Topic: On writing style ...

[Garp]

I know which 'style' I prefer.

[Ghoulie]

My eldest daughter is an Alexander Technique practitioner ( I know - wtf is that? Google it!).  Obscure subject to say the least!  She would often grab me as a bod to practice on when I visited her - which didn't impress me as a 'non- believer'.

After qualifiying, she told me she wanted to write a paperback basic introduction to the AT system to enable the public to get a grasp of the subject - since all written matter to date on the subject was off putting to say the least.

Having trained and managed sales reps for many years - and listened to their gripes about how crap secretaries were in typing up their reports for customers, I would always point out to them that the typists only typed what they as reps wrote - rarely bothering to read their hand-written  matter or attempt to understand it.  Part of their training would then become the art of writing up a report that is simple to understand - even for a layman - without jargon, and is succint, short and to the point.

So when my daughter expressed this wish to write an easily understandable intro booklet to AT, I gave her the benefit of my rep report writing training stuff to utilise in her approach on this obscure topic.  The end result has won her considerable acclaim with the public and her AT peers.  Her name is Angela Bradshaw if you want to look her up - link the name to Alexander Technique.

[romain]

I personally believe that there is something to be said for clarity. I have degrees in biochemistry and business. I can write convoluted, jargon-filled sentences with the best of them.

I work intermittently with a professional writer. He has taught me some fundamental techniques. Avoid passive voice. Keep things concise. Be clear. Know what you are trying to say. And just say it.

I have a tool as part of my blog publishing environment that runs the Flesch-Kincaid readability test on my writing. It also keeps an eye on excessive use of passive voice and flags run-on sentences. I try to maintain a score of somewhere around 80 which is considered, according to wikipedia, to be conversational and easy to read.

The snippet below gets a score of 35. Granted it is a small sample but anything in the 30-40 range is considered difficult to read. The example given on Wikipedia for prose written at this level of complexity is Harvard Law Review.

"The style can, and does, alienate some readers, just as does (I am sure) my own preference for long, convoluted, sentences with multiple subordinate clauses, archaic spellings ("shewn"), less common spellings ("pulao"), foreign spellings ("joghurt"), an insistence on the correct diacritics for foreign words such as "r

[mickyp]

Reminds me about a programme i saw about Winston Churchill, his secretary said "when he was dictating he used to mumble, so rather than ask him to repeat she used to make it up.

[Peripatetic Phil]

And yet if you read, for example, Churchill's The story of the Malakand Field Force, written when he was just 22 years of age, you will see what a brilliant and inspired writer he was.  I quote just his opening words :

On general grounds I deprecate prefaces.  I have always thought that if an author cannot make friends with the reader, and explain his objects, in two or three hundred pages, he is not likely to do so in fifty lines.  And yet the temptation of speaking a few words behind the scenes, as it were, is so strong that few writers are able to resist it.  I shall not try.
[...]
The impartial critic will at least admit that I have not insulted the British public by writing a party pamphlet on a great Imperial question.  I have recorded the facts as they occurred, and the impressions as they arose, without attempting to make a case against any person or policy.  Indeed, I fear that assailing none, I may have offended all.  Neutrality may degenerate into an ignominious isolation.  An honest and unprejudiced attempt to discern the truth is my sole defence, as the good opinion of the reader has been my chief aspiration, and can be in the end my only support.

Winston Churchill
Cavalry Barracks
Bangalore, 30th December 1897

Analysis by https://www.online-utility.org/english/readability_test_and_improve.jsp

Number of characters (without spaces):    811.00
Number of words:    180.00
Number of sentences:    10.00
Average number of characters per word:    4.51
Average number of syllables per word:    1.57
Average number of words per sentence:    18.00

Indication of the number of years of formal education that a person requires in order to easily understand the text on the first reading    
Gunning Fog index:    11.20

Approximate representation of the U.S. grade level needed to comprehend the text:    
Coleman Liau index:    9.07
Flesch Kincaid Grade level:    9.92
ARI (Automated Readability Index):    8.79
SMOG:    11.66

Flesch Reading Ease:    56.03

 List of sentences that we suggest you consider rewriting to improve readability:

    An honest and unprejudiced attempt to discern the truth is my sole defence, as the good opinion of the reader has been my chief aspiration, and can be in the end my only support.
    I have always thought that if an author cannot make friends with the reader, and explain his objects, in two or three hundred pages, he is not likely to do so in fifty lines.
    I have recorded the facts as they occurred, and the impressions as they arose, without attempting to make a case against any person or policy.
    The impartial critic will at least admit that I have not insulted the British public by writing a party pamphlet on a great Imperial question.

[Peripatetic Phil]

Just for comparison, I threw Romain's "vietnamese chicken curry

[romain]

Haha. Grade 4 level comprehension. Sounds about right. I was going for Grade 6 but I will take Grade 4. Maybe I'll throw in a comma or two now I know I have some leeway.

[mickyp]

And yet if you read, for example, Churchill's The story of the Malakand Field Force, written when he was just 22 years of age, you will see what a brilliant and inspired writer he was.  I quote just his opening words :

He was Brilliant, he put the Bulldog into the British people and inspired them too

On general grounds I deprecate prefaces.  I have always thought that if an author cannot make friends with the reader, and explain his objects, in two or three hundred pages, he is not likely to do so in fifty lines.  And yet the temptation of speaking a few words behind the scenes, as it were, is so strong that few writers are able to resist it.  I shall not try.
[...]
The impartial critic will at least admit that I have not insulted the British public by writing a party pamphlet on a great Imperial question.  I have recorded the facts as they occurred, and the impressions as they arose, without attempting to make a case against any person or policy.  Indeed, I fear that assailing none, I may have offended all.  Neutrality may degenerate into an ignominious isolation.  An honest and unprejudiced attempt to discern the truth is my sole defence, as the good opinion of the reader has been my chief aspiration, and can be in the end my only support.

Winston Churchill
Cavalry Barracks
Bangalore, 30th December 1897

Analysis by https://www.online-utility.org/english/readability_test_and_improve.jsp

Number of characters (without spaces):    811.00
Number of words:    180.00
Number of sentences:    10.00
Average number of characters per word:    4.51
Average number of syllables per word:    1.57
Average number of words per sentence:    18.00

Indication of the number of years of formal education that a person requires in order to easily understand the text on the first reading    
Gunning Fog index:    11.20

Approximate representation of the U.S. grade level needed to comprehend the text:    
Coleman Liau index:    9.07
Flesch Kincaid Grade level:    9.92
ARI (Automated Readability Index):    8.79
SMOG:    11.66

Flesch Reading Ease:    56.03

 List of sentences that we suggest you consider rewriting to improve readability:

    An honest and unprejudiced attempt to discern the truth is my sole defence, as the good opinion of the reader has been my chief aspiration, and can be in the end my only support.
    I have always thought that if an author cannot make friends with the reader, and explain his objects, in two or three hundred pages, he is not likely to do so in fifty lines.
    I have recorded the facts as they occurred, and the impressions as they arose, without attempting to make a case against any person or policy.
    The impartial critic will at least admit that I have not insulted the British public by writing a party pamphlet on a great Imperial question.
[/quote]

[Garp]

And I bet you voted for Brexit, Micky, with that kind of statement.

Churchill was, to be kind, a controversial character.

[Ghoulie]

Brexit aaaallll the way !! Nowt wrong with Churchill - up there with the best of them - and then you have the also ran wimps - like Major, May, Brown - clueless with no vision or backbone - happy to be subservient to a bureaucratic cesspit called the EU - which is in the gradual, inevitable process of collapse.  Hope I get to see it in my lifetime.