Purple prose has earned its place on nearly every list of things writers need to avoid and for good reason. But the advice to avoid writing purple prose doesn’t mean much for writers who haven’t quite grasped its meaning yet. So we ask: what is purple prose? How do we identify if our writing has crossed the line between descriptive and purple? And how do we fix it?
What It Is
The phrase “purple prose” was first used by the Roman poet Horace in his poem Ars Poetica where he referred to flowery language with the Latin phrase “professis purpureus” which translates to purple patches, purple cloth, or purple prose. In Ancient Rome, purple was associated with wealth and royalty—the color represented extravagance and lavishness. Applied to writing, it means writing that carries those same qualities—excess, ornate, extravagant language—but it is not complimentary.
Purple prose is writing that is too ornate, flowery, and wordy, trying too hard to be rich in language and description but tipping the scales to the point of overdoing it. It’s characterized by use of too many adjectives, adverbs, metaphors, clichés, excessive emotion, long sentences, words that try too hard to sound “smart” or “fancy,” and being too poetic. Purple prose often comes in patches throughout the story.
Readers do not like purple prose. It’s going to strike them as frustrating and amateurish or like an attempt to sound smart and important, a real “writery” writer. It makes reading difficult, frustrating, and just plain unenjoyable. It most cases, purple prose has no place in novels that hope to keep readers engaged and entertained (exceptions made, of course, for satirical purple prose which serves its own purpose.)
An important note about purple prose: not all elaborate, lyrical, or complex language is purple prose. Writing is allowed to be—should be—emotionally expressive, beautiful, and detailed. It’s allowed to be creative and full of evocative language. You do not have to conform to Hemingway-esque minimalism in order to be a good writer. Language can be lush and descriptive without going overboard into distracting purple prose, and that’s the key to great, immersive writing.
There are examples of flowery, ornate language that enhance scenes, that make prose sing off the page and make the novel what it is. That is not purple prose.
Purple prose specifically refers to flowery, over-the-top writing that does not add value to the story’s style or to the story itself. It redirects the focus to itself instead of the story unfolding and detracts from the reading experience.
Why Purple Prose Happens
Purple prose is often the result of authors trying too hard. Whether they’re trying too hard to sound smart or sophisticated or trying to imitate their favorite author’s style and voice, it can easily result in the type of language that is undeniably purple. Instead of focusing on developing their own voice and telling a story in the way that feels most natural, some writers try to make their story fit into a mold defined by other writers’ styles or by what they think readers are looking for. Or sometimes, in the course of trying to develop their own style and voice, some authors go overboard with description, hoping to impress readers with their grasp of the language and their ability to conjure a hyper-detailed image with lots of adjectives. Or in trying to sound intelligent and “literary,” they pull out a thesaurus and craft unnecessarily long, overly complex sentences that are impossible to follow.
Examples of Purple Prose
There are many examples of purple prose throughout published literature. Here are some I’ve found after just a few quick searches:
Delina Delaney by Amanda McKittrick Ros
“She tried hard to keep herself a stranger to her poor old father’s slight income by the use of the finest production of steel, whose blunt edge eyed the reely covering with marked greed, and offered its sharp dart to faultless fabrics of flaxen fineness.”
(Translation: Delina took up work as a seamstress so she wouldn’t be relying on her father for money.)
Jerome K. Jerome from Three Men in a Boat
“The river—with the sunlight flashing from its dancing wavelets, gilding gold the grey-green beech-trunks, glinting through the dark, cool wood paths, chasing shadows o’er the shallows, flinging diamonds from the mill-wheels, throwing kisses to the lilies, wantoning with the weirs’ white waters, silvering moss-grown walls and bridges, brightening every tiny townlet, making sweet each lane and meadow, lying tangled in the rushes, peeping, laughing, from each inlet, gleaming gay on many a far sail, making soft the air with glory—is a golden fairy stream.”
The Eye of Argon by Jim Theis
“The weather beaten trail wound ahead into the dust racked climes of the baren land which dominates large portions of the Norgolian empire. Age worn hoof prints smothered by the sifting sands of time shone dully against the dust splattered crust of earth. The tireless sun cast its parching rays of incandescense from overhead, half way through its daily revolution. Small rodents scampered about, occupying themselves in the daily accomplishments of their dismal lives. Dust sprayed over three heaving mounts in blinding clouds, while they bore the burdonsome cargoes of their struggling overseers.”
Bob Honey Who Just Do Stuff by Sean Penn
“There is pride to be had where the prejudicial is practiced with precision in the trenchant triage of tactile terminations. This came to him via the crucible-forged fact that all humans are themselves animal, and that rifle-ready human hunters of alternately-species prey should best beware the raging ricochet that soon will come their way.”
Note: Penn’s novel is meant to be satirical, but this sentence is just impenetrable. It’s the perfect example of purple prose that’s not necessarily overwrought in flowery description, but is made overly complex and unnecessarily difficult to understand.
Purple Prose from the Reader’s Perspective
Purple prose is unenjoyable. Simply put, readers do not want to read it.
Purple prose slows down the story in every meaning of the word. Purple patches distract from the plot by spending too much time on needlessly ornate or wordy descriptions, which slows down the reader and can undercut their interest in the overall plot. Long, winding sentences of pure description can bore readers and, depending on how flowery the word choice is, even make the reader take the story less seriously, being so melodramatic. Overly complex sentences will frustrate readers.
The reader’s focus shifts from the scene unfolding before them to the prose itself because the author directs their focus away from what matters with purple prose. It’s counterproductive to the story. No matter how impressive or poetic an author may hope their writing is, there is no point in detracting from the overall story itself to do so. It only works against the novel overall.
