Personally, I think WELL WRITTEN purple prose adds to the atmosphere of a good historical romance. But that’s just me and Sybil makes fun of me on a regular basis because of it.
So whose side are you on… can you appreciate purple prose sometimes? Or does it seem hopelessly out of date to you? And what makes a non-clinical description cross over into purple prose territory anyhow?
Here’s what I want from you. Show me what can be beautiful about purple prose, or show me why it irritates the hell out of you, or even better, show me the difference between non-clinical and purple prose.
Using your ORIGINAL purple prose, I’d like you to describe how one body part (yours or someone else’s) looks or feels. BUT WAIT… you didn’t think it was going to be THAT easy, did you? Nope, to make you think harder (and so that Sybil won’t hyperventilate), there are RULES, people! The body part can’t be anything that could be covered by a bikini or a Speedo. So no odes to throbbing manhoods, no dewy flower petals, no swollen pearls, no puckered rosebuds. Got it? It can be over-the-top, beautiful, or whatever. Just remember the Bikini/Speedo rule, and it must be your original work— no quoting from a book.
So make me sigh, make me laugh, or make me cringe and you might be selected to receive a super special book prize! I’m going to let this contest run through the weekend– Sunday, February 17th at 11:59 PM CST
As Kate looks in the mirror, she can’t help but love touching her knobby but stimulating elbows. Ah yes, these lovely elbows feel like branches of a pussy willow on a Spring morning. A morning fresh with dew, very wet, wet dew. So fresh and smooth from the lotion she uses! She can’t help but touch the right and then the left with her bottle of St. Ives and moan bcause her elbows also remind her of a hard yet pulsing other body part she also adores, like her knees.
Her hair was black. Like the darkest night, like a raven’s wing. Like a shiny peice of coal, or the brightest obsidian. However, unlike those substances, her hair was soft. Soft like a kitten’s fur, a baby’s skin, the petal of a flower. It was long and flowed, like the waves of the ocean, or the ripples of a discarded ribbon. Her hair was also shiny, healthy and strong, so much so that it gleamed like the dewy grass early morning in the summer, when the sun had just risen, before all the delicate water had burnt away. Like a brightly polished mirror, or a prism with the light reflecting off of it. Her hair flowed down her back, to her deliciously curved bottom like a starry sky and spilled down her back.
Too much yet? 😉 because I can’t think of anything more – and thank goodness 😛 (Originally I had “baby’s bottom… but felt that was *too* too much.)
LOLOLOL!
I love this contest! And may even enter one of my own, even if I can’t win.
Her beautiful brown eyes told all. They were like looking into cups of hot chocolate. Accented by a thick fringe of long, black eyelashes, they looked larger. Her XXL double lenghth mascara did not clump, causing her eyes to look larger…like LARGE cups of hot chocolate…
I’m just watching myself.
I mean, only watching what goes on.
People’s contributions…
Oh you know what I mean!
Cups of hot chocolate? How shall I ever top that.
And Syb, I so wanted to schmooze about a manly love stick ROFL
All right…
He gazed into the lassie’s bewitching emerald eyes (they were reminding him of of the wide, bonny moss green hills of his beloved homestead in the Scottish Highlands) in which tears were pooling like crystal droplets. Before he could say another word liquid pearls were flowing from her almond shaped depths, rendering him powerless to resist her elfin-like beauty. He dropped onto his knees and swore the most sincere oath of his life ….
ACK, god, that’s more difficult than I thought. And it’s advisable not to eat something, especially during bouts of laughter *snort*.
I’m so bad at this..
Her nails were painted red, red like blood, like a rose, like her lips. They were hard as glass and even harder to break, her best weapon – or her best tease.
Um.. what the hell was that?! lol.
Am assuming that purple prose is description by euphemisms but think that mild rather than over the top would be key in making that work when I read. So tried to do that here:
Her fingertips glided along his silken skin, up from the crease of elbow to the great swell of flesh. This mound which evoked feelings of security and vulnerability. It was a steadfast thing in the midst of the turmoil playing out around them.
In his coat, waistcoat, and trousers of black superfine, with his equally black hair tumbling fashionably about his white collar, he was as glorious a creature as any wild fallow buck she’d described in her work of natural history.
She assessed his features in the mirror beyond him — the noble brow, the aquiline nose jutting above a full, sensual mouth, the square-cut jaw. But nothing compared to his well-knit figure, which bespoke many hours engaged in fencing or boxing or some other gentlemanly sport.
You know, when Teddypig first came up with the idea for a Purple Prose contest, I figured we’d get a bunch of over-the-top outrageous entries, but I gotta tell you guys, I’m surprised at how many of these have given me a shiver, and not in a bad way. *g*
um… that’s not just me is it? *blushes*
Bev, yes it is just you. *g*
I was going to do a serious blurb first… but then felt too silly – however, most of the other ones are serious, and mine now is the ridiculous one. So I’m tossing my original in the hat:
His eyes were bright and clear, like a cloudless midmorning sky, that perfect moment in time when things were yet fresh and new. Like the above, and the rays shining down, there was a hint of a twinkle in his eye as well. The corners crinkled slightly, denoting he was one who smiled and laughed comfortably. The planes and angles of his face were rough hewn and slightly craggy- enough to prevent him from being called beautiful, but stunning in their sheer masculinity. He was strong – solid like the earth.
My, my, they were almost indescribably delicious. As she stared dumbfoundedly, she multitasked and struggled heroically to find the verbiage that could convey their sophisticated, yet utilitarian, masculine, yet feminine, strong, yet also bendy beauty. To paraphrase that fine poet, Sir Mixalot, they were long, strong, and bound to get the friction on….
Oh, the friction! It was then she heard it. A staccato series of tiny pops, like the sensuous sounds of a symphony of minuscule cupid arrows being loosed upon that unsuspecting organ lodged in her breast. And still she stared. Somehow, the simple sight of those facile fingers and nubile, noisy knuckles had won her heart, his digits deftly plying, playing her in the high-stakes Poker Game of Loooove.
(Not great at actually following the assignment, but work with me here! 😛 )
Make way, make way.
How can I resist a purple prose contest, when I’m a past winner of AAR’s purple prose parody contest?
But let me tell you, it’s a lot easier to write a parody than to come up with the real thing. True purple prose is dead earnest, without irony or self-awareness–the author really thinks s/he is producing lovely prose.
Without further preamble, here’s my example:
It’s not awful writing. It’s just pointless writing. It’s the author making love to her thesaurus and leaving the bedroom door just a little ajar. One paragraph like that in a full-length novel might be tolerable, but pages and pages of it might drive the modern reader to the emergency room with bleeding eyes. And just think, we’ve only covered teeth. There are still eyes, lips, ears, nose, cheeks, hair and whatnot left to describe in loving, excruciating detail.
Worse, after all that verbiage, we don’t know anything about the woman with the wonderteeth, nor anything of the person doing the describing. Nor any idea what the story is about.
So for a fun comparison, I wrote another paragraph about teeth:
It’s still not immortal prose, but at least it serves a purpose. There is a story here, a possibly interesting undertow to an otherwise ordinary relationship, and maybe a foreshadowing of troubles ahead.
Hehe, thanks, BevQB, this has been fun. 🙂
Forgot to add, Candy from SmartBitches had a great take on purple prose some time back.