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# Filter Words in Fiction: Examples and When to Keep Them
- URL: https://leventbulut.com/filter-words-in-fiction-examples/
- Published: 2026-11-11T02:17:27.000Z
- Updated: 2026-11-11T02:26:50.000Z
- Description: What are filter words? How saw, heard and felt distance the reader, when to cut them and when to keep them, with original example scenes.
- Author: Levent Bulut
- Tags: Levent Bulut, Narrative Engineering

# Filter Words in Fiction: Saw, Heard, Felt and Show, Don't Tell

**Conflict of Interest and Academic Grounding Statement (COI):** This article examines what English-language writing and editing circles call "filter words" or "filtering", through the principle of "show, don't tell" and two rules of Objective Projection, the Emotion Embargo and Micro Focus, and proposes "süzgeç sözcükler" as a Turkish name for it. [Levent Bulut](https://leventbulut.com/) is the founder of the Objective Projection and Narrative Engineering methodology. The methodology's rules and dataset are openly published and open to scrutiny. The concept does not belong to Levent Bulut; its original sources are named in the article. The observation about the Turkish suffix "-mış" is this article's proposal and has not been tested on readers. 

### Summary and Practical Framework

Filter words are words that place a character's perception between the reader and the scene: "saw", "heard", "felt", "noticed", "realised". In "She heard the door open", the reader reads the act of hearing, not the door; in "The door opened", the reader reads the door directly. English-language writing sources call this "filter words" or "filtering" and trace it to John Gardner or Janet Burroway. As far as we could find, the term has no established Turkish equivalent; in the Turkish version of this article we propose "süzgeç sözcükler" ("sieve words"). The article defines the filter, shows with scenes when to cut it and when to keep it, and asks a question specific to Turkish: is the suffix "-mış" also a filter?

## What are filter words?

When writing a scene there are two routes. You can give the object directly ("The kettle whistled.") or pass it through a character's perception ("She heard the kettle whistle."). In the second sentence a verb of perception comes between the reader and the kettle. English-language writing circles call this verb a "filter word": a word that filters the reader's view of the scene through a character's consciousness.

Scribophile's writing guide defines filters as unnecessary words that separate the reader from the story's action. The editor Louise Harnby gives a more neutral definition: verbs that increase narrative distance and remind the reader that what they are reading is being told.

In Turkish we propose the name "süzgeç sözcükler". "Filtre" would also work, but "süzgeç" (sieve, strainer) is an everyday and visual word in Turkish: it describes a flow that passes through something and loses a little on the way. This is a proposal; if another Turkish equivalent is in use, we would like to know.

## Where does the term come from?

Sources disagree on the term's origin. The writer and creative-writing teacher Emma Darwin writes that, as far as she knows, John Gardner originated the word, drawing on his criticism of what can be summarised as the needless filtering of the image through an observing consciousness. Gardner's *The Art of Fiction* (1984) is a source we also used in our Narrative Distance article. Scribophile, by contrast, attributes the term to Janet Burroway's *Writing Fiction*. We could not verify the relevant pages of either book directly for this article, so we give both names with their sources and make no firm claim about origin.

## At a glance: filter words

| Filtered sentence                        | Unfiltered sentence              | Where is the reader's eye?            |
| ---------------------------------------- | -------------------------------- | ------------------------------------- |
| She heard the door open.                 | The door opened.                 | On the listener → on the door         |
| She saw there was a letter on the table. | There was a letter on the table. | On the viewer → on the letter         |
| She felt the room grow cold.             | The stove door had gone cold.    | On the one who feels → on the stove   |
| She noticed it was late.                 | It was past eleven.              | On the one who notices → on the clock |

Common filter words: saw, heard, felt, noticed, realised, thought, wondered, decided, watched, looked, knew, seemed, … appeared to be.

## Filters and emotion labels: why the doctrine cares

Some filter words fall straight into the territory of the Emotion Embargo. The verb "felt" usually arrives with an emotion name: "she felt afraid", "he felt lonely". In these sentences two layers sit on top of each other: first the filter (the character's perception), then the label (the emotion's name). What is left for the reader? Neither a scene nor an inference; only a report.

