[HN Gopher] Write Like You Talk (2015) ___________________________________________________________________ Write Like You Talk (2015) Author : ivanvas Score : 91 points Date : 2022-10-23 16:59 UTC (6 hours ago) (HTM) web link (paulgraham.com) (TXT) w3m dump (paulgraham.com) | legendofbrando wrote: | This is all true and I think mercurial is an excellent word. | Spoken and written. | coyotespike wrote: | Easy recent counterexamples include, say, Hilary Mantel, | Christopher Hitchens, David Foster Wallace, Helen Dewitt. | | Each of these wrote brilliantly, in a style very different to how | most people talk. Some of them (Hitchens) wrote deliberately in a | "high style," successfully and delightfully. Others are, well, | simply themselves - Mantel once noted, "You simply cannot run | remedial classes for people on the page." | | The plain style often misses the joy of language deployed for its | own sake, for play. It can be well done, but it's certainly not | the only legitimate style. | | I will concede that for most people, writing for most practical | purposes, the Strunk & White school which Graham is channelling | is probably pretty good advice. | nmilo wrote: | I don't like this viewpoint at all. Spoken English and written | English are different languages, full-stop. You can see this in | effect when someone is giving a fully-scripted presentation or | talk---it just doesn't sound like speaking, no matter how | conversational the text is. This is in large part due to the | issue of word choice: speakers must choose their words quickly, | so they must transmit their idea using lots of small, common | words, while writers have time to think about word choice and | select the one that transmits the exact connotation the writer is | going for. And that's not to mention the nonverbal cues which add | a ton of richness to spoken English. Writing allows you to take | time to look over your words which lets you re-gain that richness | with poetic devices which really allow your words to flow in a | way that would sound unnatural and forced in spoken language. I | would go as far as to say that if your writing sounds good | spoken, it is not very good writing at all. | bennysonething wrote: | "The mercurial Spaniard himself declared: "After Altamira, all is | decadence." " | | Actually I could imagine Neil Oliver would say something like | this in one of his documentaries. | kayodelycaon wrote: | The better than 95% of writers bit bugs me. It feels like looking | at all of written history and saying everyone else was doing this | wrong because they don't write simply enough. | rongopo wrote: | Having your voice in writing is a difficult milestone. | agalunar wrote: | Writing and speaking are such different media - for example, you | can go back and reread a sentence, but you can't wind back time | in a live conversation; you can signal how something should be | interpreted,* give parsing hints, and add emotion using | inflection and tone while speaking, but you can't do this in | writing. So I think we should expect good writing to look | different than good speaking. | | PG might have in mind then the strange affectations that seem to | grip people sometimes when they write, but I can't think of any | examples off the top of my head. | | *sarcasm, e.g. | dcminter wrote: | It's not, I think, quite what you mean, but when you refer to | "strange affectations" of writers (nicely put) I was reminded | of this: | | "Words resemble fish in that some specialist ones can survive | only in a kind of reef, where their curious shapes and usages | are protected from the hurly-burly of the open sea. 'Rumpus' | and 'fracas' are found only in certain newspapers (in much the | same way that 'beverages' are found only in certain menus). | They are never used in normal conversation." - Terry Pratchett, | 'The Truth' | russellbeattie wrote: | Anyone who has tried to dictate something instead of typing it | knows how far off Graham is in this advice. Writing is a | different medium than spoken language and reading is different | than listening. Readers have different expectations than | listeners. The cadence of sentence length is important, and the | exact words you use count more. The pace of writing allows one to | pick and choose more carefully - being more descriptive or | precise as needed - and readers expect this. | | He may have meant "conversationally," but that depends on context | and your audience. This comment has a completely different tone | than I would use in a professional document. Bad writing is bad | writing, whether it's an academic paper, a blog post or a legal | brief. It doesn't have anything to do with writing like you talk. | | All that said, it is a good place to _start_ writing, especially | if you are having trouble organizing your thoughts or getting | started. Imagine sitting in front of someone and explaining to | them what it is you want to convey. Write that all down as if you | 're chatting. But then go back and edit. And that's a second good | bit of advice: Writing is editing. | mr_sturd wrote: | Whey if a wrert like a taa'ked, a divn't think anyone would kna | what a wa' gaan an aboot... | chromatin wrote: | What an absurd and pathetic characterization of Southern | Mountain Speech and/or rural American dialect. It comes across | as speaking more to your character than your polemic target. | mr_sturd wrote: | I meant it to read as if spoken by broad | Northumbrian/Geordie. | dctoedt wrote: | > _Southern Mountain Speech and /or rural American dialect_ | | Funny, I thought it was a phonetic transcription of | _Scottish_ dialect (whence are derived many Appalachian | speech patterns, of course). | mr_sturd wrote: | Touching on Scottish, but Northumbrian. I'm not that | "broad" really, though. | ant6n wrote: | Like a