WELCOME, WRITERS

If you've come to this blog, you're probably already a competent writer--or well on your way to becoming one. After all, the surest sign of a good writer is an eagerness to become an even better writer. Writing teachers are also welcome here.

This blog will offer advice on style, grammar, even such mundane matters as punctuation. Good writing is an art, yes, but it is also a craft, like quilting or carpentry or car repair. That means the ability to write is more than just an inborn talent; it is also a skill that can be learned.

Over the years, folks have paid me a lot of money for my writing and for my advice about writing. I've been a senior editor at the New York Times Magazine Group, and I've published hundreds of magazine articles myself.
I've taught writing at several universities—most recently Virginia Tech. Corporations like FedEx have hired me to teach their executives how to write better. (Note to teachers: Many of my blog posts originated as lesson plans. Feel free to use them in your own classes.)

Now retired from full-time work, I still teach writing seminars, for free, to worthy nonprofits.

Given all this, I suppose I'm qualified to offer some suggestions about the subject of writing. Much of what I say here has been said in other places--especially in fine books like Strunk and White's The Elements of Style and Donald Hall's Writing Well. You should read those books. Meanwhile, I hope you find some of the advice on this blog useful.

Thursday, October 24, 2013

DAISY, DAISY: A Parable for Writers

A field of daisies? No: a daisy and a daisy and a daisy . . . .

      An Old Man and A Boy are standing in a field of flowers. The Old Man points to the field and says to The Boy, "Tell me, what do you see?"
     The Boy answers, "Master, I see a field of flowers."
     "Ah," says The Old Man. "Now kneel and look again. What do you see?"
     The Boy kneels and says, "Master, I see some daisies."
     "Ah," says The Old Man. "Now lie on your stomach and look again. What do you see?"
     The Boy lies on his stomach and says, "Master, I see two tall daisies."
     "Ah," says The Old Man. "Look more closely. What do you see?"
     The Boy says, "Master, I see a 12-inch-tall daisy with three flowers that have yellow centers, one flower with a bee on it, and another with a broken stem. The leaves are green."
     "Yes," says The Old Man. "Now look beside it. What do you see?"
     The Boy says, "Master, I see a 22-inch-tall daisy with four yellow-centered flowers, one with two ants on the petals. The petals are white, but the leaves are brown and--"
     "Enough," says The Old Man. "Stand up."
     The Boy stands up.
     The Old Man points to the field. "Now what do you see?" he asks.
     "Ah, master," says The Boy. "I see a daisy and a daisy and a daisy and--"
     "Yes," says The Old Man.
     "--and a daisy," says The Boy, as they walk away, "and a daisy . . ."
 _____________

     The preceding is an ancient parable that I recently made up. I invented it to illustrate an essential principle of good prose. For me that principle has recently gone beyond mere aesthetic suggestion and has entered the realm of Moral Imperative. The principle is this:
Be specific. Generalities lie. There is no such thing as a field of daisies. There is only a daisy and a daisy and a daisy. . . .


Good writers see specific daisies.

     "Be specific" is one of the two principles by which every great writer, from Sophocles to Shakespeare to Salinger, has lived. (The other principle is "Be concrete," which deserves an essay of its own.)
     What does "Be specific" mean? It means, don't say "stomach medicine" if you mean "Maalox"; don't say "employee" if you mean "pimply bank teller"; and don't say "bodily substance" if you mean "belly button lint" or "ear wax." It means recognizing that generalities are merely a convenient, mendacious shorthand designed to prepare the way for specific examples--specifically for at least three specific examples, because three is, for the human mind, a magic number. Here are three specific examples of what I'm talking about:

  • Generality: "A sweet nothing works best when it combines understatement with a figure of speech." Specifics: "Your doe-brown eyes are neither unbeautiful nor unbewitching. Your skin is somewhat smooth and somewhat sweet--like a ripe nectarine. You are only slightly more lovely than a mountain sunrise."
  • Generality: "Psychologists are neurotic." Specifics: "My last psychologist weighed 420 pounds and held her sessions in a kitchen. The one before that couldn't talk unless he was petting a cat. The one before that wore Groucho Marx glasses and called it 'role-playing.'"
  • Generality: "People who receive radio stations through their teeth should feel blessed." Specifics: "To receive The Weekly Top 40 will make you young. To receive Beethoven will make you profound. To receive All Things Considered will make you wise beyond all other mortal men."

"Pickle" is "food" with a face.

     Specifics, I tell my students, are more real, more vivid, more informative, more honest, and certainly more entertaining than generalities. "Pickle" is "food" with a face. "Sweatsock" is "footwear" with a smell. "Rolex" is "time-piece" with cachet. A good writer must thus develop an eye for specific detail. He must, for example, learn the names of plants and animals. Many a hiker has blistered because he didn't know witch hazel from wisteria, many a cobra has bit the dust because he didn't know a mouse from a mongoose--and many a novelist has blistered and bit the dust for the same reasons.
     Generalities, however, are seductive. It is easier to hold one field of flowers in your head than a million individual daisies. Besides, specifics can be dangerous. In Jorge Luis Borges' marvelous short story "Funes, the Memorious," the title character is a young boy who, as the result of an accident, sees and remembers every single detail of his life, right down to "every leaf on every tree of every wood." In the end, Borges tells us, the boy dies--of congestion.