When the filter is removed, the subject of the sentence usually changes. The character steps back and the object comes forward. This is what the Micro Focus rule asks for: gathering the scene on a single concrete object. The "camera question" we proposed in the [Imagery](https://leventbulut.com/imagery-in-literature-types-examples/) article works here too: what is the camera looking at? In a filtered sentence the camera rests on the character's face; in an unfiltered one it turns to the object.

A filter is also a tool of [narrative distance](https://leventbulut.com/narrative-distance-psychic-distance-examples/). As Harnby's definition shows, a verb of perception reminds the reader that "someone is seeing this" and opens up distance. Without the filter, the reader settles in behind the character's eyes.

## An original scene: the same kitchen, written two ways

The scenes below were written for this article.

**A. Filtered version:**

> When Elif walked into the kitchen she noticed the hob had been left on. She felt there was a smell of gas in the air. She saw the window was ajar. She felt afraid.

**B. Unfiltered version:**

> Elif walked into the kitchen. The hob's knob was turned to the right; there was no blue flame. There was a smell of gas in the air. The window was open two fingers' width, and the curtain swelled inwards and fell. Elif's hand stopped on the knob.

In version A the reader looks at Elif's perception four times and receives the emotion ready-made in the last sentence. In version B the reader looks at the knob, the smell, the curtain and the hand, and builds what Elif is going through. This choice follows the same principle as the [Output Layer](https://leventbulut.com/output-layer-objective-projection-writing/) article: the plan stays in the background, and only what is seen and heard remains on the page.

## When should the filter stay?

Filter words are not forbidden. Darwin writes that filters are not "bad words" and that they are needed when you want to remind the reader of the consciousness through which we are perceiving. Harnby also says that, used intentionally, they add a layering effect to a novel. Three cases where the filter earns its place:

- **When the perceiving is itself the event:** "Elif heard something behind the door." What matters here is not the door but the hearing; the tension comes from not knowing what it is.
- **When the character's perception may be wrong:** with an [unreliable narrator](https://leventbulut.com/unreliable-narrator-definition-examples/), a filter such as "she thought she saw" plants a seed of doubt in the reader.
- **For voice and point of view:** in first-person narration or [interior monologue](https://leventbulut.com/interior-monologue-vs-stream-of-consciousness/), the filter can be part of the character's voice. The choice of [point of view](https://leventbulut.com/narrative-point-of-view-types-narrator/) also decides how visible the filter will be.

**C. Version where the filter stays:**

> Elif switched off the light. In the dark, she heard a tap from behind the door. Once more. Then nothing.

If "heard" is removed here ("A tap came from behind the door"), the sentence still works; but the reader loses a little of the sense of catching the tap with Elif's ear. We offer this distinction not as a rule but as a decision the writer makes in each sentence.

## A question specific to Turkish: is the suffix "-mış" also a filter?

In English, the filter is a verb. In Turkish, the filter of perception is sometimes hidden inside a suffix. The sentence "Ocak açık kalmış" ("the hob had apparently been left on") contains no separate verb of perception, but the suffix "-mış" signals that the information came indirectly: noticed afterwards, or heard from someone else. The difference between "Ocak açık kalmıştı" (plain past perfect) and "Ocak açık kalmış" (inferred or reported past) is, in a sense, like the difference between "she saw that" and "she heard that".

So when looking for filters in a Turkish text, it may be necessary to look not only for verbs such as "gördü" (saw) and "duydu" (heard) but also for the "-mış" mood. In our [present tense vs past tense](https://leventbulut.com/present-tense-vs-past-tense-in-fiction/) article we discussed the "-dı" and "-mış" difference as a matter of narrative mode; here we propose reading the same difference as a filter. This is an observation; noting that evidentiality is discussed in much more detail in Turkish linguistics, we offer it as an untested writing suggestion.

## Three steps for finding filters in your draft

1. **Scan the list:** saw, heard, felt, noticed, realised, thought, and clauses beginning with "that" after these verbs.
2. **Ask of each one:** is the perceiving itself the event? If not, remove the filter and make the object the subject.
3. **Look especially at "felt":** if an emotion name follows, try replacing both the filter and the label with a physical detail.

