The Hillerman Thesaurusectomy

Stephen King once said that “any word you have to hunt for in a thesaurus is the wrong word.” I agree. You should never search a thesaurus for a specific word to replace another specific word in your work-in-progress, though I think a thesaurus is useful at other times for unsticking you and opening your mind to words and phrases you may not have considered.

But what King said got me thinking. What if you took a passage from a classic mystery novel and tweaked it using a thesaurus? So just for fun I took this paragraph from Tony Hillerman’s Dance Hall of the Dead. This is how it reads as Hillerman wrote it:

The moon now hung halfway up the sky, the yellow of its rising gone and its face turned to scarred white ice. It was a winter moon. Under it, Leaphorn was cold. He sat in the shadow of the rimrock watching the commune which called itself Jason’s Fleece. The cold seeped through Leaphorn’s uniform jacket, through his shirt and undershirt, and touched the skin along his ribs. It touched his calves above his boottops, and his thighs where the cloth of his trouser legs stretched taut against the muscles, and the backs of his hands, which gripped the metal of his binoculars.

This is what that same paragraph looks like with a moderate thesaurus tweak:

The orb of night now dangled halfway up the sky, the yellow of its ascension defunct and its face converted to scarred white ice. It was a wintertime orb of night. Under it, Leaphorn was cool as custard. He hunkered down in the shadow of the rimrock checking out the commune which called itself Jason’s Fleece. The cold percolated through Leaphorn’s uniform jacket, through his chemise and undergarment, and frisked the skin along his ribs. It manipulated his calves above his boottops, and his thighs where the fabric of his trouser limbs stretched taut counter to the muscles, and the flip sides of his hands, which clasped the metal of his field glasses.

But I couldn’t leave it there. I had to try a complete thesaurusectomy:

The orb of night presently dangled smack in the middle of the sky, the amber of its ascension defunct and its visage converted to traumatized alabaster permafrost. It was a wintertime orb of night. On the nether side of it, Leaphorn was cool as custard. He hunkered down in the obscurity of the rimrock checking out the municipality which designated itself Jason’s Fleece. The frigidity percolated through Leaphorn’s uniform threads, through his chemise and undergarment, and frisked the dermis along his upper trunk. It manipulated his calves above his footwear zeniths, and his thighs where the fabric of his dungaree limbs expanded snug counter to the muscles, and the flip sides of his mitts, which clasped the chemical element of his field glasses.

One thing I noticed, aside from how ridiculous the two thesaurus-ated passages read, is that Hillerman’s paragraph kept getting longer the more I tinkered with it. Hillerman knew what he wanted to say, and he said it succinctly, using just the right words. Even the short sentence “Under it, Leaphorn was cold” loses its punch if you change it, very simply, to “Under it, Leaphorn was chilly.” You can’t change one word of Hillerman’s prose. But that’s why he was a master of the mystery.
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