onamatopoeia

i love making up onamatopoetic expressions. i think that they are the most honest way of describing the noise something makes. there are the common ones that act as actual words since they are so accurate, such as "sizzle" and "beep". there are also those we've almost accepted as actual words, such as, "vrooom" (the sound a car or motorcycle makes) and "woosh" (the sound anything makes when it is going fast). but, i like to create my own. the sound a pebble thrown into the water makes a "sploosh" or a "ploop" not a splash. a cricket's song goes like "krree krrree krrree" rather than a simple "chirpping". the japanese language is chalk full of onamatopoeias. as a student of japanese, we always have to memorize some "kasanekotoba", or the onamatopoetic expressions that the fluent speakers use. take for example, "zaazaa"- the sound a heavy rain makes, or "don" the sound thunder booms. i like "pechakucha" which is the sound of chattering people. the japanese even have onamatopoeias to describe feelings and emotions. "wakuwakusuru" describes excitement, "butsubutsu" is how someone grumbles or complains and "jitto" is a state of motionless. idk about you, but i think that's interesting and it certainly shows that other people feel the same way i do about onamatopoetic expressions. haha.
sure, you could use metaphors and similies that compare the sound to another familiar one that the reader would picture hearing. but, onamatopoeias are uncensored. it's like listening to little kids describe what something does; it's unabridged. you're not really thinking if the words you are using sound "intelligent" or if they are concise enough. take the sentence, "the beads in the can rattled around, sounding like raindrops falling lightly on the wooden shingles of my roof."then take an onamatopoetic sentence, "the beads in the can rattled around, sounding like the time a passing shower pitter pattered on the wooden shingles of my roof". as a reader, i find the 2nd sentence more appealing, because "pitter pattered" creates better imagery and "soundry (?) lol (imaging the sound)" compared to "falling lightly." additionally, because i know what sound rain makes, my brain connects that sound to the onamatopoetic word, thinking, "oh yeah, it really does sound like that."
but as with anything, onamatopoetic expressions have their flaws. first of all, the biggest problem to me, is that the reader will only understand what you are talking about if they have experienced what you are describing before. for example, it will be harder for someone to think about "the large man canonballed into the water with a resounding 'blooosh'" if they had never seen that before. secondly, though i believe these words are just as accurate and concise as using similies and metaphors, more "serious" papers will probably not sound as good if you use a made up word. these kinds of papers usually call for "censoring" and trying to sound as intelligent as you can, which doesn't always include onamatopoeias.
i find onamatopoeias more engaging than the common metaphor or overused similie. they are a breath of fresh air, plus, they add a bit of humor. this could be because my voice, or the style i write, describes things (authentically of course) using humor to steer away from boredom and the same old same old. but that's not the point. the point is, that onamatopoetic expressions are just plain funny. waaaaaaaaaaaaaataaaaaaaaaaa!