The Descriptive Image

To achieve this basic image on paper, a writer must look at the things being described as they really are or may have been, consider them from the eye of his/her mind and somehow clad them in words, to present them to the audience cast in the currency of the imagination. A talented author can make a reader see what s/he intends to put across precisely.

Take for example Shakespeare’s famous and incredible piece piece from Act II of "Antony and Cleopatra":

          The barge she sat in, like a burnished throne,
          Burnt on the water; the poop was beaten gold;
          Purple the sails; and so perfumed that
          The winds were love-sick with them…

On reading this piece your imagination shakes itself awake – you cannot help yourself visualising the scene in whole and in detail. This may be considered as more than descriptive; nevertheless, as far as the writer is concerned, it is merely descriptive.

          How about Tennyson’s verses from "Come Down, O Maid":
          Myriads of rivulets hurrying through the lawn,
          The moan of doves in immemorial elms,
          And murmur of innumerable bees.

This is the image of a sound, if you could have ever imagined it possible - a remarkable piece of descriptive writing.