Gods—and great writers—see, not flocks, but individuals.

     So perhaps you can't see everything in particular. Perhaps that is only for a god to do, if you believe in gods. In fact, it is perhaps what makes a god a god--that he can actually pay attention to each individual sparrow that falls, not to mention each individual human being who is throwing up or chewing his nails. A god doesn't think in terms of flocks or demographics--he thinks in terms of a red cardinal with a black brow and a broken wing under a tree in Central Park or a black child with a white smile and a runaway red wagon in Brooklyn Heights. Maybe that's how a god can manage to love everything, and why he doesn't send form letters in answer to prayers.
     And that's where the Moral Imperative comes in. I think it is morally necessary that we resist the seduction of generalizations, not just as writers but as human beings. It is necessary if we are to, if not love, at least like each other. To embrace specifics, with all their warts and whiskers, is to see through prejudice with unclouded eyes and to engage the world with sympathy. In fact, in the face of specifics, isms--the Frankenstein creations of generality--wither and die. Sexism collapses before Jane Earthmother, who, widowed and plump, has raised nine laughing children all by herself on an Iowa farm. Racism vanishes before Ernest Workman, who, black and underpaid, labors at three jobs in Compton to pay for his wife's kidney dialysis and his little girl's braces. Ageism melts before your very own grandmother and grandfather.
     Exceptions to the rule, you say? There are no rules. There are only exceptions.


END
 

Ageism melts in the face of a specific old cat and a specific grandmother. 
(This is my late mother with her late cat Chow-Chow.)
 
 

Sunday, February 17, 2013

WASTE NOT YOUR WORDS: How to achieve conciseness

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Melville's whale of a book (above) is just as concise as                                                                                             Hemingway's sleek marlin of a novella (below).

Conciseness is a principal virtue of good writing.

Let me be clear: “Conciseness” does not mean simply “fewer words.” If that were the case, The Old Man and the Sea would be considered more “concise” than Moby Dick, and all short stories would be considered more “concise” than all novels. On the contrary: A Shakespearean sonnet is not more “concise” than an epic poem like Paradise Lost—it is simply shorter, and that has nothing to do with conciseness. (Both Shakespeare and Milton, by the way, are masters of conciseness. Consider: “Life is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing” [from Macbeth]. “Better to reign in Hell than to serve in Heaven” [from Paradise Lost]. Has more ever been said in fewer words?)

Nor does “conciseness” refer to the length of sentences. One of the deep-rooted, time-stretching sentences of William Faulkner or one of the multi-layered, massively qualified, intricately knotted sentences of Henry James is just as likely to be effectively concise as one of Ernest Hemingway’s tight-knit phrasings.

No, “conciseness” simply means the virtue of conveying the most information with the fewest words, the length of the document (or the sentence) notwithstanding. Conciseness comes down to this: Don’t waste words. For a writer, that’s worse than wasting water.

That said, here are fifteen ways to help you say more with fewer words:


1. Remove implied redundancies.

Wordy: “The young girl screamed loudly as she sat on the soft fluffy dog in the white snow.”
Better: “The girl screamed as she sat on the fluffy dog in the snow.”

When you take out “young,” “loudly,” “soft,” and “white,” you’ve lost no information. A girl is by implication young. A scream is by implication loud. (If it’s a soft scream, then the adjective “soft” should be added.) Can a fluffy dog be anything else but soft? No. Is all snow white? No. But if you simply say “snow,” the reader will see white.


2. When possible, replace adverbial words and phrases by using one well-chosen base word.

Wordy: “walked with great confidence
Better: “strode” or “marched”

Wordy:extremely large”
Better: “huge” or “enormous” or “gigantic”

Wordy: “spoke under her breath
Better: “whispered” or “mumbled” or “murmured”


3. Most of the time, use active-voice verbs. 

Wordy: “The words were spoken by my uncle.”
Better: “My uncle spoke the words.”

Wordy: “The ducks were shot by Norm.”
Better: “Norm shot the ducks.”

(Note: The passive voice has its place. For more on the passive voice, see this link: http://writeyourbest.blogspot.com/2011/02/cowards-cop-out-abuse-of-passive-voice.html .)


4. Avoid noun-based phrases where a single strong verb will do.

Wordy: “I have hopes that I will pass the test,”
Better: “I hope I will pass the test.”

Wordy: “We made a decision to climb the mountain”
Better: “We decided to climb the mountain.”

Wordy: “She came to the conclusion that she would apply only to state schools”
Better: “She opted to apply only to state schools.”

