Did I mean sensory, or sensual? In essence, both. I’m talking about concrete ways to make a work more sense-aware as well as making its characters (and setting) seem more ‘real’. It’s also about learning to describe perceptions.
For instance, how does a rose really smell? A rose is a rose is a rose. But some mornings it smells like watermelon. Other times, like velvet on a peach. When you tell the reader an object smells like something they hadn’t expected, you create a link that lingers (just like an aroma) in the mind.
EXERCISE 1
Let’s imagine we want to set a story in a roundhouse during the middle ages.
Roundhouses were made of wattle (a method of weaving sticks between uprights) and daub covered over by masses of thatch. They were called ’roundhouses’ because a circular array of poles supported the rafters. Thus the wattle-and-daub (mud) wall was merely the shelter while the structure was visible as a series of poles circling the space inside.
But while knowing the above is necessary for being able to describe a roundhouse, it doesn’t necessarily place a reader ‘in’ there. And we want that immersion, right? So in this exercise you need to think and write sensorily.
Using past experiences, what do you think it would be like to close your eyes and stand in the middle of the roundhouse (not on the hearth, mind!) smelling and ‘feeling’ the environment? Do this in your mind or jot down single phrases or words to capture the feeling.
Doing this, I get: smoky; dingy; vaulted; muffled; stew-smelling; earthy; cavernous; and so forth.
Using your word-list as inspiration, write a paragraph describing what it’s like to enter the roundhouse for the first time.