who/what? | Lukas_Skywalker wrote: | "like I talked" | mr_sturd wrote: | Yep, "like I talked". | Liron wrote: | Yet another pg classic. | | When I first read this essay, it made me go from writing 90% | similar to the way I talk, to 100% - literally _only_ writing | words and phrases I 'd realistically say in a conversation. And I | think it's been a good improvement! | l33tbro wrote: | > But just imagine calling Picasso "the mercurial Spaniard" when | talking to a friend. Even one sentence of this would raise | eyebrows in conversation. | | Why does everything have to be "optimized" with Paul? I'll take | verbose misfires any day over rigid plain-speak. | biorach wrote: | He wasn't advocating rigid plain speak | texaslonghorn5 wrote: | Ok, pretend you are Paul and then what should the author have | written instead of mercurial? | vlark wrote: | Horrible advice. Most people don't talk well; they ramble, they | stumble, they beat around the bush. Do not write in "simple | language." Instead, write in plain language: | https://www.plainlanguage.gov/media/FederalPLGuidelines.pdf | cole-k wrote: | A lot of this blog post reminded me of | https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwel.... | I am not well-read though, so maybe I just like to pattern match | to the few essays I've read that have stuck with me. | aasasd wrote: | Personally I advocate that people at least try to see if the flow | of the writing makes any sense when read out loud--if not, it's | probably just poor writing, stemming from a braindump with little | organization. And as the very minimum, it would be nice if people | stopped putting long-winded parenthetical additions in the middle | of unfinished sentences. | asciimov wrote: | > And in my experience, the harder the subject, the more | informally experts speak. | | I guess I've been hanging out with different crowds. I typically | find that the harder the subject the more exacting the language | has to be to avoid miscommunication. | rocketbop wrote: | When I watch interviews of actors and other well known | personalities in the 80s compared to now I can't help notice that | the standard of spoken conversation seems to have dropped; lower | vocabulary, shorter sentences, more interruptions. | | I think it would do a lot of good for people to try to speak more | like they write, rather than the other way around. | karmakaze wrote: | There is a good message here if you don't get distracted by | whatever may particlarly bother you about the presentation. | | > You don't need complex sentences to express complex ideas. | [...] Informal language is the athletic clothing of ideas. | | I interpret this as following my basic mode of operation: express | everything as simply as I can, even if that makes my brilliant | idea sound so obvious. The goal isn't to make myself seem smart, | it's to get the idea across. With practice this is natural and | you find yourself able to express more complex things than you | thought you could. If I use complex ways of describing less | complex things I'd be putting a lower limit on what I could | express. | | Basically, how would Richard Feynman say it? He was a master of | using the simplest descriptions of the most complex subjects. | | The same goes for coding style. There is a time where fancy | metaprogramming will be needed to make something compact and | manageable. But that isn't the first thing you should reach for | in simpler cases. | watwut wrote: | But the way people talk naturally does not lead to simple | sentences nor simple constructions. People talk in runabout | ways, add unnecessary details, miss others and then go back to | fill them in. Some people do in fact use complex words and | others use too simple wrong words when they speak. People use | tone of voice to add meaning and also gestures. | | Transcript of natural conversation is not a simple readable | text. Instead, it requires a lot of editing to become one. | dasil003 wrote: | This is an unconvincing straw man argument. Bad writing is | just... bad writing. You can just as easily point to bad speaking | and say people should talk more like they write. The fact is, | speaking and writing are different, and even within them there | are different goals and styles. | | While PG's plain-spoken dialectical style attracted me early, and | has been effective, I wouldn't call it the end-all-be-all | approach to writing. One problem with keeping things | conversational is that the substance of the argument can be | obscured by flowing narrative that sounds good but doesn't | necessarily add up. A dense, precise style might be harder to | read--and less politically expedient--but ultimately more | effective in establishing the merits of a novel idea. | jesuscript wrote: | Edit: | | I re-read your post. You and David Milch agree: | | https://youtu.be/SaE9cB6iHks | | It depends on what you are conveying. Different approaches for | different situations. | [deleted] | samatman wrote: | This is good advice if we ignore the headline completely. | | If you want to see what I mean, record yourself talking sometime, | a few minutes is fine. Make a transcript, and read that. Ideally, | if there's someone around who can do the favor, have that someone | edit the errors in transcription and punctuation first, so that | part isn't conflated. | | It's not going to look anything like good conversational writing. | | The flip side is that someone setting out to "write like they | speak" will instead succeed in writing in a conversational style, | if anything. When that's good is another question. | kayodelycaon wrote: | I think the advice could easily be summed up as "write at an | 8th grade reading level". | spacedcowboy wrote: | I like a lot of what Graham writes, but I fundamentally disagree | with him on this one. Spoken