Writing well

Writing well
julian.com

This isn't a tutorial about "writing well" in general. It focusses on a particular way of writing: writing short articles that sell a specific idea, service or product to as many readers as possible. It's a practice that won't make great or enjoyable novels, though. And while Hemingway became famous for his terse and objective prose, so did the eclectic writing of James Joyce or the long winded storytelling of Proust.

I feel that tone of voice and style are crucial in one's writing. The words you choose, ordering of your sentences, the construction of your argument, attention for positive or negative sentiment,... shape the perception with your audience. The author only briefly glosses over those points in his fourth section, before admitting it needs expansion. And yet, without developing those, your writing won't yield much life to the topic you want to brings across.

This brings me back to the style of this tutorial. It's well written in a particular context, bring a point across as quickly and efficiently as possible, but it's written in a style which I don't enjoy at all. It's a purely functional, dry, uncompromising way of writing. It's a style that comes with risks and trade offs.

This type of writing might come off as treating the reader as a passive agent that needs to be educated. And the key in doing so is applying well known devices to achieve that goal as quickly and efficiently as possible. Push the right buttons and you'll be able to build the desired sentiment with your audience.

This shines through, for instance, in his second section - objectives - where his bullet points read as:

> Open people’s eyes by proving the status quo wrong.

> Identify key trends on a topic. Then use them to predict the future.

While this isn't inherently wrong, these are bold tactics that create huge expectations at the start of the article. As an author, you better make sure you can deliver on your promise when you go down that road. Worst case, you may come of as presumptuous, even pretentious, and lose a big chunk of your target audience, while the readers that stick likely already are part of the parish you're preaching to.

Writing only becomes better when you go on a journey of identifying your own intentions, and confronting your own trepidation. Why do you want to write? Who do you want to convince? Why do you want to convince them? What do you hope to achieve with your writing? What is your relationship with the reader and what defines your relationship with your readers? What is the importance to you, personally, in writing down your thoughts? What is it you want to express through your writing?

Answering these questions as you practice your writing will provide the building blocks you need to define your style, your tone of voice, the pace of your writing and so on.

Without a due amount of self reflection, authors might risk treating this type of writing into a golden hammer. Writing only becomes compelling if there's clear, genuine, personal investment in the content itself. Without it, "writing like Paul Graham or Derek Sivers" risks turning into a cargo cult like practice which produces boring, look-a-like writing.

I'd also specifically recommend this talk by Larry McEnerney [1] which I discovered only recently in spite of actively looking for similar content - I guess I have a bias for written stuff.

[0] https://github.com/sixhobbits/technical-writing/blob/master/...

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtIzMaLkCaM

Especially on LinkedIn.

These single sentence paragraphs.

Provocative.

At least that's what they think they are.

I find them annoying.

Trite.

Overdone.

In all seriousness: this article reads more like an outline than an actual piece of writing. Good writing is all about pacing. Some of your sentences should be long and winding. While others are short.

That variance in rhythm keeps your reader involved in the piece. It's not necessary to convey a point-information is just as easily digested in bullet-point form-but it's necessary if you want to maintain your audience's attention over time.