Repetition
I usually try to avoid repeating words and phrases. Not words like “was” which you have to repeat, though I can minimize the frequency with which I use them. I mean words like “lovely,” “horrible,“ “beautiful,” or “friendly.” It’s tedious for the reader, and therefore not good for me, if they see the same word repeated and repeated and repeated.
The auto-editing function in Word, no matter how exasperating at times, helps me identify words I’ve repeated. I might have used “justify” 40 times in a 200-page story. I may not even realize it. That’s far too many times for that word. I can search in Word. It will count the number of times that word appears, and point out exactly where, so that I can revise my text to make it more engaging. Variety is almost always the spice of writing. If I am working on a play and want to know how many times a certain character appears. I can search on that character’s name, and Word will tell me.
I can’t blindly do Word’s bidding. Repetition can be good, if it is intentional, and the reason is good. I might be crafting a character whom I want to be regarded as tiresome because he says the same thing over and over. Like a father who wants his son to always pay his bills on time. Dad may say it over and over until Son has to finally get mad at him for it. That might have been the first time Son ever talked back to Dad which might be a big turnaround for Son, and the start of a downward spiral for Dad. I can vary the phrase a little bit each time the father says, “Always pay your bills on time,” to make it more interesting for the reader.
Martin Scorsese, the famous director, has a character in his film Goodfellas who is called Johnny Two Times (maybe not Johnny) because he says things twice. I don’t know why Scorsese has him in there except for fun. He’s a pretty insignificant fella’. Maybe Scorsese knew a guy like that once and just wanted to put him in there. Scorsese is long past the point in his career when he has to worry about what people might not want him to do. Nobody’s going to say no to him. Not even once. It’s a very enjoyable film and features an interesting use of a narrator.
Go ahead and use repetition of you need to. But, again, generally try not to repeat words.