March 18, 2004

Sam's mouth

filed under characterization | prose matters

Mouths are by design extremely flexible. Lots of muscles are involved in moving the lips in the production of speech, in smiling and frowning, in pursing the mouth. There are dozens of possible smiles. If you think of the person you know best in the world, you can probably identify at least three distinct smiles. The full smile, when the person is unreservedly pleased or happy, the shy smile, the reluctant smile, the sneering smile, the almost smile. These are such basics of human interaction that it's hard to describe them, and often authors don't. She (he) smiled has to be one of the most common sentences in fiction, along with she (he) said. And that's okay; there's no need, most times, to belabor the point.

But mouths can give a lot away, both about the person who owns the mouth and the person observing the mouth. From A.S. Byatt's Possession, this lovely phrasing:

...his mouth pursed, but pursed in American, more generous than English pursing, ...

This POV character has got some issues about the cultural differences between Americans and Brits.

In this next example there's Stephanie Plum's POV in Evanovich's Hot Six. Morelli is Stephanie's on-again, off-again boyfriend, and she doesn't like what she sees when his mouth twitches. We get that very directly, in her first person POV.

The corners of Morelli's mouth twitched up ever so slightly. Jerk.

One of the best examples I could find of the use of a smile in a scene is from Frasier's Cold Mountain:

Frasier combines authorial observation (he is the one telling us that there's no irony or bravado in the condemned man's smile) with actually showing us Prangle's actions. The result is a very powerful, vivid and unsettling set of images.

Back to Jean, who is observing her older brother talk to Mrs. Kevorkian. Jean is very sensitive to Sam's moods, so she watches him closely. Maybe because she is so dependent on him; maybe because she is afraid of him; maybe because she is protective of him. She may like the fact that Mrs. Kevorkian winds Sam up, or she may find it aggravating, or it may panic her for some reason. One of the ways she gauges Sam's frame of mind is by looking at his face, most particularly (in this exercise) what he does with his mouth.

"Now another thing," Mrs. Kevorkian said. "About that rodent you call a dog."

Sam dropped his head, but not before Jean saw him suck in his upper lip, a sure sign that he was about to burst into laughter.

Of course, you could lose the last phrase if you've already established what it means when Sam sucks in his upper lip. You could ignore his mouth all together, and focus on what he does with his cheeks. I'll try that tomorrow.

March 18, 2004 06:04 AM

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Comments

I ran across the description of a facial expression the other day that was so amazing I had to read it two or three times. (I love finding writing gems that give me pause!) From Ann Packer's "The Dive from Clausen's Pier":

"Why don't you try not barking?" he snapped. He stared at me with a terrible sneer capsizing his mouth, and finally I got off my stool and slunk away, past the bar, between the empty tables, through the heavy door, and out into the night."

Posted by: Alison Kent at March 22, 2004 08:06 AM

I like the capsizing, but the phrasing is a little awkward, no?

Posted by: sara at March 22, 2004 09:11 AM

Hmm. In what way? I only ask because this is the first book I have read in forever where I actually read every single word because I found the writing itself so wonderfully compelling!

Posted by: Alison Kent at March 23, 2004 08:22 AM

To my ear, it could be a little tighter. If I were editing this, I'd suggest:

A sneer capsized his mouth. Finally I got off my stool...

But that's just my take on it. I'll try to track down the novel, because of course I could be totally wrong, as I'm looking at a sentence in isolation.

Posted by: sara at March 23, 2004 08:31 AM