Reading good writing is the first step towards improving your written output. Observe the techniques that resonate with you and incorporate them into your style. It will feel clunky at first, like any new exercise, but over time will become more fluid and seamless. Reading also builds a large vocabulary, which is essential to achieve fluid prose.
Read the best authors for the intended style, be it story-writing, critical analysis or business communication. It all depends on the style of writing you would like to master. It's theor techniques that you want to emulate and make your own.
Write to evoke an emotion. There must be a purpose to your writing. If to inform, guide the reader to an ah-ha moment. Your writing will be memorable if the reader feels something.
Cut fluff. Every word must have a purpose. Less is more.
Good writing is about refining your own voice. Write as you speak, speak as you write, and both will improve.
Ultimately, have fun with it. Experiment with different styles. Writing is an art, it requires creativity. This must be cultivated and grown. In time, over many poorly crafted drafts, a unique voice, all your own, will emerge.
A professor at Harvards entire course is dedicated to the refinement process. You start with what they call “write your best story”. Every assignment afterward is the removal of something unnecessary from the original story. Each assignment is not adding to, but subtracting. Each word and sentence must matter. Painful but rewarding.
Another important skill is being able to read your own writing as if you are different readers. Think about how much someone knows and how something will sound to someone who doesn’t know as much. What’s their mental picture as they start reading, what is it after they are one paragraph in, etc. Make sure you aren’t making leaps they can’t follow. Try this out while modeling people of various levels of familiarity with the subject so your writing isn’t tedious to someone who already knows a bit. Make sure you aren’t wasting their time. Make sure you’ve defined your terms before using them. Read it over and over trying to get yourself into other people’s shoes every time. Have empathy for every reader you’re writing for.
> Reading good writing is the first step towards improving your written output. Observe the techniques that resonate with you and incorporate them into your style.
Do you have specific authors whose writing really resonated with you? How have they changed your writing?
1. Condense. Much of good writing is simply signal/noise ratio!
First write a draft that says all you want to say. Then go over it again and again, removing/rephrasing un-needed words and syllables. 20% compression is a decent result.
2. "Rubber ducking". Imagine showing the text to someone likely to read it. I've developed an "inner stranger" I show text or code to. He doesn't have my specialized knowledge, but is reasonably smart.
Implied above is to always write a draft that you edit. Do NOT try to form a perfect text in your mind before writing!
1. Read the Elements of Style by E.B. White. It describes how to write in active voice for positive effect.
2. Practice converting your thoughts to the written word so that they're clearly understood by anyone. That is the exercise at hand and it takes practice.
3. Once you've mastered clearly communicating your ideas, add some cleverness to your writing. Use double-entendre and practice economy of words. Leave something for the reader to guess, allowing one's imagination to fill the gaps with what you didn't say.
4. Finally, practice the art of showing versus telling, i.e., the art of story-telling versus an analytical accounting of facts.
I truly struggled with writing for the longest time, but three practices helped tremendously. The practices are 1) writing with a piecemeal approach, 2) accumulating notes as fuel for tomorrow’s writing, and 3) rewriting with keyword outlines.
My most important shift was to start writing nonlinearly. Instead of writing a beginning, middle, and end, I instead gather together all the claims, facts, etc. and develop them individually without concern for the overall logical structure. Eventually, the pieces start fitting together and the linear structure emerges. It is so much easier to start with too much and whittle it down.
Where do these claims, facts, etc. come from? This is what your note taking system should create. As I read a text, I highlight relevant sections and then go back through to paraphrase them. These notes are organized around topics and solve the daunting blank page problem.
How should you paraphrase? Keyword outlining is the practice of picking a handful of _keywords_ from a source text, setting aside the original text, and then paraphrasing using the keyword outline and your recollection of the original text. This is a subtle shift from the typical approach of changing a few words of the source text to paraphrase it. This is also great practice for honing your sentence and paragraph writing skills.