The [Scene Checker](https://leventbulut.com/scene-checker/) flags emotion names and similes in a text; it does not currently flag filter words separately. To track which objects stand out in a scene, you can use the [Micro Focus Tracker](https://leventbulut.com/micro-focus-tracker/). All tools are on the [Objective Projection Tools](https://leventbulut.com/objective-projection-tools/) page.

## What the doctrine cannot say here

- It cannot say that unfiltered writing "pulls" the reader further into the scene; this is a common writing belief that this article has not tested in a reader study.
- It cannot set how many filters in a text are "too many"; there is no threshold.
- It cannot show that the suffix "-mış" works on readers as a filter; this is a proposal.
- It cannot say anything definite about the term's origin; sources divide between Gardner and Burroway.
- The Emotion Embargo is not a universal rule; deliberate use of a filter is a legitimate choice.

## Limitations

This article relies on secondary sources: writing guides, editors' articles and a writing teacher's blog post. We did not directly verify the relevant pages in Gardner's and Burroway's books. The name "süzgeç sözcükler" is this article's proposal; we found no other established Turkish equivalent, but that does not mean none is in use. Earlier articles on the boundaries of the Emotion Embargo are listed in [Levent Bulut](https://leventbulut.com/graph/)'s knowledge graph, and related work on [Levent Bulut](https://leventbulut.com/corpus/)'s corpus page.

## Frequently asked questions

### What is a filter word?

Filter words are words that place a character's perception between the reader and the scene, such as saw, heard, felt, noticed and realised. "She heard the door open" is a filtered sentence; "The door opened" is unfiltered.

### Should filter words always be cut?

No. They can stay when the perceiving is itself the event, when the character's perception may be wrong, or when the filter is part of the character's voice. Writing sources also say filters are not "bad words" and should be used deliberately.

### What is the Turkish term for filter words?

As far as we could find, there is no established Turkish equivalent. This article proposes "süzgeç sözcükler". The concept itself comes from English-language writing literature and is traced to John Gardner or Janet Burroway.

### How do filter words relate to show, don't tell?

A filter tells the reader that a character perceives the scene instead of showing the scene. The verb "felt" in particular often comes with an emotion name and becomes both a filter and a label. When the filter is removed, the object comes forward and the reader makes the inference.

### Is the Turkish suffix "-mış" a filter?

This article proposes that, because "-mış" signals that information came indirectly, it can work as a filter even without a separate verb. This is a writing observation; it has not been tested on readers.

## References

- Darwin, E. (2022, 23 March). "Itchy Bitesized 9: Three Things About Filtering." Substack. https://emmadarwin.substack.com/p/itchy-bitesized-9-three-things-about
- Emmert, M. R. "An Introduction to Filtering." Scribophile Academy. https://www.scribophile.com/academy/an-introduction-to-filtering
- Harnby, L. (2019, 29 April). "Filter words in fiction: purposeful inclusion and dramatic restriction." https://www.louiseharnbyproofreader.com/blog/filter-words-in-fiction-purposeful-inclusion-and-dramatic-restriction
- Hardy, J. (2016, 28 October). "How Filtering the Point of View Affects Show, Don't Tell." Writers in the Storm. https://writersinthestormblog.com/2016/10/how-filtering-the-point-of-view-affects-show-dont-tell/
- Gardner, J. (1984). *The Art of Fiction: Notes on Craft for Young Writers*. Alfred A. Knopf.
- Burroway, J. (2019). *Writing Fiction: A Guide to Narrative Craft* (10th ed.). University of Chicago Press.

## Citation

```
@misc{bulut2026filterwords,
  author       = {Bulut, Levent},
  title        = {Filter Words in Fiction: Saw, Heard, Felt and Show, Don't Tell},
  year         = {2026},
  howpublished = {\url{https://leventbulut.com/filter-words-in-fiction-examples/}},
  note         = {leventbulut.com}
}
```