I’ve been preparing to retake the GRE this December, so I can apply to a PhD program for next year. The decision to (try to) go for a PhD deserves its own post, so I won’t get into that now. What I do want to talk about it is vocabulary.

See, when I took the GRE the first time around, seven years ago—has it really been that long?—I didn’t bother preparing at all, and I was pretty mortified by my verbal score. On the quantitative side, I did terrible—bottom 25% percent—but that didn’t surprise me at all, nor did I figure it would matter, since I was applying for MFA in creative writing programs. I got in to two of the three schools I applied, so my scores must not have held me back too much.

Still. That verbal score, it stuck with me. I’ll just come out and say it—I got a 500. I was ranked in the 61% percentile (meaning 39% of people who took the test did better than me). I did great on the writing part, but that verbal score surprised me. I’m a writer. I was an English major. I read all the time. Why was I not scoring up way at the top on the verbal part of the test?

Seven years have passed since then. That’s seven more years of reading, six-and-a-half years of teaching experience, and three years of graduate school (in English). I’d like to think my verbal score will improve this time, but to hedge my bets, I’m working on my vocabulary.

As I’ve been studying my new words, I’ve been focusing on expanding my vocabulary for real and not just memorizing a bunch of words that I’ll forget as soon as I take the exam. I want to actually have a stronger vocabulary, not just for this exam, not just so I can get into a PhD program. I want to have a stronger vocabulary because that’s important—isn’t it?—as a writer.

When I got the results of my first GRE, I tried to make myself feel better by reminding myself that I’m not a fan of bombastic prose (although I didn’t use the word “bombastic”—that’s a word I learned as I’ve been preparing for the test this time around). Concision and simplicity, minimalism, that’s what I’m drawn to as a reader. Couldn’t I write, then, and write well, even if my vocabulary was only better than 61% of college graduates (and really, it’s 61% of college graduates planning to go on to grad school, since that’s who takes the GRE)?

The answer is obviously yes—I mean, I’ve gone on to become a published writer; I won an award to publish my first book, for cripe’s sake—but, as Reverend Lovejoy from The Simpsons would point out, the answer is, “Yes with a but.” Yes, I can write well with an only just higher than average vocabulary. But I can write better with an even better vocabulary.

As I’ve been learning new words, I keep coming across words that I really like, words that I can’t help but imagine using in future stories, words that have more interesting and refined meanings than their simpler counterparts. These words can open the door to all kinds of interesting metaphors and ideas, and though I still think it’s important (for my tastes) that readers shouldn’t have to hold your book in one hand and a dictionary in the other, I do think my writing can only stand to improve from the careful, unobtrusive addition of these less common but oh-so expressive words here and there.