Writing Questions: Cliches

Alright, so... It's been a while since I've done a question blog, but this time I'd like to be more directed. The last blog got all sorts of disconnected. I think the topic ended up being too broad and the subject matter too nebulous.

This time: Cliches.

Instead of me writing a whole lot on a still broad topic, I'd like to get you all to ask me questions that I will answer in a later blog. These won't be 'end all be all' answers, and I've never promised that sort of thing. In writing, there rarely is a "This is right, do it only this way" answer. Even spelling has a little fudge factor built in.

What would you like to see me ramble on about regarding cliches?

Comments

[Luna Aeterna Solutae]

Cliches are just overused tropes, but not the enemy.

[Minds Eye]

How can you make them work?

Take dark and stormy nights for instance. They are certainly real things that happen in the world, and can therefore happen in stories. But how can you make it mean something? The power could go out in the house the characters are staying in. The house could spring a leak, and the water could trickle through a hidden crack in the wall/floor leading the characters to a secret door. Something to fit the mood or setting of the story.

Or the over-bearing police captain that wants everything done by the book, dammit. The mayor won't let him tolerate loose cannons on the case. They're too emotional, and can't be trusted with their badges and guns. Maybe because he's seen countless young officers get caught up in red tape and lose their promising careers because of one moment of carelessness. And he can't have ten more like you if he can't even have one because you screw up too.

Take something cliche, something recognizable and approach it from a different direction. You might just freshen it up a bit.

[BlazzingInferno]

As oxymoronic as this may sound: the less common or widely known cliches that you've run across. It's so sad to realize this novel thing you just thought up has actually been done to death while you weren't looking.

[Noble Thought]

3752721

That might take a little thinking and probably research to do. I can think of maybe a few, though.

3752651

I'll see what I can come up with. A lot of 'making them work' appears to be mostly exploring them, like you said, from a new direction or giving them more thought as to why and how.

3752589

But of course. If we avoided cliches because they were cliche, none of us would probably write anything.

[Luna Aeterna Solutae]

3752651
Twilight's police captain is the latter. Although he's more kindly informing the uppity young Fed assigned to his precinct that he doesn't have to take her shit and she's not special just because she comes from a rich family.
And I've previously subverted the first. Setting was pony Boston in October... which is frequently rainy.

[BlazzingInferno]

3752791
3752651
My best input on how to 'make them work' comes from a poetry class: if you're going to use a cliche, own it. Personalize it for your particular use, and make sure that moment in the narrative is deserving of attention:

Roseluck sighed. She loved getting new flower shipments in the mail, but not in this volume, and not this late on a Friday. A living room packed wall-to-wall with rose bushes in need of trimming promised her nothing but a dark and thorny night.

[CinnamonSwirltheBreaded]

Cliches are just over used tropes, and tropes in and of itself aren't bad, but they have to be handled carefully or they end up being... well, cliche.