Writing Tips!

Repetition

In reading things, what do you prefer? Re-using words/phrases over and over, or being creative?

There's an argument for both sides, believe it or not.

In poems and songs, repetition can be key, because of their structures. They both generally need words to rhyme, and there are many words with few rhymes or few plausible rhymes that you need to repeat some. Or some poems are supposed to be repetitive. In a freehand style of poetry (sorry, I don't know what it's called), you can use repetition to get your point across. I'll give an example I wrote here.

With cloth tied on our faces and limbs,
And closets closed shut,
Because we can't let them in,
We will not be silent.
With our rightful care taken away,
And people full of hate,
Just because you're trans, bi, or gay,
We will not be silent.

And so forth. It puts the idea across, and it makes it stronger. This also give me a lot of freedom with how I phrase it and why, making it easier to write.

For songs, you of course have the chorus, which needs to be repeated. And some songs are really short, like Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star, as demonstrated here:

Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are,
Up above the world so high,
Like a diamond in the sky,
Twinkle, twinkle, little star, 
How I wonder what you are.

Twinkle is repeated in each line it appears in, and the opening phrase is repeated twice overall.

And then there's also cheers, which are like songs and poems together, and I think that's pretty self-explanatory, but if you need a better explanation, comment, please.

In dialogue, it can be good for characterization, or for younger characters, the two examples below.

"And she was, like, so totally, like, all over him! It was, like... disgusting," (characterization, and a little comedy, along with stereotyping slightly)

"Moooommy! Can I please have the ice cream? Pretty, pretty, pretty please?" (young character)

And you see how that works? Comment if you need a better explanation or more examples.

But there's a bad side to repetition, too. For example, he said, she said. Tell me which is more interesting and tells you more, A or B?

"A conversation," he said.
"Can be bounced between," she said.
"Different characters,"he said.
"To make it more interesting!" they said.

Or B?
"A conversation," he spoke while smiling.
"Can be bounced between," she yelled to the students, nodding.
"Different characters," he started jumping up and down to demonstrate.
"To make it more interesting!" They grinned and joined hands, doing a pose.

And that difference makes it more interesting.

Finally, when using words instead of said, use a few actions in there as well or it doesn't paint as clear of a picture and is less interesting. Don't overuse that either, because it can get hard to follow that way.

Did i miss anything?