By Ashley Lister

 I can’t remember if I’ve shared this before or not but it’s always worth revisiting. My favourite writing exercise is the swifty. What, you might ask, is a swifty? (other than a rather awkward rephrasing of the term ‘quickie’). According to Merriam Webster a ‘Swifty is a play on words taking the form of a quotation ascribed to Tom and followed by an adverb. Here’s a good example: “The thermostat is set too high,” said Tom heatedly.’

The form takes its name from the main character (Tom Swift) in a series of adventure books ascribed to the authorship of Victor Appleton. In the series Appleton was meant to have a weakness for adverbs, attaching an excess of them to dialogue in order to add colour and variety to the narration.

“I’ve got a knife,” said Tom sharply.
“Get to the back of the boat,” said Tom sternly.
“I like the herb you’ve used for seasoning,” said Tom sagely.

I like these because, as a writing exercise, they’re a fun diversion from the seriousness of writing, they allow a little bit of silliness into the otherwise formal world of fiction writing, and they teach a valuable lesson about the way the artifice of some adverbial tags can distract a reader from the content of dialogue.

“Baa,” said Tom, sheepishly.
“I have a thing for redheads,” said Tom, gingerly.
“Have you ever tried figging?” asked Tom, gingerly.

It’s a relatively easy exercise – simply write a swifty – but it is a liberating process that reminds us of the fragile balance between dialogue creation and speech presentation. I’d love to see your examples of swifties in the comments box below.