Welcome to this week’s blog hop. Today the topic is:
How do you feel about the use of profanity, either in your stories or in what you read?
I tend not to use profanity in my writing, as I don’t often use it in my normal conversation. I know, I know, a writer should be able to write diverse characters, not just a mirror of themselves.
Certain language will be warranted in literature. You would have a hard time believing that a street thug would say, “Oh, golly gee” and we all rolled our eyes when we saw Die Hard 2 on TV for the first time and heard John McLean say, “Yippie Ki Yay, Mr. Falcon.” Who the f*#@ is Mr. Falcon?
If profanity fits the bill, there is no reason for a writer to shy away from it. If you can do without it and it doesn’t detract from the character, well, that’s another way to go.
On a side note, I do skip over anything erotic/sexual in what I read. Usually (often? more often than not?) it doesn’t add anything to a storyline, so I don’t see a point to it. Oh, I’ll still read your book, but not 100% of it. I also don’t write about it either, but that just my choice. Can two characters spend a whole book together without any sexual tension? That’s up to the writer. Is it believable? Depends on how good the writer is.
-Leon
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Leon Stevens is a multi-genre author, composer, guitarist, songwriter, and an artist, with a Bachelor of Music and Education. He published his first book of poetry, Lines by Leon: Poems, Prose, and Pictures in January 2020, followed by a book of original classical guitar compositions, Journeys, and a short story collection of science fiction/post-apocalyptic tales called The Knot at the End of the Rope and Other Short Stories. His newest publications are the novella trilogy, The View from Here, which is a continuation of one of his short stories, and a new collection of poetry titled, A Wonder of Words.
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Lines by Leon 
You can suggest a lot without being explicit, create a mood and let the reader make what they will of it. Whatever the subject might be.
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It shows a wider grasp of vocabulary not to use profanity. The same few curses get boring after a while…
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I don’t use a lot of swearing in my books, Leon, the odd word when it is necessary seeing as I write about men at war, but I don’t over do it. As for sex, you can have romance and indications of sexual tension without going into detail. Graphic sex puts your book into a different category on Amazon.
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I go back and firth in the use of profanity in my personal life. When my daughter and grandkids were living here, I didn’t use it at all, and that was reflected in my writing. I had to go back to one piece and add a few words for realism.
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