Grammar, Usage / Be Specific - writing guide [NEW]

One of the keys to successful writing is to use specific details rather than dealing in generalities.

A common mistake that many people make when writing essays is to start with a series of general statements. So, a student might begin an essay, on, say, the themes of Romeo and Juliet, by writing something like this:

Romeo and Juliet is one of the most tragic love stories ever written. It has been performed countless times, and read by millions of students...

All of this is common knowledge that has no place in any sort of focused, well-written literary essay. The information presented has nothing to do with the themes of the play, either, making the sentences particularly irrelevant and inappropriate, given the topic. Often such sentences are really only a way for students to get started. They aren't sure how to begin, so they start writing down whatever they know about the subject until they finally figure out what they want to say. This is a perfectly valid approach to beginning an essay, but it only works if you go back afterwards and delete the irrelevant material.

So, the first step in preferring the specific to the general is to get rid of any and all statements that provide only general information about your topic without advancing your argument in favor of your thesis statement.

Next, you need to focus on replacing very general statements that do advance your thesis statement, but that still make for a weak essay. Consider, for example, a university application essay in which your implicit thesis statement is something along the lines of "I'm a great person - admit me!" In such cases, many students produce essays that run along these lines:

I am an intelligent, articulate individual. I am also very dedicated and hardworking. I participate in many extra-curricular activities while doing well in school. I am also very social, and belong to many clubs. I enjoy hanging out with my friends...

All of the above does relate directly to the thesis. However, the information is so vague and general that it could apply to most of the other applicants as easily as it does to the author. Worse, it could all be a pack of lies - anyone can say they are intelligent, articulate, and hardworking. However, the way the above excerpt is written tends to indicate that the author is none of these things.

A better approach would be to use specific anecdotes, or very short stories, to show the reader your good qualities, or, at the very least, to mention specific and concise details about the extra-curricular activities and schoolwork that would make you stand out:

As a member of the debate club, I have learned to express myself clearly and concisely, whether I'm discussing the merits of global warming science or the reasons for the current economic slowdown.

The above excerpt essentially states that the author is articulate. However, it presents specific details about how the author is articulate (he can express himself clearly and concisely) and focuses on a specific activity, debating, that the author has engaged in that proves that he is articulate. It further adds specific details about that activity, by providing examples of what was debated, namely global warming and the economy. All of this shows that the author is A) social (he's a member of a club that specializes in public speaking) B) intelligent (he can discuss both global warming and the economy) C) articulate (The sentence says that, but the way it is written also shows it.) In other words, it shows all of the things that the first version only told.

Grammar, Usage / Be Concise - writing guide [NEW]

Be concise. That is, it is always better to say whatever you want to say without using any more words than necessary. Reading takes up valuable time, and readers don't want to waste that time reading things they already know, or worse, reading material that doesn't tell them anything at all.

Conciseness can be achieved in many ways. Often, you can combine sentences so that overlapping information is eliminated. For instance:

I joined my school's debate club. As part of the debate club, I learned to see both sides of every issue.
can be rewritten as:

I joined my school's debate club, where I learned to see both sides of every issue.
The above example also gives you an idea of why conciseness is a virtue. The former doesn't just waste words, it wastes time. If every sentence in an essay were written like the one in the sample, the reader would begin to skim rather than peruse, confident that he could skip clauses or even whole sentences without missing anything important. In short, wordiness trains the reader to disengage with the material he is reading.

Conciseness also dictates that certain wordy phrases always be avoided: "There is," "there was," "It is," and "the fact that" are prime offenders:

There was a movie I wanted to go and see.
I wanted to see a movie
I was stunned by the fact that the politician would lie so brazenly
I was stunned by the politician's brazen lies.
This sort of editing is useful because it puts the key words of the sentence closer together, making the reading of it less tiring. In the last example, the key words are "stunned" "politician," "brazen," and "lie." None of the other words are interesting or conjure up any mental images. The more concise the sentence, then, the more concentrated the interesting material becomes, to the benefit of the writing.

Conciseness often involves eliminating phrases that involve a lot of small words, especially prepositions. Frequently, these may be stock phrases that should always be avoided. Even if they are not stock constructions, they can often be cut down with careful editing, as in the following example, which replaces the clumsy "of the"s with possessive forms:

He grabbed the sword of the prince and swung it at the head of the invader.
He grabbed the prince's sword and swung it at the invader's head.
A search for "conciseness in writing" via Google will find several websites that give a much more comprehensive list of redundant phrases that you should always avoid using.

Conciseness can also be achieved by reducing wordy clauses to a single adjective:

The light, which was very bright, blinded us so that we could not see who was behind it.
The blindingly bright light kept us from seeing who was behind it.
A good way to tighten up your prose generally is to look for nouns that could be used as verbs, especially if your sentence relies on weak verbs, such as "to have," "to do," or "to be."

The hero has a dedication to helping others, and is constantly offering protection to the innocent.
Dedicated to helping others, the hero constantly protects the innocent.
Find out more about avoiding forms of "to be."

Finally, many euphemisms are wordier than plain speaking, which is a good reason to avoid them. So, for instance, instead of saying that someone "passed away," say that they "died." You convey the same meaning with one less word, and the sort of people who might be offended by the substitution are not the sort of people you should be writing for.