The As Vendetta

Enhance your storytelling by changing a single word

Edited by Liz Jensen

Doing atypical things pushes the boundaries of what you are capable of. For me, I challenge myself to not use the word “as.” Of course in my drafts, you will find that contaminated word everywhere, however, when I revise I ponder the meaning behind what I’m saying and eliminate it. Why?

As is a cheat code. It’s a word that gives your sentence free momentum, like the word “suddenly.” 

Yes, there are times as is required or accepted with open arms. For instance, comparisons (or similes) like “he stood as tall as the nearest tree,” or solidifying a relation: “as your wife, I beg you to sit down.”

The following is an example from my work in progress, a retelling of king Arthur. This sentence makes its appearance at the height of tension and uses the word as. See if you can identify what this sentence is doing grammatically, especially if it’s supposed to build tension:

He stood before the fire as it crackled against his skin.

Digging into the nitty gritty of grammar, this use of as is a conjunction. It’s taken the place of “while” or “when.” This use combines two events (or two independent clauses) that happen at the same time. Which is grammatically correct. 

However, as steals from the craft of writing. As I said earlier, that sentence is meant to build tension, however, the sentence is so short that any tension created from it is short-lived. 

So how do we change the sentence to exclude as while keeping the same meaning? Here’s that sentence again, redrafted, and try to identify what changed:

He was a cathedral. The fire reflected off his eyes like stained glass at daybreak. It snaked across his skin like murals painted across marbled ceilings and that’s when I knew Sean was gone.

By challenging myself to take as out, I was able to build that tension and drag out the moment. This means I found the poetics of the diction, or the words, that relay the same information. So what exactly changed?

I found a metaphor. Metaphors are tools that writers use to describe abstract emotions or concepts by using grounded, concrete examples. The Writer's Edit, a site dedicated to helping writers, describes the metaphor as a tool to "convey meaning and conjure up images, thoughts, and feelings in a reader’s mind with just a few simple words."  In this instance, the metaphor I chose for Sean was a cathedral. 

Of course, a man is not a cathedral, yet putting that image in the reader’s mind does a few things, like it:

1. Links Sean to a holy place.

2. Shows both hope and foreboding for the story from here on out due to religious and gothic relations.

Writing is about mixing it up. If every single sentence was subject + verb + object every single time, a reader will lose interest. So maybe, including a few as conjunctions in your writing will add some flare. Because as is a tool to put less emphasis on a moment while other moments (like building tension) need more attention and activity.

Let’s take a look at a published novel, The Maze Runner, by James Dashner. The first chapter of the novel is jam-packed with action. During the first chapter, the word as is used eight times. Compared to all of the action happening in the first chapter, that’s relatively low. Here are the eight times he used it:

1. “The lightless elevator swayed back and forth as it ascended…” (pg. 1)

2. “As he scrambled to his feet, he felt the room sway less and less until it finally stilled” (pg. 2)

3. “He felt a worrying shudder in his chest, as if his heart wanted to escape, to flee his body” (pg. 2)

4. “A loud clank rang out above him and he sucked in a startled breath as he looked up” (pg. 3)

5. “He willed his eyes to adjust as he squinted…” (pg. 3)

6. “And then, as if the lens of a camera had sharpened its focus, the faces cleared” (pg. 3)

7. “Thomas hesitated, then stepped into it with his right foot and clutched the rope as he was yanked toward the sky” (pg. 4)

8. “But someone spoke as they yanked him over the sharp edge of the dark box” (pg. 4)

Breaking down these sentences even further, two of them (3 and 6) are comparisons or similes. The other six times are used during times in which the story pace is fast, where the sentences grow shorter and the story beats quicken. 

Here are a few sentences with the word as. Can you rewrite these sentences to disclude the word as? 

1.  My husband washed the laundry as he thought about dinner.

2. Hercules pounced on a lion as it opened its jaws.

3. As I watched the comb on the table, my friend expelled a bug.

4. The water rushed through the stream as I fished.

Comment the sentences you came up with! Did you use a metaphor? Split the sentence into multiple sentences? Being conscious of the ways you can identify where to edit your drafts makes all the difference in creative writing. 

Of course, you don’t have to change every single instance where you use the word as. But here’s your friendly reminder to write, write, write. Write your drafts like a bursting dam, but when it comes time to edit, I challenge you to suck out the word as and see what your writing can turn into.