language is the JIT compiler of | information transferral. It's spur-of-the-moment; it's stream-of- | consciousness; it gets the job done by stripping away a lot of | nuance and complexity. | | Written language is more subtle, more considered, more edited - | he states himself that he writes then edits - in his case to make | it more "spoken". By doing this he is removing complexity in the | interests of simplicity, and this may well fit with _his_ goal | for _this_ work. It is not a general panacea. | | I don't disagree that sometimes it is more useful to have a | simple introduction, leading to a more complex and better | understanding of a subject before layering on the exceptions and | subtleties - there is certainly a place for simplified knowledge | transfer, our entire system of education is based on this "lies | to children" approach. | | What I do disagree with is that it's a useful go-to rule. The | world is inherently complex, and we deal with complexity by | introducing layers of abstraction (more of the "lies to children" | approach, but this time to ourselves). Not everyone needs to | understand the quantum mechanical physics of a positive charge in | order to understand that balloons will stick to your hair if | rubbed against certain materials, but if you're trying to | _explain_ that, then you read the room and go with the layer of | abstraction needed. Sometimes that abstraction is very thin, and | the language used will reflect that; at other times, "it just | does" is the way to go... party handbooks printed on balloon | packets are different to undergraduate textbooks. | | So written language, with all its _capability_ for complexity, | context, subtlety and nuance should be employed when that | capability has a useful effect. That means understanding one's | audience and tailoring to suit, not just a blindly-applied rule | to "write as you speak". | c0mptonFP wrote: | You hit the nail on the head, mostly. | | > then you read the room and go with the layer of abstraction | needed. | | Finding the right layer of abstraction is orthogonal to the | write-speak axis. When speaking to my colleagues, I use | technical jargon that no layman could understand. None of the | topics are simple, or strongly abstracted. The issue of write | vs. speak is more about the sentence structure, sentence | length, and breadth of vocabulary. | | But I generally agree that carefully crafted written language | can capture and transport thoughts much, MUCH more effectively. | mediascreen wrote: | Slightly off topic: What's with HN and the word "orthogonal"? | | I'm not a native English speaker, but I read a lot in English | and it seems like the word is extremely common on HN compared | to anywhere else. | | Isn't usually "unrelated" a more descriptive and even a more | precise word in most HN discussions? (The parent comment here | does seem to make a point using axes, so maybe it is more | appropriate here?) | auggierose wrote: | I see what you did there, but I will bite: | | Orthogonal does not mean unrelated. Take two vectors in the | plane. Them being orthogonal means that they have a 90 | degree angle between them, so if you know the direction of | one of them, the direction of the other one is severely | restricted to two choices. So these vectors are very much | RELATED. It's just that they are related in a way that | makes them maximally different in a certain sense. | | So if you want to say that two things are maximally | different in a certain sense, you use orthogonal. If you | want to say that one thing has no influence whatsoever on | what the other thing is, and the other way around, you use | unrelated. | | For example, if you randomly choose a point in the plane, | then its x and y coordinates will be unrelated, but not | orthogonal. The vectors [x 0] and [0 y] are not unrelated, | but certainly orthogonal. | | Of course, this distinction is easily lost. | mediascreen wrote: | I understand that orthogonal and unrelated have different | meanings. What I'm wondering is: Isn't "orthogonal" much | more common on HN (18388 matches in search) than in other | places? | | I suspect that "orthogonal" is a word programmers fall in | love with during some CS class and then overuse because | it sounds sciency. | cole-k wrote: | I don't see why what you're saying and what the blog post says | are incompatible. I feel like Graham is not saying "simplify | your thoughts," but rather "simplify your words." Think Up Goer | 5 (https://xkcd.com/1133/) but maybe not as extreme. | | What I understood from your comment is that for complex topics | (like quantum mechanics), complex language is necessary. This | section of the post clarifies Graham's thoughts on the matter: | | > You don't need complex sentences to express complex ideas. | When specialists in some abstruse topic talk to one another | about ideas in their field, they don't use sentences any more | complex than they do when talking about what to have for lunch. | They use different words, certainly. But even those they use no | more than necessary. | | I kind of agree, although I don't know exactly whether I've | studied things that y'all might consider "abstruse". | YurgenJurgensen wrote: | Up Goer 5 is a fantastic example of why complex language is | necessary. Even in a short example, it already defines clumsy | replacements for the words it's trying to use, like "Sky Bag | Air" (Hydrogen), "Funny Voice Air" (Helium) and "Breathing | Type Air" (Oxygen). Other artificially-simple language | projects, like the Simple English Wikipedia* or Toki Pona | generally end up in the same place. You get the linguistic | equivalent of copy-and-paste coding. | | Sure, "don't use more complex language than necessary" sounds | like advice, but anyone capable of working out the minimally | complex