Avoiding Purple Prose
Purple prose generally stands out as very obvious when we’re reading someone else’s work, but identifying it within our own writing can be more difficult. We’re so close to the story, to the writing, that we might not be able to see the forest for the trees.
Purple prose red flags:
- Lots of adverbs
- Lots of adjectives
- Lots of metaphors
- Clichés
- Long, winding sentences
- Excessive emotion
- Gushy descriptions that feel melodramatic
- Complex sentences that don’t add anything in terms of real value to a scene
- Any lack of clarity
Remember that purple prose is often the result of trying to sound a certain way or like someone else. Focus on finding your voice and your style and work through the desire to sound like one of your favorites. (Sometimes the only way to work through this, which we might not realize we’re doing at the time, is to just write, write, write. Reviewing your own work will reveal the places where your writing doesn’t sound genuine. Focus on writing naturally, not trying to shove your ideas into a mold. This can take some practice.)
Purple prose happens when authors go too far with language and description. And that, of course, is subjective. Some people are Hemingway purists: a writer’s job is to tell the truth and simple, direct language is the only way to do so. These writers may always find fault with more elaborate, lyrical, complex writing, but it does not mean that sort of writing is always bad.
That type of writing is bad when it becomes excessive, when it sacrifices clarity for the sake of complexity that adds nothing to the reading experience.
While it always comes down to stylistic intention and choice, description needs to be balanced within the narrative. Readers don’t want to read excess amounts of description, nor do they want to read excessive types of description. We want to show, not tell, but we also want to avoid dumping a load of adjectives or adverbs or metaphors on readers in the process of showing. When writing description, focus on atmosphere and mood and substance. When describing a scene, does your word choice enhance or detract from the mood and atmosphere? Does it distract from the action and point of the scene by being overwrought? Keep descriptions in line with the overall mood/tone/atmosphere of a scene while also keeping the focus on the story unfolding, not the prose itself. While particularly lyrical or beautiful writing can stand out to readers positively, it happens naturally. They read and think, “Oh, I love how that’s phrased.” It’s subtle. It doesn’t involve bringing readers’ attention to the prose itself and away from the story; it just strikes a chord in some readers, enhancing the reading experience and the story itself.
Every author’s goal should be to write prose that is effective and engaging. Keep language clear, consistent, and tight. Simple word choices are often best. Vary your sentence length. Don’t spend too much time describing any one thing. Avoid excessive emotion that no longer feels genuine or realistic. Big, dramatic emotions are often best shown through small actions like a character pressing their hand to their chest, unable to catch their breath instead of making them sob or wail uncontrollably. Remember, simple doesn’t mean flat. It can be evocative without being too flowery. It can conjure an image without relying too heavily on metaphor and borderline silly descriptions. Be precise in your word choice and the things you choose to bring to reader attention. Not every detail within a scene needs to be listed and described in great detail. Give readers what’s necessary and let their imagination fill in the blanks.
There is a balance that can be struck between beautiful, evocative, detailed descriptions and the stripped bare language of minimalists that strike some readers as stark, stiff, and flat—you need to find what version of this balance works for you and represents your voice and style authentically on the page.
While drafting your novel, don’t worry too much about whether your prose is purple or not. Let the words and your creativity flow freely, then edit, edit, edit.
Related: Creating Atmosphere Effectively
Fixing Purple Prose
Read through your manuscript carefully. If you come across areas that snag your attention and make you wonder if your prose crosses the line into purple, ask yourself these questions:
Does it slow down the story and distract from the larger scene unfolding?
Does this type of language enhance the scene or feel overwhelming and excessive?
Will this frustrate readers?
What elements of this description are absolutely necessary to the scene?
If you struggle to determine if your prose is purple, bring in some backup. Ask friends or beta readers or fellow writers to take a look and give you honest feedback. While it can be difficult to see the flaws in our own writing clearly, purple prose is generally quite obvious to other readers. Another pair of eyes should be able to help you identify it.
If you’ve identified purple prose in your writing, it’s time to simplify.
Think back to the tips for avoiding it while writing and apply those to the purple patches throughout your novel. Cut back metaphor and adjective use, cut clichés that don’t serve the story. Pare back descriptions to give readers what is necessary in terms of detail for the scene to be immersive and let them fill in the rest.
Remember to focus on substance. Keep the story moving.
In Conclusion
Though many examples are so strikingly bad as to feel objective, purple prose is subjective. Not every example of purple prose is bad to every reader. Many classic authors—including Virginia Woolf, Shakespeare, and even minimalist Hemingway himself—have been accused of purple prose. Does that mean Woolf’s stream-of-consciousness, immersive style is objectively bad and should be dismissed for including more flowery language? Should we all stop enjoying Shakespeare? Of course not!
Purple patches can be found throughout the works of many successful/classic novelists who we otherwise uphold as standards of excellence or examples of perfect form/prose/etc. In fact, it’s quite common, especially in older writing. That said, writers should absolutely avoid purple prose within their own work in order for their novels to be the best they can be.
Write strong, immersive, engaging, tight prose that lets your story take center stage. If you tend toward overwriting or flowery phrasing, this may take some practice, but it will be worth the effort.
Don’t be afraid to get another pair of eyes on your writing as soon as possible to help identify purple prose. Purple prose stands out so much for most readers that it will surely stand out even to friends who don’t write or have an eye for these types of things.
As always, nothing beats a professional’s eye on your work to help you identify areas where your writing can strengthened and improved.
Work with Me
Book a call with me Send me a message Email me: madison@cadmuseditorial.com My prices