p e n c h a n t

Action verbs are like action figures: they provide immediate drama, coming to the rescue of an otherwise wimpy line. They are the muscle of a sentence; the bouncers, if you will. Examples of action verbs are hit, run, perspire, sneeze, sue (as in class-action lawsuit). Examples of non-action verbs are snooze, yawn, think, slump, die. Go through any written work, replacing non-action verbs with active ones, and watch it come alive. Even the most famous of works will sizzle. Take Hamlet’s soliloquy: “To be or not to be, that is the question.” Now, try this: “To pitch a fit, or not to pitch a fit….” Or, “To make haste, or not make haste….” This would be most effective on the stage, with the actor forcing or emphasizing the st sound on the end of haste, thereby increasing the likelihood of flying spittle—active indeed. (This, in turn, would favor the whole idea of being, for dead men have no expectoration.) The writers of early readers knew the importance of action verbs. “See Jane run. Run, Jane, run!” is far more attention-getting than “See Jane yawn. Yawn, Jane, yawn”. How could a kid learn with that kind of drowsy writing? Not very easily. So, writers all: punch those verbs up! Stop them from shuffling, dozing, dreaming. Get them marching! Get them running, racing, darting, spitting, scattering, exploding!

Action verb to the rescue!

This is the fourth in a haphazard series of helpful, time-saving tips that, if you are already familiar with, we trust you still will enjoy. If these are not familiar, then—Here’s to better writing! Once we conjure up enough tips, we’ll dump them all together for easy reference.

I bought this card in a used book shop in Harrisonburg, Virginia. Today, as I watch the snow fall, I’m thinking, The future might be good for used book shops, considering the current condition of the book industry, indeed, of the economy. But I’m also thinking, We will always want stories, no matter the form.

Artwork © Glen Baxter, 1986, the Bug House Archives

The works of both artists influenced me, those of N. C. and his son, Andrew. I remember the moment I first saw an N. C. Wyeth illustration. I was a boy and an artist, so the impact was sublime: pirates on the high seas, wind-blown, sun-seared, grim. It was a rich, bold composition for the cover of the Scribner’s classic, Treasure Island. The fact that Robert Louis Stevenson was one of my favorite authors heightened the experience. I was just as enthralled, if not more, when years later I saw the originals from the book at the Brandywine River Museum in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania.

Being a student of Howard Pyle, the father of American illustration, N. C. knew how to become his subject, whether pirate or Huron or Rip Van Winkle, in order to paint with authority. Not only did he live out the drama of his works in his mind, he surrounded himself with real articles of fading American cultures—many of which appear in his illustrations.

My first awareness of Andrew’s work was not Christina’s World—the famed painting of the stranded girl in the bleak, tense landscape (the real Christina was a victim of polio)—it was the graphite drawing of the bedpost for Chambered Nautilus. I had read that Andrew used a plain Number Two pencil—the kind I used in school—rather than an austere range of F, HB, B, B2, and so on. This told me it wasn’t as much the tools you used as it was what you did with them.

As Andrew developed as an artist under his father’s admiring eye, something unusual began to unfold. Father began to be follow son. Andrew explored directions away from book illustration, inspired by his environs rather than from literature. His art became a visual journal. I once thought that Andrew picked up where his father had left off—painting with egg tempera on panel, but it was N. C. who learned the technique from Andy, and with it sought to create art beyond illustration, which he undervalued.

The time came when father and son each entered a work for an exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Andrew’s was accepted; N. C.’s was not. Son had eclipsed father, at least in the world of gallery work. At least at that moment. For Andrew, due in part to the fact that his father was the great illustrator and his own work had a straightforward narrative, would not be taken seriously by the highbrow art scene much of his long career.

His career now over, son has joined father to stand as a major fellow figure in the American composition of art and culture.

One of the best works written on the Wyeth dynasty is N. C. Wyeth, A Biography by David Michaelis (Knopf, 1998). Michaelis spent six years in research for the book, and had access to the family letters through the gracious permission of Betsy, Andrew’s wife.

Too cold the air, the earth, the walk, the glass the ledge the stonework the cat on the stoop.

The starry sky.

The sparrow’s breath.

The homeless figure in the cardboard box. The man on the subway bench.

C-old. The word says it, onomatopoeically.

Cold feet.
Cold fish.
Cold sweat.

Cold sore.
Cold virus. Common cold.

Cold pack.
Cold cream.
Cold soup.
Cold bath.

Cold storage.

Cold fact.

Cold shoulder. Cold glance.
Cold-hearted. Cold heart.

Cold turkey.

Cold blue steel.
Cold fire.

Out cold.

Out in the cold.
Left out in the cold.

Come in from the cold.
The Spy Who Came In From The Cold.
Cold War.

Cold-blooded.
In Cold Blood.

“The love of many shall wax cold.”

Baby, It’s Cold Outside.

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Too cold is this
To warm with Sun—
Too stiff to bended be,
To joint this Agate were a work—
Outstaring Masonry—

How went the Agile Kernel out
Contusion of the Husk
Nor Rip, nor wrinkle indicate
But just an Asterisk.

Emily Dickinson

The corner of a page that’s folded down like a dog’s ear to mark a place,
or (dog-eared) something that is shabby or worn from use.

Some nights they go crazy with their calls, like monkeys. On a walk one evening to my mailbox, which is about a quarter mile from my front door, I froze as one swooped past me and landed in a tall oak. It was a barred owl, about 20 inches high, and had a long black snake in its beak, which it draped over the branch on which it perched. I could see only its silhouette, but could tell it was studying me, as I studied it. I called to it awhile, in a poor imitation of its call—something like, hoo, woo, hoo-hoo, hoo, hoo, hoo-o-o-o. It did not seem amused, or fooled, but appeared stoically curious. We must have studied each other for five minutes. Finally, it picked up the snake, which was quite dead, its spasms played out, and flew off through the woods.

For a picture book experience of owls, see the Caldecott winner, Owl Moon, written by Jane Yolen and illustrated by John Schoenherr. Simple, elegant, poetic, it’s a must for every child’s bookshelf.

Holding still with her right arm on the chair, Margaret remained motionless until the lens cover was replaced. She remains so to this day.

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Tintype for tintype’s sake. A junk shop find.

(Most tintypes are mirror images. Rather than open and close a shutter, the photographer exposed the image by removing the lens cover.)

Historians say our calendar is late by four years. If this is true, happy 2013.

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As Sandy Denny sang, Who knows where the time goes?

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“So teach us to number our days, that we may gain wisdom of heart.”
——————————————–——————-—a psalm of Moses

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artwork is ink and acrylic on paper