Communication is hard. It must be, because we're so bad at it. Many of us, anyway. Sometimes. Often. Not that we tend to be aware of it. We thunder away online, oblivious, pouring forth an endless stream of tweets and texts, manifestos and slideshow presentations that border on criminal dullness and inaccuracy.
To reach an audience consistently, delivering an intended message, you need to work at it, constantly. I've been writing a newspaper column since I was 15, and though I've managed to achieve a certain facility, the process still requires concentration and effort. I still manage to fail spectacularly now and then, if I'm not careful and sometimes even when I am. It's hard to develop an edge and easy to lose one. Frequent sharpening is required to avoid dullness.
For those weaned on Strunk and White's "The Elements of Style," reading "Everybody Needs an Editor" will be an eye-opener (I almost called it "ENAE," but took to heart the advice on page 144: "Don't overuse acronyms"). It outlines how to write email subject lines and speeches, how to fire someone and how to resign. Filled with useful tips, both specific and general, the book warns against overuse of quotation marks, of shouting via ALL CAPS (they do have a habit, either good or bad I can't decide, of illustrating what not to do by doing it), and encourage vividness. I was surprised to see several tricks I thought were genius divinations of my own — such as to use photo captions to tuck in additional information you couldn't fit into the body of your story.
"Everybody Needs an Editor" also offers a primer on the role of artificial intelligence.
"AI can improve your writing," they write (at least I assume they wrote it, as opposed to merely prompting a machine to do it, then buffing the result). "Think of it as a tool, like spell-check: It should be used in conjunction with human judgment and expertise."
Soon writers will polish AI-generated copy more than they compose original work.
"Increasingly, writers will not be putting the first draft down; 100% of their writing experience will largely be editing," said Harris in a Zoom interview. "We truly believe that editing [AI] ... making it better, is going to be the future."
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I have several friends and acquaintances who believe that they are writers. I guess they are because they do, but there's a difference between a skilled writer and people who are self-taught and it's fairly obvious.
ReplyDeleteThe book could help and probably will but training is what's needed along with experience . And a good editor.
Much like the trade from which I've made a living. It has increasingly become a DIY pursuit. People think they can do carpentry and home remodeling themselves and it often shows. I'm watching a 5-minute YouTube video in order to complete a 5-hour task Will not clue you into some of the subtle points of the pursuit.
Much like punctuation and spelling The proper tools and supervision are lacking in both realms
“Villanelle” was a new one for me. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteTime to toss Tolstoy, Hugo, Joyce... all the classics.
ReplyDeleteThanks for giving a nod to editing. I wrote a blog post "In Defense of Editing" (https://sincerelymarianne.blogspot.com/2023/02/in-defense-of-editing.html) after a former colleague of yours protested being edited and resigned. As the post says, editing is more than correcting spelling, punctuation, and grammar mistakes. It's too bad there isn't a certification test for US editors as Canada has.
ReplyDeleteDang, here’s me as a fan always wishing your articles were longer.
ReplyDeleteYes, and… way too many acronyms being used in this quickly evolving era of ours! They just pop up overnight and everyone starts using them and I know not what they mean. It took me a long time to figure out POV that is everywhere now, and it doesn’t even make sense to me to use it.
ReplyDeleteI use all caps for emphasis since I don't have an italicization function on my key board.
ReplyDeleteOK, curmudgeon time: I have trouble believing in the bona fides of anyone who believes that "editing AI is going to be the future." AI writing is nothing but automated plagiarism, and ludicrously inaccurate to boot. I predict that AI will stick to what it apparently does best, which is write computer code.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking as an eagled-eyed reader, I see that no one in the marked-up cover illustration seems to have noticed that "An" should not be capitalized in the middle of a title.
ReplyDeleteThat aside, I would say that the effectiveness of AI in drafting text depends very much on the task at hand. If given a general request, such as to summarize a topic of discussion, it can probably do a pretty fair essay, to the extent that hapless teachers will have to detect the fake writing on the basis of its perfect grammar and punctuation (and most likely its grade reading score; a third-grader's book report should not read like a college-level thesis).
