Showing posts with label marie puddu editing tips. Show all posts
Showing posts with label marie puddu editing tips. Show all posts
Saturday, January 12, 2013
Wednesday, January 9, 2013
Non sequitur, anyone?
Throw out any sentence that does not flow
logically from the previous one, lead logically to the next one, or
sound right.
Here the skeptical reader might accuse me of trying to weasel out of my promise to stop at ten tips. This is not the case. I end with logic, because it is the key to good writing, and with the ear, because whatever logic misses the ear may catch. If one sentence does not lead logically to the next, no amount of "therefores" or "howevers" can patch them together. Perhaps the greatest single benefit of the word processor is that it makes it so easy for us to move words, sentences, or paragraphs, so that logic, the DNA of analysis, can unfold as effectively as possible. Sometimes I think that writing involves less creating than listening to what was just created, so that the finished product becomes merely the inevitable outcome of the first thought.
In this process, we need to listen for more than logic, because sometimes our minds fail to explain errors that our ears can detect. Or, to put it differently, it is less important to name the problem than to find a solution. Thus the final test belongs to the ear. If after all corrective surgery a sentence sounds bad when read out loud, get rid of it and write a new one.
Thanks to: Sharon Schuman
Here the skeptical reader might accuse me of trying to weasel out of my promise to stop at ten tips. This is not the case. I end with logic, because it is the key to good writing, and with the ear, because whatever logic misses the ear may catch. If one sentence does not lead logically to the next, no amount of "therefores" or "howevers" can patch them together. Perhaps the greatest single benefit of the word processor is that it makes it so easy for us to move words, sentences, or paragraphs, so that logic, the DNA of analysis, can unfold as effectively as possible. Sometimes I think that writing involves less creating than listening to what was just created, so that the finished product becomes merely the inevitable outcome of the first thought.
In this process, we need to listen for more than logic, because sometimes our minds fail to explain errors that our ears can detect. Or, to put it differently, it is less important to name the problem than to find a solution. Thus the final test belongs to the ear. If after all corrective surgery a sentence sounds bad when read out loud, get rid of it and write a new one.
Thanks to: Sharon Schuman