The sun can smile rather than shine, and a breeze can sigh rather than blow. Personification, giving inanimate things human characteristics, provokes a reader’s imagination and awakens his senses. Giving objects human attributes can wake a reader up to the unique within the ordinary. Everyday things become extraordinary and images pop, fully formed, into a reader’s head.  Beyond producing immediate, vivid pictures, personification develops the characters and advances the story.

 Personification tells the reader how the storyteller feels about the shining sun or the blowing wind. Typically, the sun shines, but the sun can do other things. Was the sun smiling, glaring, or looking down at the people with sympathy and compassion? Perhaps the personified wind caresses the cheeks of young children or attempts to blow the leaves off every tree in the forest. In each case, you know how the writer feels about what the sun and wind are doing. You know about the main character’s or storyteller’s mood and attitude when the writer uses these types of metaphors.

In Huckleberry Finn, readers begin to learn about the main character when Mark Twain writes about night sounds that Huck hears out his window. “I hear an owl, away off, whoo-whooing about somebody that was dead and … a dog crying about somebody that was going to die; the wind trying to whisper something to me, and I couldn’t make out what it was.” Giving the owl, dog, and wind the ability to think like humans discloses Huckleberry Finn’s belief in superstition and obsession about the dead. The reader can imagine the sounds clearly and from Huck’s point of view. In his short story, "Ministerial Aid," Craig Johnson describes a sunrise as "those first, dull, yellow rays of daylight crawling up from the horizon." The main character, an exhausted sheriff, has driven through the night, and in his opinion, the sun is not bright enough or coming up fast enough. In a few words, Johnson conveys how the sunrise looks to the character and how he feels about it.

 Even when beautifully written, long descriptive passages can interrupt the flow of the plot. An image created by an object’s robust personality gives the reader the picture and keeps the narrative moving. In another of Craig Johnson's short stories, "Divorce Horse," the sheriff wears an ornate ring. Instead of using three or four sentences to describe the intricate design, Johnson writes, “I fingered the oversized ring on my thumb and watched the turquoise wolves chase the coral ones on the silver band.” He creates a clear image of the ring by giving life to the designs etched on it. In that same sentence, the author develops the character and advances the plot.

 Capturing an image in a few words gives a story more punch and a storyline more energy. Try writing descriptions by first analyzing how the storyteller feels about what you want to describe. If waves at the beach are large, how does the swimmer feel about their size? A fearful swimmer might say they threaten him, but a surfer could think the waves are challenging him. Consider how the wave reminds you of a person. Could the wave act like an angry parent, for example, or a wrestler approaching his opponent? Exploring a subject in this way before writing a description leads to more imaginative and effective writing.