Imagery Lecture

Imagery in Writing

How do we make our writing come alive?!?!

Example of Imagery

• Here is a clear, smooth lake with an electric blue color. You can hear the hum of the wind from the top of silent mountains, laying beside the perfectly circular lake. The sky is cloudless, fading from light blue to colorless white on the horizon. The sunlight falls across favored pine trees, some marked by shade and others boasting deep green hues. You can smell the clean, cold pine air and touch the hardened rock, cold in the shade and warm in the sunlight.

​Imagery

​Describing the 5 senses to help your reader imagine your story.

• ​description

• ​taste, touch, see, smell, hear

• ​show, not tell

Why do we use imagery in our writing?

• Makes writing more descriptive

• Makes writing more enjoyable

• Forces writing to be specific and precise

• If you just described this image as "a lake surrounded by mountains and trees", that wouldn't do it justice, now would it?

Imagine you are here. 

Open Ended

How would you describe this place? Use your five senses. What do you hear, smell, taste, feel, and see? Write as much as you can in 5 minutes.

Multiple Select

Which of these is imagery?

• describing what you hear, see, smell, taste, and feel

• describing objects like you would people

• describing things with as much detail as you can

• showing what the character is doing through precise word choice