For as long as I can remember, I have always desired to excel in language, especially English. It doesn't dishearten me to be told that my equation is wrong as much as it does when it is alleged that my grammar or usage is incorrect.
In school, I strove to prove myself to be a class apart from the others in this regard. Few compliments have been as satisfying as being told by my English teacher in class-IX that "my writing has a flow which is quite rare for my age". I painstakingly dotted the i's and crossed the t's with regard to grammar, and skillfully performed the drill of lexical gymnastics -- changing clauses and voices for cunningly contrived sentences, keeping an eagle eye on agreement of the verb with the subject, etc.
However, I started noticing a change in my writing during my undergraduate years. While my vocabulary waxed, my writing grew languid as the austere practices of high school education started to wane. I started relying predominantly on my "ear for the language". I would judge the correctness of a sentence on the basis of how it "sounded".
I began enjoying my writing, playing with words and admiring my own handiwork. I got better with time, and the end of the rope of high school grammar that tethered me had frayed. With characteristic modesty (!?!), I recognized that I have the gift of self-expression and articulation. There is also a general opinion of my friends that I do have a way with words.
Despite all that however, there was a thought which I kept pushing to the back of my mind-- that I don't really remember the rules of grammar anymore, I was completely reliant on my "ear" when it comes to usage, and that I undoubtedly violate some sacrosanct rules in my endeavour to write aesthetically. I spoke about this to my friends and they also agreed that it is a normal occurrence; that writing and speaking depend primarily on "ear".
The reason for my unease at this thought stems from the fact that I appreciate technique and the organized way of doing things. I believe that mastery of technique, by and large, gives a very good chance to succeed in any field. It is no coincidence that I liked Rahul Dravid the moment I saw the short ball drop dead at his feet under that solid back-foot defence.
But I digress. Anyway, I started my graduate school and there was a lot of talk of "scientific writing" which by all accounts seemed to be some stilted and emasculated form of writing where one must use simple sentences and avoid at all costs, even reasonable complications in sentence construct. I resolved not to take that course (no pun intended), fearful that I might have to change the way I write. I believed that scientific writing is not divorced from aesthetic usage of the language, that there is room to convey a scientific idea precisely while still using the language delightfully.
Luckily, I have seen enough books and papers (C.Truesdell, P.R.Halmos, A.B. Pippard, etc.) that were reassuring and I am now content in my belief.
I crave the indulgence of the reader as I embark on another digression. My dislike for excessive use of short simple sentences can be explained by comparing the act with eating delicious food. Just as one must take sufficient amounts in each mouthful so as to get the best taste of good food, so too with sentences.
My narrative until now can serve as a most instructive example of circumlocution for I come to the subject of this piece only now.
Strunk and White's The Elements of Style is a book that is highly rated by graduate students and professors alike. It is a book that is the staple fare of these courses on " scientific writing". Hence I have studiously avoided reading the book. What little I saw of its table of contents also seemed foreboding, appearing as it did, to be a collection of dos and donts designed to discourage me !
I looked at it again today and these are some of the items that caught my eye:
Use the active voice.
Hell ! And I use the passive voice often . I didn't like the way it started.
Put statements in positive form.
How then, do I manage my funny, long winded, complicated and negatively worded understatements
Omit needless words.
Fair enough
Do not overstate.
Ha! Exaggeration is the cornerstone of humour. Read P.G.Wodehouse if you don't agree.
Avoid the use of qualifiers.
Avoid Fancy words.
This was the biggest blow. I was so taken by the word Götterdämmerung, with which I titled my last post over a year ago. "Celerity" is another word I have been in love with ever since I studied it in a textbook as "Laplace and Newton's formulas to measure the celerity of sound". Maybe the alliteration had something to do with it. Anyway, plain old speed then, no celerity. One cant then speak of "mathematical legerdemain", or "ratiocinate an assumption". No delightful sentences like O. Henry in Hostages to Momus-- "...and if on any morning we get a telegram from the Secretary of State asking about the health of the scheme, I propose to acquire the most propinquitous and celeritous mule in this section and gallop diplomatically over into the neighboring and peaceful nation of Alabama."
Do not inject opinion.
That will be hard.
Use figures of speech sparingly.
I can hardly spare them.
Thoroughly irritated, I started reading from the page which said "avoid fancy words".
I finally read something that comforted me when it said:
In this, as in many matters pertaining to style, one's ear must be one's guide...
There is nothing wrong, really, with any word-- all are good, but some are better than the others. A matter of ear, a matter of reading the books that sharpen the ear.
Confirmation, finally ! Exactly what I wanted.
Then there followed some sentences and phrases which made me realise how baseless my opinion had been with regard to this book.