In specialized applications, though, I would not want to rely on it. eBay announced its availability to on-line sellers with much hoo-hah about its versatility and time-saving appeal when writing product descriptions, but the results have ranged from hackneyed to laughably bad, as a seller lazy enough to call on it for writing is also generally lazy enough to not proofread the result, and without enough specifics on the exact item they were selling, the AI text output is simply vague and strangely generic: everything is "collectible" and a "must-have," whether it's costume jewelry or replacement dishwasher parts.
We can welcome AI or fear it, but at this point I'm somewhere in the middle, and I just don't feel a need for it. Too many people seem to want it to cover up their own lack of learning.
Not everybody needs an editor, Mr. S.--I married one.
ReplyDeleteJust kidding. I probably need one more than most.
So I'm seriously considering the idea of buying this book.
I'm among the folks who've been told their writing is far above average. It's always been one of my best skills. But I know I'm not that good. Too long-winded and too verbose. Pontificating and ranting. A tendency, as a wordsmith, to beat on a red-hot sword until it's flattened into sheet metal.
Hell, I've even asked my wife for assistance, on occasion. She wants no part of my online world. So I will tweak and modify and fine-tune a post, both at EGD and elsewhere, until I'm satisfied with it--sometimes taking far too long. I don't just type and hit send. I revise and revamp. And even then, it often crashes and burns. Or pisses folks off. Or gets me in trouble. Or doesn't get posted.
Telling myself (all the time) that I could do better is what makes me try harder. Other folks, like Mr. S, actually succeed. Probably not bad, but neither am I all that good, and I know it. Strictly B-plus. If a writer fears their writing is bad, and tries to improve it, does that make him better? That book can probably do me a world of good. Twenty-five bucks well-spent...and cheaper than a class.
At least I've learned that paragraphs are your friend. I always break up long blocks of type, which are horrible to read online, and turn them into short paragraphs. Which can be distilled into sentences. Never been a fan of bullet points. Maybe I should be. And a writer's best friend, when it comes to getting facts straight or finding the right word, is a good search engine. I use Bing.. mainly because it's just there.
Lately, a few folks have labeled me as the "best" commenter here. But I don't agree. I think there's someone better. Entertainer George M. Cohan was the first one to say "Always leave 'em laughing" (a good piece of advice, when writing humor). In this instance, it's more like: "Always leave 'em guessing." Not gonna tell.
Very good point you make, Grizz, about ensuring your comments are readable by separating them into paragraphs.
DeleteCommenters (I'm sure they don't know who they are) throwing all their random thoughts and faux profundity into one big incomprehensible blob on the page drive me crazy.
john
Most of the time, when I see that, I don't read it...even if it's well worth reading. And since I know people will do that with my writing, too...I've always used paragraphs. Since Day One. The smaller, the better.
DeleteUnfortunately, I still don't know how to make it happen on Facebook. A lot of the time, it just doesn't work. Which is not such a good thing. So I keep my posts there as succinct as I can. But that isn't always possible. And those gigantic blocks of type always bother me. Maybe they bother other people enough that nobody reads them.
Grizz, it may be that Facebook just likes to mash paragraphs back together into one big lump when displaying them, ignoring the key that you pressed to separate your paragraphs.
DeleteInstead of pressing between paragraphs, try using a "soft Return" instead. That is simply pressing your Shift+Enter keys together (as if you were capitalizing your Enter key), which forces a new line but not a new paragraph. Press Shift+Enter a couple of times, as I am about to do here...
...and you can begin a new paragraph that Facebook will not actually notice. Try it and see.
Thanks for the review. I enjoy a good reference book. And thanks for all of your good writing; I admire your stamina. Writing, for me, is painstaking and tiring. The rare reward is when the "editor" is done editing and the reader gets my point.
ReplyDelete