I started reading Richard Matheson’s The Gun Fight the other night. I had read it before, but I didn’t remember much about it, other than the ending and the basic premise (basically, gossip gets out of control and results in a gun fight). After dabbling in the sci-fi and horror markets for most of his life, Matheson branched out into the western genre. I recall two other westerns by him: Journal of the Gun Years, which I always wanted to read again, and Shadow On The Sun, which is kind of a western/horror hybrid that I wanted to read again. I’ve long considered Matheson one of my favorite writers, but last night I noticed Matheson committing one of the cardinal sins of writing — using adverbs! He actually used them quite a bit. Consider the following passage…

“If they had put you on the case, John Benton,” said Henry Oliver expansively, waving a thick finger at the tall man, ”Mister John Wesley Hardin would have been in Rusk Prison long ago.”

“He’d a been in the boneyard long ago,” John Sutton added hurriedly, his young voice eager to please.

John Benton only chuckled softly and gestured toward Pat, the bartender, for another drink. He put the cigarette between his lips again and listened amusedly as the men went on discussing the imprisonment of Hardin and the possibilities of his escaping.

I suppose I should feel offense, maybe even righteous indignation. All I can generate is a slight shrug. Matheson using adverbs illustrates another writing rule — sometimes the rules don’t matter. It’s up to the writer to figure it out when they don’t. Still, we can’t let this opportunity to play in another writer’s sandbox go by. Let’s try rewriting the passage without adverbs.

“If they had put you on the case, John Benton,” said Henry Oliver, waving a thick finger at the tall man, ”Mister John Wesley Hardin would have been in Rusk Prison long ago.”

“He’d a been in the boneyard long ago,” John Sutton added, his young voice eager to please.

John Benton only chuckled and gestured toward Pat, the bartender, for another drink. He put the cigarette between his lips again and smirked as the men went on discussing the imprisonment of Hardin and the possibilities of his escaping.

It was a simple task to remove the adverbs. It didn’t even take a minute. I wonder why Matheson left them in. I wonder why the editor left them in. In three of the four cases, all I did was remove the adverb. The sentence required no further changes. In the last case, I removed two words to add one word. We are talking bare minimum effort here.

Was Matheson trying to ape a style that used adverbs? Beats me. I’m not familiar with too much western writing (I like movie westerns, but I never felt much need to read westerns). Was Matheson so good that he turned in a first draft, or was he so good that the publisher did not feel a great need to polish because Matheson’s name meant sales regardless?

Speculation is good for blog word count but not much good for providing answers. Suffice it to say a book by a famous writer was published with adverbs. And the world still turns. Let’s look at the passage again. I’m going to revise it a bit more. Such a thing has some practical value. It gives me a better understanding of how Matheson wrote.

“If they had put you on the case, John Benton,” said Henry Oliver, waving a thick finger at the tall man, ”Mister John Wesley Hardin would have been in Rusk Prison long ago.”

At first glance, this paragraph seems heavy on names (plus two Johns). I’d probably cut back in that department. And it seems a bit passive…

“If they had put you on the case, John Benton,” Henry Oliver pointed a thick finger at the man, ”Wesley Hardin would have been in prison long ago.”

Now a little deletion and a smidge of rearranging in the next sentence…

“He’d a been in the boneyard long ago,” John Sutton added hurriedly, his young voice eager to please.

“He’d a been in the boneyard long ago,” added John Sutton, young voice eager to please.

For the final sentence, I don’t like the gesturing toward Pat since we already had gesturing in the first paragraph…

John Benton only chuckled softly and gestured toward Pat, the bartender, for another drink. He put the cigarette between his lips again and listened amusedly as the men went on discussing the imprisonment of Hardin and the possibilities of his escaping.

John Benton chuckled and tapped his empty glass on the bar. Pat shuffled forward to fill it. Benton put a cigarette between his lips and smirked as the men continued to discuss the imprisonment of Hardin and the possibilities of his escape.

Now, how do they match up against each other?

Matheson version:

“If they had put you on the case, John Benton,” said Henry Oliver expansively, waving a thick finger at the tall man, ”Mister John Wesley Hardin would have been in Rusk Prison long ago.”

“He’d a been in the boneyard long ago,” John Sutton added hurriedly, his young voice eager to please.

John Benton only chuckled softly and gestured toward Pat, the bartender, for another drink. He put the cigarette between his lips again and listened amusedly as the men went on discussing the imprisonment of Hardin and the possibilities of his escaping.

My version:

“If they had put you on the case, John Benton,” Henry Oliver pointed a thick finger at the man, ”Wesley Hardin would have been in prison long ago.”

“He’d a been in the boneyard long ago,” added John Sutton, young voice eager to please.

John Benton chuckled and tapped his empty glass on the bar. Pat shuffled forward to refill it. Benton put a cigarette between his lips and smirked as the men continued to discuss the imprisonment of Hardin and the possibilities of his escape.

Technically, my version follows the rules better, but Matheson’s version is a little bit richer. I guess masters can break the rules as much as they want. Still, I’m going to try one more tweaking for fun…

Henry Oliver pointed a thick finger at John Benton. “If they had you on the case, Hardin would have been in prison long ago.”

“He’d a been in the boneyard long ago!” John Sutton’s youth made his words eager to please.

Benton chuckled and tapped his empty glass on the bar. Pat shuffled forward to refill it. Benton put a cigarette between his lips and smirked as the men continued to discuss the possibilities of Hardin rotting in Rusk Prison…or escaping.

All in all, it was an educational exercise. It’s interesting to see how two people write the same passage (in my case, twice). Regardless, Matheson is the guy who had his version in a published novel, for which he was paid. He wins…