Don’t Develop a Demi-Moore-Adverb Problem

“What on earth is that?” you ask.

Well, I’m going to tell you!

👉 The rule’s inspired by a famous court scene in the 1992 film, “A Few Good Men.”

Tom Cruise plays a young Navy lawyer and sits first chair at a trial, while Demi Moore plays his lieutenant commander in second chair.
 —{“First chair” just means the lead lawyer who is conducting the trial. “Second chair” refers to the second lawyer who plays a supporting role.}

In any event, when Tom Cruise objects to something by voicing the standard, “I object” line, the court overrules him.

But Demi Moore? She just isn’t satisfied.

❗️ She just has to get up and say: “I strenuously object.” ❗️

Big mistake.

As everyone in the audience could tell, “strenuously” didn’t make the objection any more convincing.

Instead, Demi looked desperate.

OK, she looked like a fool.

Her use of “strenuously” also was improper in terms of court proceedings.

👉 So let’s avoid all that bad stuff in your legal writing, shall we?

—> You need to take an axe to those adverbs!

Examples

1. Instead of saying, “The price went up quickly,” or “The price fell rapidly,”

Try:
“The price jumped.”
“The price surged.”
“The price skyrocketed.”
“The price plunged.”
“The price nosedived.”
“The price plummeted.”

2. Instead of saying the defendant was “very hungry,”

Try:
“The defendant was famished.”
“The defendant was ravenous.”

—> BONUS: Oomphy words liven your prose, and they take up less space than weak words propped up by modifiers.

Livening prose and saving space in legal writing are always good.

💌 Amanda

#DearLegalWriter

PS—I know you thought adverbs were your friends in college writing. They were an easy way to add oomph to a humdrum verb or adjective. And unless you were writing for an advanced writing class, you likely got away with rampant adverb use.

But as you might have gathered, nothing is “easy” about law school—or legal writing.
 
—> The writing standards have jumped a notch.

So instead of writing: adverb + weak verb, or adverb + weak adjective, try to find stronger, more vivid verbs and adjectives.

PPS—In fact, as you progress down the road of becoming a better writer, I think you’ll find that adverbs aren’t friends in NON-legal writing, either.

🔹 “The adverb is not your friend.”

🔹 “Adverbs, like the passive voice, seem to have been created with the timid writer in mind.”

 —both attributed to Stephen King

 🔹 “Adverbs…are words that modify verbs, adjectives, other adverbs, clauses, and whole sentences, and they’re often not very helpful. Usually, they tell us that the writer is in fear of not being sufficiently clear.”

 — attributed to Anne Lamott

PPS—The above derives from Interlude No. 3 in my book, “Dear 1L: Notes to Nurture a New Legal Writer.”

Get your copy from Amazon today and get all the big watch-outs before you write your brief!