language needed for any given topic likely doesn't | need to be told this. | | *A quick skim also suggests that in many places, the SEW just | gives up on simple vocabulary and uses phrases like "time- | independent Schrodinger equation". | cole-k wrote: | Just so we're on the same page, I agree to the necessity | for words like Hydrogen or Helium. And not gonna lie I get | a kick out of using fancy words that in today's English- | speaking world serve the dual purpose of implying that I'm | part of the educated social elite (although I like to | imagine this is not the reason why I like using them - I | digress). | | > but anyone capable of working out the minimally complex | language needed for any given topic likely doesn't need to | be told this. | | This is where I (and I think Graham) disagree with you. In | my opinion, this is very not easy. When I write - | especially about complex topics - I feel more comfortable | complicating my thoughts. | | If you don't mind the anecdote, in middle and high school I | thought I was hot shit because my classmates would struggle | to write enough to meet the page limit and I would struggle | to not go over it. As it turns out, this is not because I | had more to say. It's because I would use twice the number | of words to say it. But it was certainly complex prose that | used fancy language - sometimes, I'd argue, parts were even | well-written. | | I do still think there is an aesthetic to language, but | I've grown to believe that simple language possesses beauty | too. I can appreciate now how famous writers like Hemingway | could agonize for a day over a single sentence. Especially | because I look at the four paragraphs I wrote in response | and think to myself, "man I bet this is way more | complicated and rambly than it needs to be." | GeneralMayhem wrote: | > Think Up Goer 5 but maybe not as extreme. | | I don't think this proves the point you want it to. Up Goer 5 | loses a ton of information for the sake of its stylistic | schtick, and is borderline incomprehensible to people who | don't already know the information it's attempting to convey. | That's not a problem when you're doing it for comedic effect | or for its own sake; it's a big problem when you decide that | a devotion to simplistic language should trump actual | communication in scenarios where the message matters. | hinkley wrote: | I've outgrown a few bloggers. Spolsky still stings a bit. I | really liked his early stuff and then my frowns got bigger and | a lot more frequent. | | The problem I found with blogging is that I only have about two | year's of things to say, and either I start scraping the bottom | of the barrel or I had to take a long break and then circle | back, reiterating 80% of what I already said but with new or | better examples. If I was forced to have an audience for ten | years I'd just be saying crazy shit all the time. | dehrmann wrote: | > I only have about two year's of things to say, and either I | start scraping the bottom of the barrel or I had to take a | long break and then circle back, reiterating 80% of what I | already said but with new or better examples | | You sound like a Youtuber! | jesuscript wrote: | You are just circling the truth that ultimately we all really | have one or two things to really say to the world. And that's | okay. | | Refining the few themes that you have conviction for until | the end of time is worthy. Hubris is if you think those few | things now qualifies you for all things. | | It helps if your topic of interest has endless fodder. | Misanthropes know what I mean. | hinkley wrote: | I always wonder if half the time other writers are trying | to win arguments they lost somewhere else or if that's just | me. | kaashif wrote: | > If I was forced to have an audience for ten years I'd just | be saying crazy shit all the time. | | There is an alternative. Just blog without an audience. Don't | keep any web server logs (or don't look at them). Delete the | analytics. | | The fact that someone theoretically could be reading my blog | is enough motivation to write something understandable | (rather than just scrawling some gibberish in a notebook), | but whether that audience actually exists or not doesn't | matter to me. | | There's no inherent need to write regularly if you feel you | have nothing new to say, is there? | paulpauper wrote: | _There is an alternative. Just blog without an audience. | Don 't keep any web server logs (or don't look at them). | Delete the analytics._ | | That depends on your individual preferences I guess. I | think having an audience is at least an indication that | you're succeeding at it. Otherwise you have a diary, not a | blog. | texaslonghorn5 wrote: | At least in my experience, writing is a great medium for | creative expression. It's a relatively permanent medium | to express the fleeting now. I can look back in many | years and remember and reflect on what I did and thought. | | As long as you're not dependent on having an audience as | a form of income, I'd think the blog is intended for the | writer first and foremost, and having a readership is | secondary/optional. | kaashif wrote: | > I think having an audience is at least an indication | that you're succeeding at it. | | If the goal is to get an audience, then having an | audience is a success. | | If the goal is primarily to crystallize your own | understanding of things, write thoughts up in a coherent | way, or something else which doesn't necessarily involve | an audience, then you can have success without an | audience. | | > Otherwise you have a diary, not a blog. | | If the blog is still there for people to see, it changes | the kinds of things you write. I don't feel comfortable | posting half-incomprehensible jumbled thoughts with | partially worked examples, filled