On the pitfalls of unclear writing:
On similes :
The simile is a common device and a useful one, but similes coming in rapid fire, one right on top of another, are more distracting than illuminating. Readers need time to catch their breath; they can't be expected to compare everything with something else, and no relief in sight.
On offbeat terms:
...the trouble with adopting coinages too quickly is that they will bedevil one by insinuating themselves where they do not belong.
Even the world of criticism has a modest pouch of private words (luminous, taut), whose only virtue is that they are exceptionally nimble and can escape from the garden of meaning over the wall.
Finally, his summary:
But best of all, his parting words to the writer:
It is now necessary to warn you that your concern for the reader must be pure: you must sympathize with the reader's plight (most readers are in trouble about half the time) but never seek to know the reader's wants. Your whole duty as a writer is to please and satisfy yourself, and the true writer always plays to an audience of one. Start sniffing the air, or glancing at the Trend Machine, and you are as good as dead, although you may make a nice living.
For all his exhortations to the contrary, one can see the mastery of words, the well chosen metaphors, the hint of exaggeration ...
I succumbed to him when I read the bit about satisfying oneself. It has been the sole reason for my blog.
With the fervor of a born-again believer, I started with the preface and uncovered yet another gem:
"Omit needless words!" cries the author on page 23, and into that imperative Will Strunk really put his heart and soul. In the days when I was sitting in his class, he omitted so many needless words, and omitted them so forcibly and with such eagerness and obvious relish, that he often seemed in the position of having shortchanged himself — a man left with nothing more to say yet with time to fill, a radio prophet who had out-distanced the clock.
It is a joy to read such writing. My opinion of "scientific writing", as understood by many of my peers and some professors, has not changed. But I now concur that this book must be read by everyone who ever needs to write a sentence in English.
In school, I strove to prove myself to be a class apart from the others in this regard. Few compliments have been as satisfying as being told by my English teacher in class-IX that "my writing has a flow which is quite rare for my age". I painstakingly dotted the i's and crossed the t's with regard to grammar, and skillfully performed the drill of lexical gymnastics -- changing clauses and voices for cunningly contrived sentences, keeping an eagle eye on agreement of the verb with the subject, etc.
However, I started noticing a change in my writing during my undergraduate years. While my vocabulary waxed, my writing grew languid as the austere practices of high school education started to wane. I started relying predominantly on my "ear for the language". I would judge the correctness of a sentence on the basis of how it "sounded".
I began enjoying my writing, playing with words and admiring my own handiwork. I got better with time, and the end of the rope of high school grammar that tethered me had frayed. With characteristic modesty (!?!), I recognized that I have the gift of self-expression and articulation. There is also a general opinion of my friends that I do have a way with words.
Despite all that however, there was a thought which I kept pushing to the back of my mind-- that I don't really remember the rules of grammar anymore, I was completely reliant on my "ear" when it comes to usage, and that I undoubtedly violate some sacrosanct rules in my endeavour to write aesthetically. I spoke about this to my friends and they also agreed that it is a normal occurrence; that writing and speaking depend primarily on "ear".
The reason for my unease at this thought stems from the fact that I appreciate technique and the organized way of doing things. I believe that mastery of technique, by and large, gives a very good chance to succeed in any field. It is no coincidence that I liked Rahul Dravid the moment I saw the short ball drop dead at his feet under that solid back-foot defence.
But I digress. Anyway, I started my graduate school and there was a lot of talk of "scientific writing" which by all accounts seemed to be some stilted and emasculated form of writing where one must use simple sentences and avoid at all costs, even reasonable complications in sentence construct. I resolved not to take that course (no pun intended), fearful that I might have to change the way I write. I believed that scientific writing is not divorced from aesthetic usage of the language, that there is room to convey a scientific idea precisely while still using the language delightfully.
Luckily, I have seen enough books and papers (C.Truesdell, P.R.Halmos, A.B. Pippard, etc.) that were reassuring and I am now content in my belief.
I crave the indulgence of the reader as I embark on another digression. My dislike for excessive use of short simple sentences can be explained by comparing the act with eating delicious food. Just as one must take sufficient amounts in each mouthful so as to get the best taste of good food, so too with sentences.
My narrative until now can serve as a most instructive example of circumlocution for I come to the subject of this piece only now.
Strunk and White's The Elements of Style is a book that is highly rated by graduate students and professors alike. It is a book that is the staple fare of these courses on " scientific writing". Hence I have studiously avoided reading the book. What little I saw of its table of contents also seemed foreboding, appearing as it did, to be a collection of dos and donts designed to discourage me !
I looked at it again today and these are some of the items that caught my eye:
Use the active voice.
Hell ! And I use the passive voice often . I didn't like the way it started.
Put statements in positive form.
How then, do I manage my funny, long winded, complicated and negatively worded understatements
Omit needless words.
Fair enough
Do not overstate.
