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Lessons Learned from “On Writing Well”

robinwieruch.de

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Re: Lessons Learned from “On Writing Well”

#31

Post by Normal_gaussian »

lacampbell wrote: post #26
x1798DE wrote: post #3

I was so disappointed with this book. Some of the platitudes Zinsser goes into are reasonable, like try to be uncluttered, direct and to the point, but all the worked examples seem to just be arbitrarily chosen to his taste. For example, in the chapter on "clutter", Zinsser picks out this passage from Walden as his exemplar of "uncluttered English": "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front…

"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived." Dense, incredibly difficult to parse, with a non-standard use of "front" as a verb and what seems to be a triple-negative. If I said that sentence to you, out loud, I doubt you would catch the meaning of i…

I completely agree. As another native English speaker I find the highlighted passage parses incredibly naturally. It feels like a single cohesive thought without the need for back-referencing despite encompassing several 'ideas'.

Re: Lessons Learned from “On Writing Well”

#33

Post by jimmaswell »

x1798DE wrote: post #3

I was so disappointed with this book. Some of the platitudes Zinsser goes into are reasonable, like try to be uncluttered, direct and to the point, but all the worked examples seem to just be arbitrarily chosen to his taste. For example, in the chapter on "clutter", Zinsser picks out this passage from Walden as his exemplar of "uncluttered English": "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front…

I don't see anything wrong with the sentence besides maybe the use of "front" that you pointed out. I got it easily the first time reading it and I'm certain it would be just as clear to me spoken as long as I was paying attention.

Re: Lessons Learned from “On Writing Well”

#34

Post by blisse »

x1798DE wrote: post #29
cgh wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure you've seen it before, but The Economist's style guide is my usual resource: http://www.economist.com/styleguide/introduction

This might not be so bad as a general guide to writing things like blog posts or whatever, but I'm specifically looking to get better at technical writing - e.g. writing software documentation. For example, the prohibition there on "jargon" words would probably come into conflict with the kind of precision you need in technical writing; I would expect the advice on something like that to be like, "where terms of art…

But the rule is to avoid jargon if there's a better everyday equivalent, not to avoid jargon at all costs. There's no contradiction.

Re: Lessons Learned from “On Writing Well”

#35

Post by rangibaby »

x1798DE wrote: post #3

I was so disappointed with this book. Some of the platitudes Zinsser goes into are reasonable, like try to be uncluttered, direct and to the point, but all the worked examples seem to just be arbitrarily chosen to his taste. For example, in the chapter on "clutter", Zinsser picks out this passage from Walden as his exemplar of "uncluttered English": "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front…

I enjoyed "Writing that works".

Re: Lessons Learned from “On Writing Well”

#36

Post by AckSyn »

jimmaswell wrote: post #33
x1798DE wrote: post #3

I was so disappointed with this book. Some of the platitudes Zinsser goes into are reasonable, like try to be uncluttered, direct and to the point, but all the worked examples seem to just be arbitrarily chosen to his taste. For example, in the chapter on "clutter", Zinsser picks out this passage from Walden as his exemplar of "uncluttered English": "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front…

I don't see anything wrong with the sentence besides maybe the use of "front" that you pointed out. I got it easily the first time reading it and I'm certain it would be just as clear to me spoken as long as I was paying attention.

I remember this story and the only (personal preference) issue I can take with it were the comma placements. Yikes. Shatner anyone?

Re: Lessons Learned from “On Writing Well”

#37

Post by chubot »

I recommend Steven Pinker's "the Sense of Style". He talks about some cognitive science behind why some sentences are easier to parse than others.

He also makes a distinction between "classic style" and other styles like "self-conscious style" and technical jargon.

The concept of "classic style" is worth it alone. It's kind of an obvious idea but once you know it, you will look at things you read a different way. It doesn't apply 100% of the time, but it almost certainly does in technical or business communication.

Re: Lessons Learned from “On Writing Well”

#38

Post by x1798DE »

blisse wrote: post #34
x1798DE wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This might not be so bad as a general guide to writing things like blog posts or whatever, but I'm specifically looking to get better at technical writing - e.g. writing software documentation. For example, the prohibition there on "jargon" words would probably come into conflict with the kind of precision you need in technical writing; I would expect the advice on something like that to be like, "where terms of art…

But the rule is to avoid jargon if there's a better everyday equivalent, not to avoid jargon at all costs. There's no contradiction.

Yes, I didn't intend that there was a contradiction, just that "jargon" and technical words are actually used more in technical writing than in other kinds of writing, and it can be tricky to understand where the line is, how to introduce these terms such that the reader is not confused by the unusual term (or by a common word used in an unusual way, like how in programming contexts the word "string" refers to a sequence of characters).

Anyway, it's not that none of these principles apply, it's just that there are almost certainly many tweaks here and there and additional tips for people writing technical documentation - for example, almost no one sits down and reads the documentation for a library from "front to back", it is usually used in segments, which has implications about what you can expect your reader to know, and about how important navigation and organization of the document are.

These are just some things that I've noticed as a consumer and producer of documentation, and I don't know that I even have good answers to most of them.

(I hate to make it seem like I'm arguing the point that these more general writing guides are not good, I just want to clarify the kind of thing I'm looking to improve, for myself.)

Re: Lessons Learned from “On Writing Well”

#39

Post by munificent »

ktRolster wrote: post #20
munificent wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> read it out loud (or pronounce it in your mind) If you pronounce it in your mind, you'll pronounce what you thought you wrote, not what you actually wrote. Your memory of your writing will distract from your vision. The simplest, best, most actionable advice I know to improve writing is: "Edit". The second is "Read it out loud".

If you pronounce it in your mind, you'll pronounce what you thought you wrote, not what you actually wrote With a little practice, that won't be a problem. If you find it is still a problem, then the solution you gave of reading it out loud is fine, too.

> With a little practice, that won't be a problem.

I've written quite a bit of prose over the past decade or so. I still find a lot of things in the third draft (read out loud) that I didn't notice in the first two.

Re: Lessons Learned from “On Writing Well”

#40

Post by Normal_gaussian »

aggie wrote: post #30
cachvico wrote: post #28

There's an amusing number of simple grammatical mistakes in this article.. ("english", "It is unnecessary words that don’t add meaning but complex sentence constructions.", "Write about “grass” except when (my insert) it has another color than green", "Avoid semicolons except when (my insert) you want the reader to make a pause", ...)

In all but one of those examples you're calling out technical errors that don't have much impact on communication. It seems most HN threads about writing advice have a post nit-picking the article for grammar. I don't see how this is interesting if you don't want to actually make the case that it hurts the author's credibility. Do you?

I found it somewhat amusing, and whilst it did not have a significant effect on my understanding of the article it did break 'the flow' and made the piece much less compelling.

Does this hurt the authors credibility? Yes.

The piece is a summarisation of a book literally called "On Writing Well" yet the text itself shows the author has not fully digested the information they are regurgitating. This is ironic.

That said, it is very well written for a non-native speaker. I would feel much more comfortable having this author communicate on my behalf than many native English speakers that I am close to. With some practice (probably including spoken word and works of fiction) there is no reason they could not exceed the skills of the majority.

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