with mistakes on a | blog, whereas I would feel comfortable writing that | privately. | | This does definitely depend on individual preferences and | whether one can motivate themselves to write well without | even the possibility of an audience. I can't. | omginternets wrote: | To add to your comment, it's also been my experience that | writing improves one's speaking. So to the extent that one | wishes to be more articulate in his oral communications, he | should not write as he speaks. | alanbernstein wrote: | Uhh no | paulpauper wrote: | Success at writing has almost everything to do with who is doing | the writing, not the quality of the writing or how clear it is. | Michael Crichton demonstrated this himself at Harvard by turning | in an essay written by Orwell, unbeknownst to the teacher, and | got a "B-". I have seen this as well. Why do Glen Greenwald | articles get so much traffic even though it's just basic | political commentary? Because of his brand. | legrande wrote: | Being grandiloquent does not equate to being more intelligent, | you're just being superfluous when more terse and lean sentences | are better. | jimmySixDOF wrote: | The old adage "sorry for the long letter I didn't have time to | write a short one" has some relevance here if you approach it | from the perspective of maximum efficiency and information | density. But that is not always the best path to get your idea | across. A conversational style presumes you have a longform | narrative and the extra elbowroom for nuance and variations on a | theme. I dictate a lot from inside a VR headset and I usually | work backwards from the spoken paragraphs to an outline form I | can then expand on at a later stage in an email for example. Just | sending pages of raw transcript is not great if you respect your | readers time. | | As an aside, the best mix for me is doing Screen Recording | walkthroughs of some topic which can communicate so much more | info than a written description while keeping the conversation | narrowly focused. Video platforms like Loom, mmhmm, yac, Tella, | etc all these provide a better way to coordinate discussion when | integrated with typical tools like email and thread messengers. | secondcoming wrote: | I see some people on HN, presumably Americans, start sentences | with 'Like,...' | | I find it annoying and it dims my view of the poster. | cole-k wrote: | I would encourage you to try and push past this feeling. | | It's part of a natural change in dialect. There are instances | of prejudice toward similar phenomena such as vocal fry or | uptalk that have been shown to disproportionately be attributed | to women, even though this is not the case. | | (https://scholarworks.arcadia.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article.. | . some reading I found on the subject) | secondcoming wrote: | Like, nah, I probably won't. | extragood wrote: | I'm pleasantly surprised to see so many diverging with Paul on | this point. | | "Why waste time say lot word when few word do trick" | | My take is: don't let language get in the way of expressing | yourself. Language is one of our most important social | constructs. Restricting yourself to simple language has the side | effect of losing precision and/or meaning in communication. | bcantrill wrote: | As with so many things Paul Graham: there is a good, important | idea here (omit needless words!) but he overshoots the mark, | descending into venomous overgeneralizations. The truth is more | nuanced: speaking and writing are both important vectors for | communication (obviously?), but they _are_ different | (delightfully so!) -- with different strengths and weaknesses. | Great writing is tight: it crackles. If a word serves that end, | it should be used -- knowing that if someone like Graham wants to | decry the word choice as "fancy", it reveals more about the | critic than the writing. | louison11 wrote: | And that, sir or madam, was a beautiful comment. I don't know | if you speak like that - and it doesn't matter. | civilized wrote: | > venomous overgeneralizations | | Sorry, but this illustrates Graham's point even better than the | "mercurial Spaniard" thing. Reaching for a fancy word that | doesn't quite make sense in context. | | Overgeneralizations could be absurd. They could even be | dangerous, perhaps - although Graham's alleged | overgeneralization really doesn't seem to be, even if wrong. | They're not venomous, at least not without an argument. You | can't just throw it out there for _effect_. That 's | grandstanding. | | The slower, less urgent pace of writing allows us to overthink | things and make odd communication mistakes we wouldn't make in | conversation. Graham's advice is good for avoiding this. | GeneralMayhem wrote: | The venomous, dangerous, overgeneralized part is - I assume | intentionally - snuck in under the radar. Did you follow the | link on the word "bogus", and notice what keywords PG thinks | are indicative of bogosity? A warning against overwrought | language is one thing, but it's carried through to an attack | on _any_ complexity in written language (with no | acknowledgement that sometimes that complexity is necessary | or preferable except for nefarious reasons), and from there | to an attack on the caricature of the liberal arts that STEM- | lords love to mock without understanding. You start out | nodding along to the idea that "mercurial Spaniard" is a bit | much, and by the end you're nodding along to the idea that | liberal-arts academia is a conspiracy. | YurgenJurgensen wrote: | That "bogus" link is also cheating. I can't hyperlink with | my voice, so hyperlinks aren't spoken language. | rfrey wrote: | >Sorry, but this illustrates Graham's point even better than | the "mercurial Spaniard" thing | | Funny, I thought it _refuted_ Graham 