frame such tight, well-structured narratives.
Consider rule #3. Never use a verb other than “said” to carry the dialogue. Rule #4 is the chaser – never use an adverb to modify the verb said. It can be fun to jazz up a feature article with the occasional “she asserted” or “he posited,” but I really do try to keep it simple whenever I can.
Leonard also shows how the exclamation point is more intrusive than you might realize. “You are allowed no more than two or three per 100,000 words of prose,” he says.
Use regional dialect sparingly. I battled with this idea a lot in my early days at Cotton Farming magazine. If you’ve ever talked with someone from the Mississippi Delta with a thick, southern drawl, you’ll know it’s very specific and very beautiful. But is it worth trying to capture on the page? Or does it just become another distraction at some point? (I pondered quizzingly.)
Elmore’s final rule of writing is deceptively simple: “Try to leave out the part that readers tend to skip … if it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.”
If you’re still reading, you might be wondering what a weird word like “hooptedoodle” is doing in the headline. It’s a reference to two chapter titles in a lesser-known John Steinbeck novel, Sweet Thursday.
As Leonard puts it: The third chapter is titled ”Hooptedoodle 1” and the 38th chapter ”Hooptedoodle 2” as warnings to the reader, as if Steinbeck is saying: ”Here’s where you’ll see me taking flights of fancy with my writing, and it won’t get in the way of the story. Skip them if you want.”
Leonard concludes his essay by admitting he read every word of the hooptedoodle chapters.
Here, I think, is Leonard’s core argument. Your writing style is largely dictated by any number of self-imposed rules that you then have the self-discipline to follow. At the same time, it’s okay to break those rules from time to time as long as you’re doing it deliberately. A little self-awareness can go a long way.
Leonard died in 2013, but he’ll inspire future readers (and writers) for generations to come. Is there a writer (fiction or nonfiction) who is a special inspiration to you? Let’s keep sharing good advice with one another – send your thoughts to [email protected].
Ben Potter is the Editor of the ACN ByLine in Brief Newsletter and a Senior Editor with Farm Futures magazine. He has more than 20 years of experience as a public relations professional and journalist in the agriculture industry.