Some Thoughts On Using Cultural Idioms In Creative Writing Posts

A lot of my Hive posts are creative writing. A complete mix of sci-fi, fantasy, gothic fiction, dystopian and historical fiction.

But I've realised I've got a problem.

Hive creative writing posts seem to have a "sweet spot" where ones which work out to be 3-5 minute reads get the best results in terms of both upvotes and (more important in my mind) engagement. Shorter than that, and they struggle to get the richness of detail they deserve. Much longer than 5 minutes and they'll get skim-read or just upvoted by loyal friends and followers, but most people don't have the attention span to read them properly.

Image by Pexels from Pixabay

When I write a story, I like to give the impression that it fits into it's world. That even a stand-alone piece should hint that it is part of a jigsaw of other stories as yet untold. But because Hive is a medium which encourages brevity and being to the point, the way I find myself adding this richness is by using cultural idioms as a kind of short-hand.

What I have realised is that by doing that, I'm creating references that quite a lot of my readers may not pick up on.

It's not because they are stupid (far from it... Hive seems to self-select for intelligent people !), it's just that many of the references carry baggage in ways that are not universal. Someone from England, of about my age and with a similar education is likely to pick up on most of them. Someone much younger, from another country and who went to a more enlightened or modern school may well not pick up on the cultural baggage.

Another factor is that I've always loved playing with words, creating hidden in-jokes or secret meanings with character and place names.

Let me give you a few examples, just pulled from one recent post I wrote. It was based on a picture prompt in the Freewriters community; A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words - "Talk To The Fat Pig !"

In the very first paragraph, I used the image of guards in red and gold with eagle-tipped banners to set the scene. It probably works anyway to a certain extent, but for someone in Western or Southern Europe with a "traditional" education, either consciously or unconsciously it's likely to put an image in a reader's mind that this is set somewhere in the ancient Greek or Roman world. But a younger person, or someone from (say) South America is unlikely to have that as part of their culture, so the story might put a totally different picture in their heads, or none at all.

I was "lucky" enough to go to an incredibly traditional school. We did Latin. We didn't learn useful life skills. Cooking and budgeting ? Nope, that was for the hoi-polloi. But Learning Latin encouraged my interest in history.

So in the post, the two people I give names to are influenced by this. The king (and his father) are King Basileus. That's a joke name; Basileus is a Greek word for King (it came from the Helladic Greek Gwasileus, but by the classical period had changed to it's newer form, and was still used that way right up until at least the late medieval period). So the character was actually "King King". The other name is the farmer, Agerus. Ager was the Latin word for a field. So he was just a chap in a field. But a reader unfamiliar with Latin and Green is unlikely to spot what I did there.

I use similar techniques in a lot of my creative writing posts. A mix of clever in-jokes and cultural references that act as short-hand because the baggage they carry can set the scene very effectively in just a few words.

The trouble is, I'm being unfair on a lot of my readers. Why should I expect them to understand English mythology and historical references ? I love collecting myths and legends, and have huge respect for the richness and depth of other cultures. I enjoy learning more about them; Hive has been a wonderful way to open my eyes and mind to other cultures. But I'll be the first to admit that if someone from (say) Nigeria wrote a post referencing a legend from that country, I wouldn't be likely to spot the reference or all the subtle connotations it carries.

So what is the solution ? Am I inadvertently upsetting or insulting people by using this method ? Or (just as bad) am I selling them short by not giving a fair chance for everyone to understand the full depth I'm trying to convey ? Is there a better way to create a sense of depth and richness in a few words that works more universally ?

I'm aware that anything about cultural differences can be controversial, and I'm trying to approach this with an attitude of respect and trying to improve the way I write. I'd love to know what you think about this !