Gene Wolfe, my favorite writer, said that the advice he gave people was to pick a short story they thought was perfect, and try to rewrite it word for word from memory.
Presumably the idea is that you run into the same challenges the original author did — how to get from one scene to the next, how to direct or misdirect the reader, etc. — and by solving those challenges you understand the mechanics of storytelling at a deeper level. Since you've got the "perfect" version of the story as a key, you aren't just guessing, and there is a right and wrong answer.
He also said that, to his knowledge, nobody had ever taken him up on this advice.
But, Wolfe was a fantastic writer, and an engineer, so I assume his approach would be a practical and useful one for anyone willing to put in the work.
I just spent about 30 minutes trying to find the source of the quote, but failed. /shrug
Stephen Fry has talked about trying to rewrite scenes from The Great Gatsby from memory, and the renewed appreciation he got for Fitzgerald's prose after that attempt.
My personal experience has led me to believe that there’s truly no substitute for reading a lot and writing a lot. But the funny thing is that you may not realize how true that is until you’ve gotten sick and tired of trying to find shortcuts and hacks. You can get burnt out on reading and watching material about how to write well but it can be helpful in moderation. The best resource I’ve found is the Belief Agency YouTube channel. They have a lot of great interviews/shows about how command of the concept of storytelling can improve your communication, written or otherwise. Brian McDonald’s books are great too—-especially Invisible Ink. One more thing I’ve found helpful is to take up a practice that has nothing to do with writing—-gardening in my case—-and see if you can learn some things that shape the way you think about the writing process. All of these things should lead you back to a regular practice of reading and writing though. It’s like an archaeological dig. Most of the time you’re just throwing dirt over your shoulder but once in a while you find treasure.
You can only ever be as good as that which you read. Read only blog post and you will sound like a blogger. Read only classics and you will sound like a scholar. If you read enough you will become your own best critic. Stop trying to write better and spend that time reading the best material you can find.
The same is true for all aspects of language. If you want to speak better, don't watch TV news or LA sitcoms. Watch classic British comedy (Blackadder) or BBC science docs (Brian Cox) that will expand your practical vocabulary and sense of proper diction.
"You can only ever be as good as that which you read." I disagree. If your statement was true, progress would never occur. Obviously writers can learn by reading the writing of other good writers, but the are not bound by what they have read. The ability to exceed is always present.
Then collect some example writings that represent the best writing style you aspire to. I prefer short stories and essays, but for larger examples (novels) you can focus on single chapters.
Every day spend about 1/2 hour copying the example writing by hand into the spiral notebook. When you are done copying about two pages into your spiral notebook review the pages and identify different writing techniques. I used this technique to learn copywriting so I identified different persuasion techniques including what’s the catch addresses or Promise.
However, you could also use this same technique to become a better novelist. So maybe you identify alliteration, irony, foreshadowing, etc.
Why does this work? This have been studies on the powerful learning effect of writing notes by hand. The technique I described follows the same principals. By copying great writing by hand you are engaging multiple senses at one time. You are feeding your conscious and subconscious mind rich example writing that will help you improve your own writing.
I am happy you found success copying others’ writing but highly doubt that rote copying is what made the difference. It’s more likely that you learned through analysis.
Learning works through synthesis of material, which is the main takeaway from the writing studies you mentioned, however when copying writing no synthesis occurs. Also these studies were recently duplicated and results did not match the original conclusion.
Readit News
Read the best authors for the intended style, be it story-writing, critical analysis or business communication. It all depends on the style of writing you would like to master. It's theor techniques that you want to emulate and make your own.
Write to evoke an emotion. There must be a purpose to your writing. If to inform, guide the reader to an ah-ha moment. Your writing will be memorable if the reader feels something.
Cut fluff. Every word must have a purpose. Less is more.
Good writing is about refining your own voice. Write as you speak, speak as you write, and both will improve.