5. Avoid most intensifiers. These include words like “very,” “really,” and “extremely.”

Wordy: “I am very eager to take on really difficult subjects in the extremely challenging college curriculum.”
Better: “I am eager to take on difficult subjects in the challenging college curriculum.”

The intensifiers add nothing to the original sentence and in fact make it seem that the student is trying really very extremely too hard.

6. Avoid most deintensifiers. These include words like “rather,” “somewhat,” and “quite.”

Wordy: “I am rather eager to take on the somewhat difficult subjects in the quite challenging college curriculum.”
Better: “I am eager to take on difficult subjects in the challenging college curriculum.”

The deintensifiers add nothing to the original sentence and in fact make the writer sound rather somewhat quite wishy-washy.

7. Avoid pompous phrasing.

Wordy: “at this point in time”
Better: “now” or “today”

Wordy: “He engaged in the utilization of the chain saw.”
Better: “He used the chain saw.”
A worker engaged in the utilization of a chain saw?

8. Consider changing “there are” and “it is” phrasing.

Wordy: “There are many people who prefer bagels to donuts.”
Better:  “Many people prefer bagels to donuts.”

Wordy: “It is often the case that college seniors get careless about doing their schoolwork.”
Better: “College seniors often neglect their schoolwork.”

(Note that I’ve also changed the long-winded phrase “get careless about doing” with the crisp verb “neglect,” which contains all the same information. Well-chosen verbs are at the heart of good, concise writing. Note also that I say consider changing "there are" and "it is" constructions. That doesn't mean get rid of all of them. They have their place.)

9. Put statements in positive form.

Wordy: “It was not uncommon for Ted to talk too much.”
Better: “Ted often talked too much.”

Wordy: “None of the dogs in the room appeared sick or injured.”
Better: “All the dogs in the room appeared healthy.”

Wordy: “I hardly ever saw Jane when she was not drunk.”
Better: “I rarely saw Jane sober.”

(Like most rules, this can be broken in certain circumstances. For more on this subject, see this link: http://writeyourbest.blogspot.com/2011/03/dont-tie-yourself-in-nots.html . I first learned this advice from the wonderful book The Elements of Style, by Strunk and White, which you should read tomorrow.)

10. Avoid empty “all-purpose” nouns.

Wordy: “The dining situation in the dorms is inefficient.”
Better: “Dorm dining is inefficient.” 

Wordy: “Drinking water is a factor in preventing dehydration.”
Better: “Drinking water prevents dehydration.”

Wordy: “Grades are a consideration to be an issue in college admission decisions.”
Better: “Grades influence college admission decisions.”

11. Avoid long imprecise phrases where a single precise word will do.

Wordy: “wooden interdental stimulators”
Better: “toothpicks”

Wordy: “electronically-regulated traffic-control mechanisms”
Better: “stoplights”

(Note: These two wordy examples come from real government documents. For more examples of bad writing, see this link: http://writeyourbest.blogspot.com/2011/01/can-you-translate-this-16-real-examples.html .)
An electronically-regulated traffic-control mechanism?

12. Avoid redundant categories.

Wordy: “The campus is a place where people feel safe.”
Better: “People feel safe on campus.”

Wordy: “My mother is a person who cares about others,”
Better: “My mother cares about others.”

Wordy: “Waitressing is a job that teaches many life skills.”
Better: “Waitressing teaches many life skills.”

13. Avoid redundant pairs.

Wordy: “our goals and objectives”
Better: just “our goals” or just “our objectives”

Wordy: “your hopes and dreams”
Better: just “your hopes” or just “your dreams”

14. Tighten too-loose sentences.

Wordy: “There I was, walking in the woods, and it was 6 a.m. in the morning, and the sun was just above the horizon in the east when I saw twelve crows and they were flying low above the wheat field.”
Better: “Walking in the woods at 6 a.m., the sun just above the horizon, I saw twelve crows flying low above the wheat field.”

15. Subordinate or reduce minor ideas into clauses and phrases instead of giving them their own sentences.

Wordy: “The dog was brown. It was also large. It came at me slowly. It was snarling. The wind was rising. Rain could be seen in the east, where there were hills. I began to run.”

Better: “The large brown dog crept toward me, snarling. The wind was rising, and I could see rain in the eastern hills. I began to run.”

(Note: There are other good ways to merge these ideas into sentences. How you do it depends on the effect you wish to achieve.)

Note that in all this advice, I don’t recommend that you save words by removing ideas, information, examples, or concrete images from your writing. Indeed, they are the substance of good writing. When you save words by using such tactics as I’ve listed here, you have room for even more substance.

I must add, here at the end, a mild caveat: There may be times when, for stylistic reasons (rhythm, sentence variation, a shift of emphasis, and so on), the sentence that best serves your needs contains more words than you might require for purely informational purposes. As with any writing advice, the command to be concise must be weighed against the other demands of good writing.

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