Ha! Exaggeration is the cornerstone of humour. Read P.G.Wodehouse if you don't agree.
Avoid the use of qualifiers.
Avoid Fancy words.
This was the biggest blow. I was so taken by the word Götterdämmerung, with which I titled my last post over a year ago. "Celerity" is another word I have been in love with ever since I studied it in a textbook as "Laplace and Newton's formulas to measure the celerity of sound". Maybe the alliteration had something to do with it. Anyway, plain old speed then, no celerity. One cant then speak of "mathematical legerdemain", or "ratiocinate an assumption". No delightful sentences like O. Henry in Hostages to Momus-- "...and if on any morning we get a telegram from the Secretary of State asking about the health of the scheme, I propose to acquire the most propinquitous and celeritous mule in this section and gallop diplomatically over into the neighboring and peaceful nation of Alabama."
Do not inject opinion.
That will be hard.
Use figures of speech sparingly.
I can hardly spare them.
Thoroughly irritated, I started reading from the page which said "avoid fancy words".
I finally read something that comforted me when it said:
In this, as in many matters pertaining to style, one's ear must be one's guide...
There is nothing wrong, really, with any word-- all are good, but some are better than the others. A matter of ear, a matter of reading the books that sharpen the ear.
Confirmation, finally ! Exactly what I wanted.
Then there followed some sentences and phrases which made me realise how baseless my opinion had been with regard to this book.
On the pitfalls of unclear writing:
Muddiness is not merely a disturber of prose, it is also a destroyer of life, of hope: death on the highway caused by a badly worded road sign, heartbreak among lovers caused by a misplaced phrase in a well-intentioned letter, anguish of a traveler expecting to be met at a railroad station and not being met because of a slipshod telegram.
On similes :
The simile is a common device and a useful one, but similes coming in rapid fire, one right on top of another, are more distracting than illuminating. Readers need time to catch their breath; they can't be expected to compare everything with something else, and no relief in sight.
On offbeat terms:
...the trouble with adopting coinages too quickly is that they will bedevil one by insinuating themselves where they do not belong.
Even the world of criticism has a modest pouch of private words (luminous, taut), whose only virtue is that they are exceptionally nimble and can escape from the garden of meaning over the wall.
Finally, his summary:
The language is perpetually in flux: it is a living stream, shifting, changing, receiving new strength from a thousand tributaries, losing old forms in the backwaters of time. To suggest that a young writer not swim in the main stream of this turbulence would be foolish indeed, and such is not the intent of these cautionary remarks. The intent is to suggest that in choosing between the formal and the informal, the regular and the offbeat, the general and the special, the orthodox and the heretical, the beginner err on the side of conservatism, on the side of established usage. No idiom is taboo, no accent forbidden; there is simply a better chance of doing well if the writer holds a steady course, enters the stream of English quietly, and does not thrash about.
But best of all, his parting words to the writer:
It is now necessary to warn you that your concern for the reader must be pure: you must sympathize with the reader's plight (most readers are in trouble about half the time) but never seek to know the reader's wants. Your whole duty as a writer is to please and satisfy yourself, and the true writer always plays to an audience of one. Start sniffing the air, or glancing at the Trend Machine, and you are as good as dead, although you may make a nice living.
For all his exhortations to the contrary, one can see the mastery of words, the well chosen metaphors, the hint of exaggeration ...
I succumbed to him when I read the bit about satisfying oneself. It has been the sole reason for my blog.
With the fervor of a born-again believer, I started with the preface and uncovered yet another gem:
"Omit needless words!" cries the author on page 23, and into that imperative Will Strunk really put his heart and soul. In the days when I was sitting in his class, he omitted so many needless words, and omitted them so forcibly and with such eagerness and obvious relish, that he often seemed in the position of having shortchanged himself — a man left with nothing more to say yet with time to fill, a radio prophet who had out-distanced the clock.
It is a joy to read such writing. My opinion of "scientific writing", as understood by many of my peers and some professors, has not changed. But I now concur that this book must be read by everyone who ever needs to write a sentence in English.
2 comments:
Characteristic modesty?:D :D
Lovely post Shriram, well worth the years wait. Very reassuring as well, parts of it at least. I agree with the 'avoid fancy words' though; in my opinion,words should be used applying the strictest of morals.There is nothing more irritating than reading prose peppered with big words when one can be more eloquent with simpler words.Fancy language is acceptable only when it is impossible to get the meaning across without it.Of course one can't accuse you of pandering to such methods. I've realised that fancy language is a rather relative term.It's always amusing to discover what some people self-righteously construe as fancy unwittingly exposing their appalling ignorance.
a really good work of art; I like the way You shape your thoughts into words; Thanks, for I was happy that the blog had got an essence which I hadn't tasted before.
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