Ultimately, have fun with it. Experiment with different styles. Writing is an art, it requires creativity. This must be cultivated and grown. In time, over many poorly crafted drafts, a unique voice, all your own, will emerge.
Best of luck!
Do you have specific authors whose writing really resonated with you? How have they changed your writing?
1. Condense. Much of good writing is simply signal/noise ratio!
First write a draft that says all you want to say. Then go over it again and again, removing/rephrasing un-needed words and syllables. 20% compression is a decent result.
2. "Rubber ducking". Imagine showing the text to someone likely to read it. I've developed an "inner stranger" I show text or code to. He doesn't have my specialized knowledge, but is reasonably smart.
Implied above is to always write a draft that you edit. Do NOT try to form a perfect text in your mind before writing!
2. Practice converting your thoughts to the written word so that they're clearly understood by anyone. That is the exercise at hand and it takes practice.
3. Once you've mastered clearly communicating your ideas, add some cleverness to your writing. Use double-entendre and practice economy of words. Leave something for the reader to guess, allowing one's imagination to fill the gaps with what you didn't say.
4. Finally, practice the art of showing versus telling, i.e., the art of story-telling versus an analytical accounting of facts.
My most important shift was to start writing nonlinearly. Instead of writing a beginning, middle, and end, I instead gather together all the claims, facts, etc. and develop them individually without concern for the overall logical structure. Eventually, the pieces start fitting together and the linear structure emerges. It is so much easier to start with too much and whittle it down.
Where do these claims, facts, etc. come from? This is what your note taking system should create. As I read a text, I highlight relevant sections and then go back through to paraphrase them. These notes are organized around topics and solve the daunting blank page problem.
How should you paraphrase? Keyword outlining is the practice of picking a handful of _keywords_ from a source text, setting aside the original text, and then paraphrasing using the keyword outline and your recollection of the original text. This is a subtle shift from the typical approach of changing a few words of the source text to paraphrase it. This is also great practice for honing your sentence and paragraph writing skills.
Presumably the idea is that you run into the same challenges the original author did — how to get from one scene to the next, how to direct or misdirect the reader, etc. — and by solving those challenges you understand the mechanics of storytelling at a deeper level. Since you've got the "perfect" version of the story as a key, you aren't just guessing, and there is a right and wrong answer.
He also said that, to his knowledge, nobody had ever taken him up on this advice.
But, Wolfe was a fantastic writer, and an engineer, so I assume his approach would be a practical and useful one for anyone willing to put in the work.
I just spent about 30 minutes trying to find the source of the quote, but failed. /shrug
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oSdLfPas8dw around around 10 minutes. Good stuff!
PS: I'm more of a fan of Zelazny, but I enjoyed quite a lot The Book of the New Sun
Zelazny was my first love. :)
The same is true for all aspects of language. If you want to speak better, don't watch TV news or LA sitcoms. Watch classic British comedy (Blackadder) or BBC science docs (Brian Cox) that will expand your practical vocabulary and sense of proper diction.
Get a cheep spiral notebook and a nice pen.
Then collect some example writings that represent the best writing style you aspire to. I prefer short stories and essays, but for larger examples (novels) you can focus on single chapters.
Every day spend about 1/2 hour copying the example writing by hand into the spiral notebook. When you are done copying about two pages into your spiral notebook review the pages and identify different writing techniques. I used this technique to learn copywriting so I identified different persuasion techniques including what’s the catch addresses or Promise.
However, you could also use this same technique to become a better novelist. So maybe you identify alliteration, irony, foreshadowing, etc.
Why does this work? This have been studies on the powerful learning effect of writing notes by hand. The technique I described follows the same principals. By copying great writing by hand you are engaging multiple senses at one time. You are feeding your conscious and subconscious mind rich example writing that will help you improve your own writing.
Anyway, this worked for me. Good luck.
Learning works through synthesis of material, which is the main takeaway from the writing studies you mentioned, however when copying writing no synthesis occurs. Also these studies were recently duplicated and results did not match the original conclusion.