's point, very | effectively. | paulpauper wrote: | The most successful writers in the world do not do this, and many | who do are not successful. Writing has to be much more precise | than speech. Speech has tone, cadence, and body language. Writing | does not, so you need to be articulate to get the the desired | message and intent across and most importantly avoid confusion. | And it has to be interesting enough for the reader to hopefully | not give up too soon. This is much harder than speech. | pklausler wrote: | I'm not going to write the same words that I would speak because | my reader is not going to process those words in the same way | that my listener would. | [deleted] | indus wrote: | Three core mediums that transfer human knowledge: | | - spoken words (live events, political speeches, etc) | | - recorded words | | - written words (blogs, books, papers) | | Spoken words have the highest activation energy. Hence, the value | that we expect is very very high. There is commitment of time. | | Recorded words are speeches, discussions, lectures. Lower than | listening something live. | | Written words have the highest volume in today's society. Also | the lowest activation energy for the writer. | | If written words are not edited, thought through, the increasing | volume adds to the noise rather than a better signal. | r_hoods_ghost wrote: | This is mistitled. What it should be is "Write like I talk." | Sorry mate but not everyone limits themselves to the stripped | back, limited vocabulary of Silicon Valley demotic, even in | speech. | marginalia_nu wrote: | Eh so like I think this maybe is primarily good advice for people | who are good, like naturally good advice, no I mean speakers, not | people like me who like can barely keep the tail end of a thought | in my head... co- uh co- coherenty ... like. | GeneralMayhem wrote: | How much of PG's blog is based on setting up strawmen and using | them to bash on the liberal arts? | | > Even one sentence of this would raise eyebrows in conversation. | And yet people write whole books of it. | | These sentences immediately identify one big, relevant difference | between speech and non-blog writing, which is not commented on in | the blog post: _people do not generally give book-length | monologues on a single topic_. Books will necessarily end up | using more flowery language because if they didn 't _they would | be extremely boring to read_. | | > perhaps worst of all, the complex sentences and fancy words | give you, the writer, the false impression that you're saying | more than you actually are. | | On the other hand, simpler words and sentence structure give the | reader the false impression that you're being more honest than | you actually are. Demagogues (especially of the right-wing | variety) have known this for centuries: people like simple ideas. | Making an idea sound simpler, even if at the expense of _actual_ | clarity, means that people will agree with you more readily. That | can be dangerous. | | But even assuming you're communicating in good faith, sometimes | you really need the nuance that only more sophisticated language | can grant. In speech, we tend to do this by inflection, body | language, and gestures; in writing, those aren't available, so we | do it with vocabulary choice and more careful sentence structure. | In English (and many other languages), a single spoken word can | have dozens of different connotations, or a sentence dozens of | meanings, depending on tone and emphasis (see | https://bridgeenglish.com/blog/2012/08/28/who-stole-the-mone... | for a classic example). In writing, we have to be more precise | with the words themselves. | | All of that said - | | > If you simply manage to write in spoken language, you'll be | ahead of 95% of writers | | is probably true, but I think it says more about 95% of writers | than it does about what's actually good. In most disciplines, the | techniques it takes to become "not terrible" are qualitatively | different from the techniques it takes to be "good". I would | posit that writing is one of those; the best writers are | fundamentally treating the written word differently than those of | us who just want to get through the day and be understood on a | basic level. Moreover, "top 5 percent of writers" is not really | that good, considering that most readers are reading the same | vanishingly small fraction of writers. Even in a professional | capacity, where you're going to read design docs and such from a | wider array of writers (as opposed to the extreme power-law | distribution of novelists), I'm certain that the top 1 in 20 | writers in my company are read way out of proportion to everyone | else, and some of them are still terrible writers. | pwinnski wrote: | This deserves a call-out: | | > On the other hand, simpler words and sentence structure give | the reader the false impression that you're being more honest | than you actually are. Demagogues (especially of the right-wing | variety) have known this for centuries: people like simple | ideas. Making an idea sound simpler, even if at the expense of | actual clarity, means that people will agree with you more | readily. That can be dangerous. | | Well said! | dctoedt wrote: | > _How much of PG 's blog is based on setting up strawmen and | using them to bash on the liberal arts?