More than the literal meaning
Read for meaning first. Select a highlighted word if you want a closer look.
At a writing seminar, Dana compared the terms 'thrifty' and 'stingy.' Both could describe limited spending, but their connotation differed. The second carried a pejorative judgment about excessive unwillingness to spend. Dana also noticed a deprecating remark in a review of her own work: the critic called her careful research 'fussy little collecting' without addressing what the evidence showed.
Dana revised a description that unintentionally gave a negative connotation to a character she meant to portray sympathetically. She did not remove every pejorative word from her writing, since characters sometimes express harsh judgments. Instead, she made the speaker's attitude clear. She also replaced a deprecating comment in her workshop notes with a specific criticism that another writer could use.
Before you move on
Look away from the passage. Can you explain each focus word in your own words?
Original fictional passages for vocabulary practice.