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I thought of you – and your writing and editing – when I read this about editing in the New York Times. In an article about Robert Loomis, an editor at Random House, Dinitia Smith described Loomis’s “gentle suggestions” to his writers.” To Jim Lehrer he said, “Eureka! You did it, Jim. It’s a wonderful novel.” Then after a pause, “Almost. That is, except the space between the beginning and the ending.” To Maya Angelou he would respond, “It’s really good – almost.” And to Calvin Trillin he would say, “‘It’s almost there. Everything is great but the beginning and the end.’ Which, of course, leaves the middle to be completely rewritten” (Smith, 2007).

So if you’re struggling with writing and editing, you are in superlative company.

I’ve previously mentioned the use of subheadings to organize your writing and help with transitions between sections. Here’s an example of what can happen when you don’t use subheadings. For these break writing postings, I draft what I want to convey, largely based on my own writing experience, my work with graduate students, and what I’ve learned from others – my colleagues who have shared ideas or writers writing about writing. Then I look through resources to supplement, illustrate, or quote when someone has said it better than I. (And Anne Lamott in Bird by Bird always says it better.)

Several times I’ve picked up the book “Writing for Social Scientists: How to Start and Finish Your Thesis, Book, or Article” by Howard Becker, a professor of sociology at the University of Washington. And I’ve never read very much of it or found it interesting or helpful. This weekend I picked it up again and finally figured out why. The man doesn’t use subheadings. Entire chapters of 20 and more pages start with a chapter title and have no other headings throughout the chapter. Assuming two to three manuscript pages per published page, this is 40 to 60 manuscript pages without any headings or subheadings. It’s very hard to even begin to read. But I did read some this weekend, and I want to share some of Becker’s tips, paraphrased here from pages 79-85.

1. Use the active, rather than passive, verbs when you can.
2. Use fewer words. (Recall Strunk and White’s “Omit needless words.”I saved this example for you from my writing this weekend. My original sentence was: What happens if the first author is not able to complete the responsibilities of the first author role? I then edited it to this: What happens if the first author is not able to complete first author responsibilities? (Or is this better: “What happens if the first author is not able to complete assigned responsibilities?”)
3. Avoid repeating the same words within one sentence or close proximity if you can avoid it.
4. Use the structure of your writing to help convey the content particularly in the use of subordinate clauses.
5. Avoid using abstract phrases when concrete ones are more precise, specific, and effective.(Becker, 1986).

Becker also reminds us that writing is not easy, although we often want our students to think we write perfect final drafts on the first try. Becker described his graduate writing seminar: “My students find it difficult at first to understand why, having rewritten a sentence, I then rewrite it again, and even a third or fourth time. Why don’t I get it right the first time? I say, and try to show them, that each change opens the way to other changes, that when you clear away nonworking words and phrases, you can see more easily what the sentence is about and can phrase it more succinctly and accurately.” (Becker, 1986, p. 78).

Another example from Becker about the struggle and progress to near perfection: To his graduate writing seminar Becker brought a four-page draft, “a rough second draft,” of a manuscript that his sociology colleague had produced. “Sociologists habitually use twenty words when two will do, and we spent most of that afternoon cutting excess words. With my pencil poised over a word or clause, I asked, ‘Does this need to be here? If not, I’m taking it out.’ If no one defended the word or phrase, I took it out. I changed passive to active construction, combined sentences, took long sentences apart – all the things these students had once learned to do in freshman composition. At the end of the three hours, we had reduced four pages to three-quarters of a page without losing any nuances or essential detail” (p. 5-6). Becker reported that his students felt great sorrow for his colleague’s “humiliation, that it was lucky she hadn’t been there to die of shame…. I told them (truthfully) that I habitually rewrote manuscripts eight to ten times before publication” (p. 6).

One more from Becker that I really like because it’s so critical…and true. “Some of those long redundant expressions couldn’t be replaced because they had no underlying sense to replace. They were placeholders, marking a spot where the author should have said something plainer but had at the moment nothing plain to say. These spots nevertheless had to be filled because otherwise the author would only have half a sentence…. Writers routinely use meaningless expressions to cover up two kinds of problems.” (p. 7). Then Becker explains that one problem is attributing agency: Who are the actors that did whatever is reported or alleged, a problem that often occurs when writers use passive construction. Now for the second problem that Becker mentions. And guess what? Without subheadings, or bullets, or numbered sections – any device to help organize the ideas and writing, I was never certain I had found the second of his aforementioned “two kinds of problems” in the following six pages of the chapter. So use subheadings (and other devices) for more effective organization of your writing.

Resources

Becker, H. (1986). Writing for social scientists: How to start and finish your thesis, book, or article. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Lamott, A. (1994). Bird by bird: Some instructions on writing and life. New York: Anchor Books.

Smith, D. (2007, January 23). A career in letters, 50 years and counting. New York Times, retrieved on January 28, 2007

Some of the information in the Break Writing postings is drawn from previously published work, and I have tried to properly attribute the ideas and work of others. If I have failed to do so, please let me know so I can clarify and correct (ja2310@columbia.edu)

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