3 Almost acceptable uses of the word "Because" - And a a water-boarding.

In this new section of the Lemon, I am letting you know of these words wich, if they became actual people, would definitely enter the FBI most wanted list. 

Note: This is only my opinion. Abuse them if so is your wish (then watch me curse each and every keystroke of yours, for seven generations).

Because

"Because the moon never beams without bringing me dreams

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee" 

Reads weird? It certainly does, since the original goes like this:

"For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee"

See where the problem is?

Omnipresent in our day to day vocabulary, "because" begs for overuse, longing to turn your fastest paced narration into a primary school show and tell. Personally, I only know of three uses that don't make my eyeballs swell:

The Why

Answering a "why" question with a "because" renders your style livelier, bouncier and to the point, as underlined in the following example:

"Why does the chicken cross the road? Because fuck you, that's why." 

Works for me.

The who

Another use I will tolerate without frothing at the mouth for too long : "Because of that/[any object]", used in a casual tone or an explanation, to point out the cause behind a process.

"See, Zombies have taken over all the fast food delivery jobs, because of that, nobody dares ordering brain-burgers."

"Don't blame me if I'm surprised that you're actually a man. After all, I've moved to Los Angeles, changed my hair color and started studying gynecology because of you."

Still okay. Somehow.

The emphasis

When carrying undertone of gravity, innocence, and employed with the greatest caution,'because' as a mean of emphasis produces suprising results.

"Tread softly, because you tread on my dreams" 

In the conclusion of Yeats' Aedh Wishes Fot The Cloths Of Heaven , 'because' becomes the carrier of the whole work's emotional intensity, revealing further the simple yet authentic, heartfelt, dramatic power behind its words.

That is to say: make sure you're not short of authentic, heartfelt, dramatic intensity if you want to pull out that trick.

All the rest.

In any other case, "because" will turn your prose into the mind equivalent of boiled cabbage: Tasteless, colorless, and totally lacking of charisma.

Writing "He wouldn't feel like working on Mondays, because he was tired" deserves a good half hour of waterboarding. Full stop.

You might have a different opinion and want to right my wrongs in the comment section because you disagree. Please do and let the fun begin because I like debating.
No if you'll excuse me, I need to go and bite my fingers off.


More info, more cake and still no lemon at Without a Lemon's Facebook Page


Eyes-Gouging Words: Because. by Danny Hefer is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.