Prompt #16 Travel and Adventure

April

Hi Friends,

In the past couple of weeks, I have given you various prompts to get to the truth not only of place but about your own feelings about that place. One of the barriers to writing our truth—whether that’s about place or ourselves—is relying on overused, worn-out words and phrasing—otherwise, the deadly cliché. When we use a cliché, it’s a place holder for the truth. It is often close to what we want to say but it is never exactly right. And our reader has heard the worn-out saying so many times already that it means absolutely nothing.

Travel writing can be tricky because we so often fall back on cliché. Peaceful fishing village. Snow-capped mountains. White sand beach with aquamarine waters. These descriptions are over used but also, they do not get to the truth of place. While it is true that the mountains outside my window still have snow on them, they do not look like they are wearing little snow caps, so it’s not accurate. It’s also incomplete, because in my hometown, there are also casinos and gas stations and burger joints; there are white fir trees infested with bark beetles, huge swaths of forest that were blackened by wildfire. There are also tumbling creeks and waterfalls, woodpeckers, bobcats, and bears. To tell the truth about a place, you need specific detail, not hackneyed phrases. And also, at the very worst, these familiar phrases we write without even thinking about might have more sinister consequences. Are they perpetuating damaging stereotypes? As travel writers, we have an ethical obligation