A Deeper Gaze at "Her Gaze"

I have written a lot of pieces I believe are challenging. It's always my goal as a writer to push myself outside of my comfort zone, and in turn, hopefully to push my readers there too. For this challenge, Vocal has asked us to pick an excerpt from a piece that we consider both imperfect and brimming with potential.

The truth is, while we can all strive for perfection in writing, nothing we write will ever be perfect in the truest sense of the word. And that's fine. If we have written a piece to the best of our ability and put our heart and soul into it, there's nothing more we can do.

Initially, I was going to pick apart a piece that was not very popular and full of flaws. I may still do that for another entry. But as I revisited my work, I came across a piece I wrote for the Lipogram Challenge, titled Her Gaze. It received a Top Story, but didn't place in the challenge.

Reading it again, with months of experience under my belt and a more critical eye, I still love it. It was the best version of itself at that specific time. But I can also see its flaws. This makes it a fascinating piece to analyse, because the challenge of writing it, and the deeper meanings behind it, deserve a closer look.

Here is a link to the full story. It may help you to read it to understand my analysis.

The Challenge of the Lipogram

For anyone unfamiliar or who needs a reminder, a lipogram is a piece of writing that omits a specific letter or letters. In Vocal's Lipogram challenge, we were required to avoid the letter "I".

Never one to take the easy route, I knew from the very start that I wanted to write a first-person narrative. A seemingly impossible task, given the reliance on "I" in that perspective.

As I considered ideas for the story, I realised I could use this restriction to explore the loss of self, not just in the writing itself but in the narrative's deeper themes.

The removal of I mirrored the narrator's own identity loss, making the constraint more than just a technical writing challenge.

As I was taking on a weighty challenge, I chose a tight, focused storyline with just two characters. This meant I could experiment with sentence structure without making the challenge impossible.

What resulted was a story that blended mystery, psychological tension, supernatural horror and romance. The narrator receives a note with the word "eyes", then meets a woman and he becomes obsessed with her gaze, the last thing he will see.

A story about entrapment that evolved into devotion, where his fear and longing became inseparable.

Interestingly, the limitation that made this a difficult piece to write helped elevate the atmosphere. The narrator's restricted voice mirrored his restricted movement, reinforcing the theme of surrender.

The Opening - Original Vs Edited

One of the most crucial sections of the story is the opening. Here's the original version -

Original Version

"Her gaze, deep yet absent, ethereal yet judgemental, was the last set of eyes my own saw before the world spun out of control. Moments became longer, and the passage of day to dusk became senseless. The four hours that preceded my encounter were a mystery. All that was brought to the forefront of my broken memory was a note pushed under my door that read "eyes". The reason for such a message was undoubtedly connected to the woman's eyes, whose wounded beauty caused an ache through my stomach. A powerful ache that held me locked where we stood bent forward before the woman who refused to tell me her name. As my eyes met her steely, deep green crystals, all the power that coursed through my body to my eyes couldn't peel them away from her gaze."

On closer reflection, I still love that I chose to begin with "her", immediately making the woman the focus of the whole story. However, some sentences feel too bloated. If I were to refine it, I might write -

Edited Version

"Her gaze, deep yet absent, ethereal yet judgement, was the last set of eyes my own saw before my world spun out of control. Mere moments became longer and the process of day to dusk, became senseless.

The four hours that preceded my encounter with her were a complete mystery. All that came to the forefront of my broken memory was a note pushed under my door. The note simply read "eyes".

The reason for such a message was clearly connected to her, the woman before me and her gaze. Whose wounded beauty caused my stomach to ache. An ache that locked me where we stood, bent before her. She refused to tell me her name. As my eyes met her steely, deep green crystal pools, all power that coursed through my body to my eyes couldn't peel them away from her gaze."

What I find interesting is that while this version is definitely tighter and more direct, it is missing some of the poetic, hypnotic quality found in the original.

That’s something I’ve discovered about editing, refining can enhance the clarity of a piece just as easily as it can strip away its essence. Great editing isn't just about cutting, it's about knowing when to cut and what to preserve.

The Turning Point - Original Vs Edited

A pivotal moment in the story is when the narrator stops resisting and starts to surrender to his fate.

Original Version

"Fear and lust overshadowed me as my head was full of her. All memory of my world was forever changed and featured her, only her. Her and her deathly, sensual gaze. Her and her shapely curves stunned and thwarted even the most powerful. Was to become her prey, my end? Hope seemed short on supply as my cerebral cortex was repurposed as a herald for her. My Empress. My Temptress. The last face my eyes gazed upon before my whole world was consumed by her."

I still love this passage for the rising tension and conflicting emotions, there's fear and devotion, terror and acceptance. However, some of the phrases could be smoother.

Edited Version

"Fear and lust overshadowed me as my head was full of her. All memory of my world was forever changed and featured her, only her. Her and her deathly, sensual gaze. Her and her shapely curves stunned and thwarted even the most powerful. Was my end to become her prey? There was a short supply of hope as my whole surrendered to her completely. My Empress. My Temptress. The last face my eyes gazed upon before my whole world was consumed by her."

In this revision, the language is tightened while retaining the sense of obsession and inevitability. The line "was to become her prey, my end?" now flows a lot better as "Was my end to become her prey?" and the awkward phrase "my cerebral cortex was repurposed as a herald for her" is replaced with a clearer and more evocative sentence.

How This Challenge Changed My Writing

Reflecting deeper on this piece and the challenge it presented, writing a first-person narrative without the letter "I" had a notable impact on my approach to writing fiction.

It showed me that constraints can be very liberating. They can actually force creativity and push us to find new ways of develop character perspectives, structuring sentences and telling stories.

First-person narratives often rely on I to create a level of intimacy, but this challenge proved that there can still be a strong personal voice even when expected tools are removed.

Would I go through this brain-mashing concept again? Perhaps not too often. But now my approach to writing is different, knowing there is flexibility with language and that sometimes, the best way to push things forward is by taking something away.

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Thanks for reading!

Author's Notes: As fortune would have it, my ABCommunities challenge for this week was to write in the Critique community. A community I have written in before. To make things a bit interesting, I decided to combine this with an entry for the Self-Editing Ephiphany Challange that Vocal is running.

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