_ | | It'd be surprising if PG wanted to bash the liberal arts, given | his longstanding interest in fine arts, specifically painting; | see, e.g., his _Hackers and Painters_ book. (He studied | painting at RISD and in Florence.) | | https://www.amazon.com/Hackers-Painters-Big-Ideas-Computer/d... | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Graham_(programmer) | GeneralMayhem wrote: | Liberal arts != fine arts | pwinnski wrote: | There is a good idea in here somewhere, but "write like you talk" | is horrific advice that very few people should follow. | | "Write casually for a wider audience" might work. | | "Avoid complicated sentence structure and unusual vocabulary for | a wider audience" might also be good advice. | | People don't read in the same way they listen, so one should not | write in the same way they speak. | | Or, to put it another way, "Gosh, I dunno. Seems kinda like he | didn't think that one through, you know? Maybe he knew what he | meant, but what he said sure ain't it." | [deleted] | texaslonghorn5 wrote: | > But perhaps worst of all, the complex sentences and fancy words | give you, the writer, the false impression that you're saying | more than you actually are. | | Disagree. | | When you're writing / reading, it's much easier to parse complex | sentences. It's also much easier to express a cohesive, complex | thought this way compared to a meandering, directionless | sentence. | | And the whole point of "fancy words" are to succinctly convey | some nuance rather than using a generic word which is much | broader. Check out the often reposted article about Webster's | 1913 dictionary. Also this is exactly the purpose of the | thesaurus. So yes, if done right, you ARE "saying more than you | actually are." | | > The last straw for me was a sentence I read a couple days ago: | | >> The mercurial Spaniard himself declared: "After Altamira, all | is decadence." | | "mercurial" does the trick in the quoted example, does Paul have | a patch? | teucris wrote: | The Spaniard, known to change his moods on a whim, himself | declared: "After Altimara, all is decadence." | | > And the whole point of "fancy words" are to succinctly convey | some nuance rather than using a generic word which is much | broader. | | Which can be bad when you want your audience to understand you | without significant effort. Reading a novel, a reader may be | willing, or excited even, to expend effort to get all the | nuances and context. But if you're writing to communicate an | idea, you have to match the expectations of your audience, and | your audience may have a fixed effort budget to spend on your | writing. Most people know this deal, which is why I think using | big words is looked down on as self-absorbed or conceited. | | I think similarly about code one-liners: they are super hard | for another programmer to read, and not everyone has time for | that. So they tend to come off as a kind of elitist bragging if | not done carefully. | texaslonghorn5 wrote: | If you're writing for an audience familiar with the word | mercurial then saying mercurial conveys exactly what the | author meant. | | If you're writing for an audience unfamiliar with mercurial | then what you said is appropriate. | | As is with a one liner, you wouldn't put that into a tutorial | but you might include it without description in a CppCon | talk. | 7speter wrote: | >> The mercurial Spaniard himself declared: "After Altamira, | all is decadence." | | It's one thing to construct a sentence like that for a | fictional story or novel, it's another to write that way for | documentation or a legal document. | curo wrote: | There is something exhausting about that example sentence. | | Yes, different words embed different meanings. For instance, | it's clear to me what Paul means by "fancy" and "complex." The | author William Zinsser makes both points: choose great words | and write like you speak. | | But I agree that somewhere out there, beyond the horizon, | there's a time and place for the word 'mercurial.' | jameshart wrote: | Perhaps pg favors git over mercurial. | Cthulhu_ wrote: | That's it, it'll depend entirely on the context. Maybe if | you're selling something you should write like you talk, or if | you're posting comments / opinions on an orange/brown/grey | website, but if you're writing "A History of Ancient Britain", | it's not exactly you'd talk to your friends about; it's a book, | it's to educate and to entertain. Do you talk to your friends | to educate and/or entertain? I mean the latter, sure, but | people even change how they talk when they are entertaining | someone else, so. idk. | tayo42 wrote: | Fwiw Stephen King in "On Writing" also says to not use a | thesaurus and just use the words you already naturally know how | to use. He follows on saying your vocabulary will naturally | expand as you read more. | unethical_ban wrote: | The first sentence is about the writer; the second about the | reader. | | If writers aren't learning new words, then readers can't | learn from them. When do writers learn new words? From | reading! Who writes what the writer reads? Writers. | | King seems to be saying "the best way to discover new words | is through the labor and chance of picking up the right books | and finding some words you had not read before". So all words | that can ever be useful have already been written or will be | invented by fiction writers, and it is up to you to read a | variety of styles and types of fiction rather than the | compendium on your shelf. I find this notion silly. | | The answer of course is a blend. If someone is leaning on a | thesaurus to make bad writing good, there will be a problem, | too. | [deleted] | nathias wrote: | I often use thesaurus to translate complex words into simpler | ones, it really does improve the overall writing especially | if you are biased towards redundant complexity ... | js8 wrote: | Not an english speaker, but I use thesaurus when I feel there | might be a better fitting word or if I would repeat the same | word several times. | kayodelycaon wrote: | I agree with King on that. A thesaurus is great for finding | words you know but don't use often. Learning new words from | it... you're usually missing important nuance. | fnordpiglet wrote: | I use a thesaurus