How Writing Advice is Killing Your Writing, The Series – Part 1

Reading bad writing is like eating half-done macaroni.

It’s almost satisfying, but mostly leaves you wanting to order out from the corner Chinese restaurant that gives you vicious diarrhea.

What’s got me all grumbly now? Last week I read a guest-post about writing better copy. It was, ironically, perfectly fit for a funeral home brochure, and contained half-chewed advice destined to stop any budding writer in his or her tracks.

So I’ve decided to take matters into my own hands. We’re gonna put some of this assfuckery to bed, one installment at a time.

And what classier way is there than that to introduce:

How Writing Advice is Killing Your Writing, The Series

We’re gonna kick the series off by talking about intelligence. Yours, mine, and that of your audience.

Now, intelligence might not sound like it has a whole lot to do with writing technique. Usually writing advice concerns itself with effective headlines, verb/noun agreement and conjugating your mom.

But as you’ll see throughout this series, the way you treat your audience is paramount to the way they receive your written message. And treating them like a bunch of cavemen is going to ruin your writing.

And that brings us to the two most common enemies of know-it-all copywriters: long words and long copy.

Copywriters who don’t know better like to parrot a copy-disfiguring mantra: “Short, simple writing makes a better impression.”

Right. Because apparently we’re all a bunch of gerbils.

I don’t know how to refute this any more simply than with a bit of poetry:

People like awesome shit.

Tada!

Here’s some more poetry for you:

If people are putting down your writing because you used a large word, your writing sucks balls. Period.

People like good music, good art, good sex, good food and good writing.

People will listen to a very long song (classical music, anyone?) if it’s awesome.

People will stare at a painting for a long time if it’s great.

People will sit at the dinner table for a long time if the food doesn’t taste of anus.

And people will read long words, long sentences and long books if the writing is fantastic.

A compelling message will carry an interested reader through fat, long, wide, skinny and ugly passages of writing.

Enter the Knuckledraggers

Your #1 Fan?

Nor do I care to read something that has been “keenly engineered” to fit my intelligence. Nor do I want my business to attract clients who prefer sentences with 7 words, three of which are “see,” “Spot,” and “run.”

This more and more timeworn idea is not only insulting, it would destroy a great many works of written brilliance.

Case in point, this last weekend I discovered a fellow Seattleite, Scott Berkun. His blog posts (and speeches for that matter) are nothing short of riveting, and they break many of the rules normally suggested by “good writers” out there. He uses big and uncommon words, formidable blocks of paragraphs and long sentences. And to make matters worse, he discusses ideas that aren’t exactly strawberries and ice cream to devour.

Another case in point: Stephen King’s Gunslinger series. In the second sentence of the very first book is the word apotheosis. In the same paragraph are the words alkali, and bucka.

Way to go, Stephen. Apotheosis? Alkali? Bucka? I didn’t know what those words meant when I read the book. But now I do, because I own a dictionary and I’m not a jackass. Apparently this is true for a lot of Stephen King’s readers because they buy an awful lot of books.

Another case in point: Atlas Shrugged. One of the best-selling and most brilliant works of philosophical fiction in the history of the solar system. It’s a perennial favorite for the “What books would you want with you if you were stranded on a desert island” game, ranking right up there with the Bible. It’s 1200 or so pages of microscopic print, and has one character giving a speech that goes on for 70+ pages.

That Jerk is a Real Troglodyte

You’ll have to make a judgement call about the words. If you put some polysyllabic sesquipedalian word in the middle of a gunfight or in your website’s call-to-action, you might want to rethink it.

But then again, sometimes big words serve. Calling someone a troglodyte just kind of works. Even if you don’t know what it means, you still know someone just got royally burned.

The important part? The message. If you know the message, the words will come.

Maybe every song should only be 12 seconds long…

So much for the words. How about the sentences and paragraphs?

Well, writing is a lot like music. Long phrases followed by short; slow passages followed by fast; changes of key and tempo…these things add interest. Ever wonder why songs have intros, verses, choruses, bridge sections and solos?

Interest, that’s why. Just like writing. Just like fine dining with its 3-course meals.

Some like it long. Some like it short.

Long passages of writing are perfect if you’ve got a long passage of things to say. Like a nostalgic winter scene, where the wind pulls the dust of fallen snow like wraiths over the rolling hills, and the silence is only interrupted by distant “whumps” as branches give way under the strain and drop their new parcels of snow to soft ground below.

That was a 47-word sentence right there. Not brilliant, no, but it didn’t read like a medical journal either. It sort of meanders along like winter scene should.

Short passages are great, too.

Especially for adding speed! Excitement!

He’s got a gun!

Shit! Run!

BAM!

“Ack, my spleeeeen!”

Too many long passages can be tough to read and slow down the pace. On the other hand, if you use too many short passages you run the risk of sounding like the POW, BAM and WHAP of your typical comic book.

But all this is really beside the point. What’s actually important here is the underlying (or overriding?) message. If your message is better served with ginormous sentences, write some goddamn long meandering ginormous sentences.

But. Need short? Go short.

Long story short (see what I did there?) here are some things to keep in mind:

1. Forget the rules for now.
2. Decide upon your message (ie “I’m going to write about snakes/web design/sex.”).
3. Pick an appropriate tone for that message (humorous, gloomy, business-like, etc.)
4. Write in such a way that that message is communicated lucidly. Note, it might take long words and sentences, short words and sentences or, more likely, a combination thereof.
5. Edit.
6. Keep writing, and stop reading blog posts and taking advice. Writing takes practice. So go practice.
7. But don’t forget to come back here and read my shit because it’s awesome.