as a memory prompt. | paulpauper wrote: | Agree. Fancy' words can add flavor to the writing and help | avoid repetition, and also are more precise. If you are writing | warning labels or instructions, then maybe simpler is better. | But otherwise, I don't think it is a problem.. | glenstein wrote: | And to make a point that perhaps is restating yours, or | overlaps with yours, I think some good writing is "dense" the | way that certain foods are calorie dense. | | You can intentionally write in a way that's different from | your natural voice if your goal is, say, information density, | or expressiveness that conveys personality or that makes the | experience of reading more enjoyable, or to allow writing to | shimmer with all of its contextual entanglements. | | Of course people can attempt to do this and make a reading | experience worse, and I think writing how you talk can be a | helpful rule of thumb for certain use cases. | mpalczewski wrote: | As a reader I would prefer the writer not repeat themselves | and write less, rather than try to find some fancy way of not | "sounding" repetitive, but in reality finding yet another way | of repeating. I prefer actual repetition to that. | | More precise words aren't always better either. Having | someone easily grasp what you are saying works much better | for conveying information. | | Complicated writing is lazy writing. "If I had more time, I | would have written a shorter letter." | elevenoh wrote: | freetime2 wrote: | > "mercurial" does the trick in the quoted example, does Paul | have a patch? | | How about: | | He said "After Altamira, all is decadence." | | That is the way I would probably phrase it if spoken. Assuming | of course that "he" is clear from the context - if not I would | use the subject's name. | jameshart wrote: | And if you wanted to attribute that sentiment to some aspect | of his character and/or nationality? | | I can perfectly well imagine saying out loud, in conversation | or in a spoken presentation, something like "Being the | mercurial Spaniard that he was, Picasso said 'After Altamira, | all is decadence'". | | I don't think there's anything wrong with the _vocabulary_ | choices here, but there is a kind of journalistic writing | style which favors brevity, probably originally because you | 're writing to a column inch count, and it drives writers to | try to convey those extra connotations in fewer words. An | editor will look at my wordy sentence, tell me to get rid of | the throatclearing and filler words and reduce it to "The | mercurial Spaniard said..." - and they may well be right. | caconym_ wrote: | > When you're writing / reading, it's much easier to parse | complex sentences. | | All other things being equal, I think this is only true because | you can reread them at will and puzzle over them until you | think you know what the author was trying to say. | | Sometimes there's value in that. A good writer knows how to mix | up the pacing of their prose, to organically guide the reader | into engaging more fully with the parts that communicate | complex ideas while the connective tissue disappears | effortlessly into the background. But in the hands of a less | skilled writer complex language is usually worse on balance: | they don't understand that prose should always be economical, | that less is almost always more, and many really do suffer from | "the false impression that [they are] saying more than [they] | actually are." Whether they're writing flowery romance fiction | or technical manuals, they get high on their own supply without | considering that writing is first and foremost a tool to convey | meaning. | | The "mercurial Spaniard" bit seems fine out of context. | However, _in_ context it had better be clear who that person | actually is. | emptysongglass wrote: | I speak as I speak and write as I write. There need be no | competition between the two. What Graham is doing here is | reducing two very different media to one. | | I love the rich complexity of language you can find in any book | by Gene Wolfe. Much of how he writes allows him to communicate | two truths in one thick sentence or leave us puzzling over a | philosophy. I'd never expect or insist Wolfe to speak as he | wrote. It would be a crime to his works and a crime to many | others'. | [deleted] | Animats wrote: | No, don't. Your writing will read like a transcript of a podcast. | sebastianconcpt wrote: | When you talk you talk custom calibrating to who and the | environment (place and time). When you write that expands to a | whole lot more diversity of mindsets. As much as I like and agree | with many points that PG publishes, as general advice I'd say | this is terrible advice adding that it would be okay advice if it | would have been more modest, as in _Blog Like You Talk_ for | example. | gmuslera wrote: | For a moment I thought that the article was about using phonetic | language when writing in English, that may have some sense | noticing sound alike words that may not be always obvious for the | speaker. | | But regarding using a different way to express yourself in | written and spoken forms, the media, the context and the timing | matters. There are some things that we may rely on gestures or | attitude that are not transmitted so easily in written form. Is | not the same talking to friends face to face, with all the | context you have with them, than to white sheet of paper. And you | have time, you are not pressed by the people you are talking to | to deliver the right word right now, you can make pauses, you can | check for the right expression, you can rewrite what you wrote. | | It is not so simple, it have its own advantages, but it is not | for everything and everyone at all times. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-10-23 23:00 UTC)